CHAPTER XVIII.FACING CERTAIN DEFEAT.
Six innings of the game between Yale and Virginia had been played, and Virginia was three scores in the lead, the tally standing four to one.
The game had been begun without Merriwell, for all efforts on the part of Hodge and others of the nine to find Frank had failed.
Roland Ditson was triumphant. His heart was filled with great joy, for it was his disposition to regard this as a great victory for him. Besides that, was he not going to make a lot of money through the defeat of Yale?
The distress of the Yale team without its captain and leader was apparent, though it made a fierce fight under command of Bart Hodge, who had been given charge by the manager.
But Hodge was so worried that he could not do his best, and to him had been due the giving of Virginia her first score on a passed ball.
That was in the fourth inning, Yale having made her only score in the first. Then Morgan seemed to get rattled, and two more scores came in on clean hits.
Without the least hesitation Hodge set Starbright to “warming up,” intending to put him into the box and take Morgan out.
The sight of Starbright preparing to pitch did not rattle Dade Morgan. Instead of that, it seemed to cause him to brace up in a most wonderful manner. He clenched his teeth, pressed his lips together, and struck out the next man. The man who followed put up a little fly that Morgan captured, and the side was retired.
But where was Merriwell? That was the cry that filled the heart of every man on the Yale bench. With Merriwell absent they felt that Virginia was bound to carry off the game. And Virginia had a team that was in no way comparable with Yale’s. Paragon was the only great man U. V. had, and he really was a wizard, else how had he kept the slugging Yale men down to three hits and one score in six innings? His support had been far from gilt-edged.
In the sixth Virginia had obtained another score, and Morgan had pulled himself together again after filling the bases with one out, and had permitted no more tallying.
There was one knot of youngsters who gathered by themselves and looked very miserable. Early that day they had been the followers of King Watson, but with the accession of King Jimmy they transferred their allegiance to him, and King Jimmy was faithful to the great Frank Merriwell. It made no difference that he was strangely missing, it made no difference that Watson taunted them and sneered at them, they remained faithful to him who had won the glory of sitting upon the shoulder of Frank Merriwell.
Therefore they were very miserable, and they told themselves that “things would be different if Frank Merriwell was here.” And they wondered and speculated at the absence of both Frank and King Jimmy from the ball-field.
Hodge had been compelled to give up the search for Frank and go into the game. He was satisfied that Ditson’s trick was simply to keep Merry out of the way till U. V. could win, and he firmly believed that the fellow would take good care that no real harm befell the captain of the Yale team.
Then Bart resolved to defeat Ditson’s purpose by encouraging the men to win, even though Frank was not there to pitch. But Virgil Paragon, the Virginia pitcher, proved to be the great stumbling-block. They could not seem to get safe hits off him when hits were needed.
Ditson, who had obtained odds when he bet on Virginia earlier in the day, was now offering odds, and with no takers.
Had Frank Merriwell been there, he would have found plenty who were ready to cover his money; but without Frank Merriwell the Yale men seemed to lack heart and confidence.
“Just hear that blower!” growled one of the disgusted subjects of King Jimmy. “If Frank Merriwell was here, I’d shut him up! But I reckon it ain’t any use as long as he ain’t here.”
Then they resigned themselves to fate.
In the sixth Morgan had again seemed on the pointof going to pieces, and Hodge feared the third time this should happen; therefore he resolved to put in Starbright.
So Dick was again set to “warming up,” and Morgan knew he was to be taken out. If he felt angry over this, he held his temper. He had learned that pitchers might be changed any time during the game on a trip like this, and no pitcher was liable to win the satisfaction of claiming truthfully that he had carried off a game without assistance.
In the first of the seventh the Yale men were at the bat, but Paragon toyed with them as before, not permitting a man to reach second.
Deep was the gloom of the men from the North when they moved out onto the field beneath that smiling blue Virginian sky.
The crowd was delighted, as it had a right to be, for it was an honor to defeat Yale.
Oh, where was Merriwell!
Morgan sat on the bench and saw Starbright go into the box.
“Ha! ha!” laughed Ditson. “Our boys will make short work of that big duffer! Why, he can’t pitch!”
Now Starbright had been doing very good work during the trip, but on this occasion he felt the absence of Merriwell as much as any one, not even Hodge being excepted.
Somehow it seemed to Dick that Merriwell had always given him strength and courage in whatever he undertook since entering college. A look from Frank’seye was enough to brace him up and give him unbounded confidence.
He could not receive that look now, and even Hodge’s words of instruction spoken to him just before he entered the box were not enough to steady his nerves and put him on his mettle.
Elsie Bellwood, her face pale, was there amid the spectators. Inwardly she was almost frantic, but what could she do? Bart had tried to soothe her by telling her that Merriwell would not be harmed, but her fears could not be so easily allayed.
Starbright was in his position. The batter came up to strike. Hodge was under the bat, with his mask adjusted.
Then Dick sent in the first ball, and the batter lined it out with a tremendous crack.
The crowd rose as the man who had hit the ball sped down to first. Gamp, Yale’s center-fielder, was doing his best to get near the place where the ball must fall, but it went far over his head and he chased it into the distance, while the runner circled the bases and came home, with the crowd roaring.
Dick Starbright was white as chalk. With difficulty Bart choked back a groan.
“It’s all over!” he told himself. “Where is Merriwell? If he