CHAPTER X.PERSISTENT CHESTER.
Spr-rr-rr-rr—crash!
“Hooray! A strike!”
“That does it!”
It was a rainy afternoon, and the members of the team were putting in the usual hour for the baseball practice in the gymnasium.
Darrell, Jolliby, Tubbs, and Merriwell were just finishing a bowling match on the new alleys, Dick and Obediah being matched against Hal and Chip.
Up to the last frame it had seemed as if Darrell and Jolliby were the winners. It looked like a forlorn hope when Merriwell took his place to bowl for the last time, as he needed eighteen pins to tie and nineteen to win. Nothing but a spare or a strike could save him. With a spare, his chance of getting nine pins on the last bowl would be very slim.
This being the situation, there was great excitement when Dick sent his first ball curving into the pins, striking number one quarteringly, and raking down the whole bunch.
“Dern my picter!” palpitated Obediah Tubbs, his eyes bulging.
“Wouldn’t that sus-sus-sus-sus-scald you!” chattered Jolliby.
“How sorry I am!” shouted Ted Smart, who was setting up the pins.
“Talk about luck!” sneered Arlington, who was one of the spectators. “What do you think of that? That was a case of horseshoes, all right!”
“Luck! Waugh!” snorted Buckhart. “Didn’t he hit ’em right?”
“I have seen them hit a hundred times in that way without making a strike,” retorted Chet. “But he has to get nine pins with his next ball in order to tie. He can’t do it.”
Up to this point Dick had been bowling for sport and for the fine exercise it provided. It must not be understood that he was not trying to do his best, for he always did at anything. But now Arlington’s words aroused him, and he was seized with a sudden powerful desire to win.
“Bet you a horse he gets them!” exclaimed the Texan.
“If he does,” declared Chet, “it will be more of his slobby luck. When it comes to bowling he is a mark. I can bowl a little myself. I’d like to get at him once at this. But he doesn’t dare to give me a show on these new alleys.”
“Hi suppose you’re a wonderful bowler?” put in Billy Bradley. “I suppose you ’ave an hastonishing record?”
“I have bowled one hundred and thirty-eight in a single string of candlepins,” asserted Chet.
“And then you woke up!” observed Buckhart. “You’re pretty clever—let you tell it.”
Chester was not a whit abashed. He continued to boastingly assert that he knew he was able at any time.barring accident, to defeat Merriwell or any other boy in the school at candlepins.
“Dern his picter!” muttered Obediah Tubbs, nudging Dick, who was apparently unconscious of Arlington’s presence. “Don’t you hear what he is saying? By Jim, he needs a good lesson!”
Merriwell, however, felt it was an impossibility to teach Arlington a lesson he would remember, for even his experience on the yacht had had no lasting effect.
“Ken you git nine pins?” anxiously whispered the fat boy.
“I can try,” was Dick’s quiet answer, as he lifted the polished candlepin ball and stood with his eyes fixed on the pins.
“Watch him!” muttered Arlington, seeking to divert the bowler’s attention. “He knows we’re all looking at him. See him get two pins with that ball.”
It’s a sure thing that mind as well as body plays a prominent part in scientific bowling. Not only does it require brains to secure the best result, but the bowler must fix his mind on the object he desires to accomplish most, seeing in advance what success he would attain, and must, in rolling a curving ball, behold in advance the sweeping movement he wills the ball to take. It is sometimes the case that a player may secure a good string by rolling carelessly, without any particular mental effort. This is always a matter of chance. But the heady bowler who uses his brains, and seems to control the ball with his mind, is one who persistently and repeatedly accomplishes surprising results.
Arlington knew something of this, and he understoodthat it was often a fatal mistake for a player to let his mind be diverted in the least, at the moment when he starts to deliver the ball. This being the case, it was Chester’s object to “rattle” Dick if possible. He failed utterly.
Advancing three steps to the line, Dick sent the ball down the polished alley, striking the pins with a clattering crash, leaving but one standing on the corner.
Dick had won the string with a ball to spare.
The boys gave a shout of satisfaction, while Arlington bit his lip in disgust.
“Dern my picter!” cried Obediah Tubbs. “I kinder thought that I was going to beat you by my rotten bowling, Dick; but you pulled us out of the hole.”
“That was clever,” laughed Chet, as he stepped onto the runway of the alley; “but still I believe it was nothing more than luck. As I have just said, I can bowl a little myself, and I don’t depend on luck. I challenge you to go me a string, Merriwell.”
Dick was becoming wearied by these repeated challenges on the part of Arlington. Defeat after defeat made no difference with Chester. He persisted with bulldog determination in his efforts to beat Merriwell at something.
Hal Darrell was annoyed by the insolent manner in which Chester forced himself among them. His eyes blazed as he said in a low tone:
“This party is made up. We’re bowling among ourselves now! When we have finished, get your friends and take the alley! Don’t butt in!”
“I am not speaking to you, sir!” retorted Chet haughtily. “I have issued the challenge to Mr. Merriwell.Perhaps he doesn’t dare accept. If that’s the case, of course I will retire.”
“Gug-gug-gug-gug-go chase yourself!” said Jolliby. “You know he isn’t afuf-fuf-fuf-fuf-fraid of you!”
“Actions speak louder than words,” said Chet. “I am here on the spot, and I have issued my challenge. I am feeling just like bowling him now, and it will show he hasn’t the nerve if he tries to put it off.”
“Dern his picter!” whispered Obediah Tubbs. “You will have to trim him, Dick. There ain’t no way out of it.”
Suddenly Dick’s mind was made up.
“One string settles it, does it, Arlington?” he asked.
“That will be all you will care for,” laughed Chet. “You will get all the satisfaction you want in one string.”
“Get off your coat,” said Dick. “I will bowl you one string.”
Among the spectators who gathered around were a few sympathizers with Chester. These chaps were in every instance dissatisfied fellows, who themselves had failed to be particularly successful at anything, through lack of determination or industry, and who were envious of others who succeeded.
Chet joyously removed his coat and hung it on a hook. He also took off his collar and tie and rolled up his sleeve, displaying his forearms.
A coin was flipped to decide who should lead off, and the lead fell on Arlington.
“Get them right on the spot, every one of them, boy!” he called to Smart.
“I will do it,” retorted Ted. “It will be such abeautiful sight to see them standing there after you roll! They will be all up for Merriwell when you get through!”
Arlington examined the balls, and picked out and placed aside two that were slightly marred. Then, having weighed several of them in his hands, he selected one and slightly dampened his fingers with the sponge.
As Chet started to roll Buckhart started to say something, but Dick silenced him with a gesture and a look.
With his eyes on the pins, Arlington balanced himself on the balls of his feet, ran lightly forward three steps, and sent the ball spinning whirringly down the polished surface of the alley. It struck the head pin squarely and cut a hole through the bunch, leaving five standing, three on one side and two on the other.
“Hard luck!” exclaimed one of the fellows who sympathized with him.
“Oh, that’s all right!” retorted Chet with supreme confidence. “I will clean them off.”
He then assumed a new position on the alley and rolled for three pins on one side. It seemed that he would hit them perfectly, but the ball missed the pin in advance by the narrowest margin and clipped off the other two.
“Now that was hard luck!” he exclaimed. “Never mind; I will take the two on the other corner and start with nine.”
“That’s the talk!” cried a spectator.
Chester rolled with care and hit the nearest pin, which set its mate swaying, and the latter finally fell.
“Nine pins!” announced Gardner, who was scoring.
“I don’t believe Smart had them on the spots,” declared Chet, standing with his hands on hips and glaring at the two pins left upright. “That ball should have taken them, sure.”
“What a shame!” cried Smart. “I am so disappointed!”
“That will do for you!” flared Chet. “While you’re setting up pins, you’resupposedsupposedto be dead!”
Arlington sat down with an air of dissatisfaction.
It was now Dick’s turn, and he was ready by the time Ted had the pins up.
Dick’s ball seemed to strike them handsomely, and he swept down eight pins, leaving, however, one standing on each corner.
“Now that was hard lul-lul-lul-luck!” came from Jolliby.
Merriwell said nothing. Picking up another ball, he took his position on the left side of the runway and prepared to try for one of the pins. As he started to bowl some of his friends uttered low exclamations of dismay, for it seemed that the wooden sphere would leave the alley four or five feet before it reached the pin. Nevertheless, this did not happen, for the ball took a pretty curve and clung to the edge of the alley until it struck the pin fairly and sent it spinning against the buffer.
“Ha!” was the cry. “He did it!”
“Well, there is one remaining on the other corner,” laughed Chet. “Let’s see him pick that off.”
“He will do it, you bet your boots!” declared Buckhart.
Dick now got into position at the right hand of the runway and rolled what is called a “cross-alley” ball. That is, he rolled the ball so that it started on the right side of the alley, crossing diagonally to the left on a perfect line for the pin at the corner. In this manner this pin was picked off, and Gardner called:
“Ten pins for Merriwell!”
“Beautiful work!” exclaimed one of the boys, while several clapped their hands softly.
“Evidently you’re going to stretch yourself, Merriwell,” laughed Arlington, maintaining that insolent atmosphere. “You will have to stretch yourself, all right, my fine fellow. I haven’t started to bowl yet.”
“You’d better start right away,” said Buckhart, whereupon Dick promptly stepped over to Brad, to whom he spoke in a low tone.
“Don’t make any talk, old man,” he said. “I have more friends here than he has, and I want him to have just as good a show as I do. If he beats me let him do it fairly; if I beat him I will do so without taking any advantage.”
“Well, you’re a whole lot scrupulous!” growled the Texan. “That galoot certain has missed no opportunity to take advantage of you.”
“Do you wish me to put myself on the same level?”
“You can’t get down to his level in a year if you try!”
The pins were up and Arlington was ready. He thrust up his right sleeve a little farther, so that the lower portion of his swelling biceps could be seen.
Chester did not use a curve, but rolled a ball with a moderate amount of speed, starting his first one ineach set from the right side of the alley and sending it toward the head pin. This time he barely missed the pin in advance, and the ball lopped off the entire side of the bunch, leaving four standing on the opposite side.
“That would have been a strike if he had touched the head pin,” declared one of the spectators.
“It is a spare now,” averred Arlington, with unshaken confidence. “I can’t miss them.”
At this statement some one laughed.
“Oh, laugh away!” exclaimed Chet. “But just watch this ball a moment!”
Chester rolled his second ball. This time he used a trifle too much speed. The ball seemed to hit the head pin squarely, and the pin took one of those peculiar, freakish jumps that carried it clean over the others without touching them.
Arlington stood still in the middle of the runway with his hands on his hips, glaring at the pins.
“I’d like to have some one tell how that happened,” he finally cried.
“Hard luck!” said a voice. “You should have had your spare!”
“I know it!” growled Chet, picking up another ball.
He then did a foolish thing, for, having missed the spare, he rolled the final ball carelessly, the result being that it simply clipped off the corner pin.
In a close candlepin bowling match every point counts, and the winner often is the man who can best pick off single pins.
“Eight pins for Arlington!” said Gardner, as he recordedit on the score board, making a total of seventeen.
Dick had hard luck with his first ball, cutting two pins out of one side of the bunch.
“That’s a shame,” said Chester, laughing.
Although Dick took the greatest pains, his next ball cut out two pins on the opposite side, and left in the worst possible position the ones standing.
At this Chester laughed heartily.
“A wooster!” he shouted. “You’ll get five pins on this roll, if you’re lucky.”
Brad Buckhart was both angry and disgusted.
“Well, that was beastly luck!” he muttered.
“Pick off two of the corner ones, Merriwell, old man,” advised Barron Black, who was an interested spectator.
Dick paused a moment in consideration. He had once been able to get eight pins out of a similar break by hitting the head pin, although he knew the chances were ten to one that he could not score more than two, while the odds were decidedly against obtaining more than one in hitting them in that manner.
Nevertheless he decided to take chances and roll for all he could get. With this in his mind, he sent the third ball straight for the head pin. He gave it a twisting whirl as it left his hand, using great speed.
The head pin was struck and sent flying against the others. To the astonishment of Arlington and the surprise of every one, those pins flew in such a peculiar manner that all save one went down.
“Well, what do you think of that?” exclaimed Chet.
“I think it was great luck,” smiled Dick quietly, as he turned to sit down on the bench.
“Luck!” said Buckhart. “It was science. You hear me chirp!”
“Science!” sneered Arlington. “Why, it wouldn’t happen in a hundred times! Science, indeed!”
Gardner recorded the score on the board, the total giving Dick nineteen points and putting him two in the lead.
“I think I will have to let myself out if I am going to beat his luck with my science,” said Chet.
When the pins were up, he sent the first ball into them in such a manner that they all fell, save two. Those two were widely separated, but at one side of the alley a deadwood fell, lay spinning a moment, and then began to roll toward the other side.
“Look at that deadwood!” burst from Arlington. “Why, the confounded alley isn’t level! The left-hand corner is lower than the other, or that pin wouldn’t roll across in such a manner.”
“The left-hand corner is lower,” immediately agreed one of the spectators. “We discovered that several days ago.”
“Well, that puts a big element of chance into the game,” declared Chet. “When the pins roll like that there is no telling what may happen.”
The rolling pin, however, stopped against one of the two left standing, and Chester studied its position.
“That isn’t so bad,” he finally declared. “If I can hit that deadwood fairly I know I can get the pin it rests against, and the deadwood ought to drop the other pin. Watch me do it.”
Having called their attention in this manner, he chose his ball and with careless ease and assurance sent it straight at the end of the deadwood.
The ball did not swerve a fraction of an inch during its course down the alley. It struck the deadwood perfectly, and in a twinkling both pins were down.
Arlington had made his first spare.
Exclamations of satisfaction and applause burst from a number of the witnesses, while Dick Merriwell generously clapped his hands and said:
“That was a beautiful shot, Arlington.”
“Oh, I knew I could do it!” smiled Chester in a most conceited and lofty manner. “I can always do a thing like that when I have to. You can’t beat me at this little game, Merriwell.”
Ted Smart heard these words, even though he was standing up the pins at the far end of the alley.
“If there’s anything I admire it’s a chap that never boasts!” cried Ted. “There’s the modest fellow for you!”
“Until you finish setting up those pins you’d better be seen and not heard!” warmly retorted Arlington.
Dick followed with a handsome break, leaving only two pins standing.
“There is a spare for him,” declared Black.
“If he gets it,” said Chet instantly.
A deadwood had fallen in such a manner that it seemed certain Dick could not miss sweeping down the pins with it. While he was picking up his next ball, however, this deadwood began to roll toward the lower side of the alley, and by the time he was ready it wastoo far from the standing pins to be any use against them.
“Fine old alley!” laughed Arlington. “That’s how, by being out of level, it robs him of almost a sure spare.”
Dick used a curve, and again it seemed that his ball would leave the alley on the right side. Once more it curved in time to cling to the edge, but it failed to touch the pin in advance and simply removed the one on the extreme corner.
“Ha! ha! ha!” laughed Chet. “That’s the time he didn’t do it! The cant on the alley surely did me a good turn then. He would have made it had the deadwood remained where it fell.”
Merriwell made no complaint, but chose his third ball, and with it sent the last standing pin against the buffer, which gave him another score of ten, with a total of twenty-nine.
“Twenty-nine,” said Chester, as he rose and looked at the score board. “I must get two pins with my first ball in order to tie him. Well, here goes for eight pins.”
Crash! He sent the ball into the pins. Six fell.
“Only six!” he exclaimed, as if disappointed.
“That puts you four in the lead in the third box,” said one of the spectators.
“That ball should have been good for eight or nine,” asserted Chester.
“Dern my picter!” exclaimed Tubbs. “He beats the earth!”
“Sus-sus-sus-sixteen looks pretty good for him in that box,” stuttered Jolliby.
“Sixteen is better than the average spare,” confessed Mel Fraser, who had heard the match was taking place and hurried to the gymnasium to witness it.
“No bigger than the ordinary spare that I make,” declared Chet, wagging his head.
“Well, there is another spare for you, if you hit them right,” said Fraser.
“Oh, I will get it, all right,” promised Arlington, posing with his second ball ready. “Just watch this!”
Once more, however, his confidence was too great, and to his unspeakable disgust he missed the pins entirely.
Instantly he caught up the third ball and sent it with a snapping movement flying down the alley. This ball took off only one pin, which gave Chester seven in his fourth box and a total of forty.
“If the alley had been level, I must have made another spare with my second ball!” he growled as he sat down.
This was not true, for the ball had swerved, at most, less than half an inch in its course.
Dick slowly moistened his fingers with the sponge.
“Now let’s see him get another ten!” cried Arlington. “He can’t make all nines and tens.”
Dick’s curve was a fraction too wide, for the ball missed the head pin and gave him a poor break.
“I told you!” laughed Chet. “He couldn’t keep up that string of tens.”
Buckhart started to say something, but remembered Dick’s warning and stopped.
For all of the bad break, Merriwell sent his nextball into the pins in such a manner that they fell handsomely and only one was left standing.
“Well, he has nine!” nodded Chester. “I think he will leave that one standing.”
“You’ve got another th-th-th-th-think coming!” burst from Jolliby, as Dick picked off the tenth pin.
“Ten!” called Gardner, making the record on the board. “Thirty-nine for Merriwell in the fourth box!”
Arlington rose and stood with his hands on his hips, looking at the score board. He whistled softly.
“Thirty-nine,” he said. “Why, he’s only one behind!”
“And he hasn’t made a spare yet,” observed Barron Black.
“I see I must get down to business,” said Chester. “I have fooled with him just as long as I can.”
Having made this remark, he chose a ball and rolled.
Crash!
Every pin fell!
“A strike!” shouted Fraser.
“Well, wouldn’t that ju-ju-ju-jar you!” chattered Jolliby.
“I rather think it will jar Mr. Merriwell a little,” said Chet, as he gracefully sat down, his face wreathed in smiles.
Dick did not look disturbed. There was in his eyes that strange, grim determination so often seen there on the diamond and the gridiron.
“There’s a strike!” cried one of the watchers, asMerriwell’s first ball smashed into the pins, sending them flying.
It was not. On the corner one pin remained tottering and swaying a little until it settled and stood still.
Not a word of complaint came from Dick. Instead, he rolled his next ball with great precision, and removed the standing pin, thus getting a spare.
“That’s all right,” exclaimed Black. “It wouldn’t surprise me to see him get as many pins on his spare as Arlington does on his strike.”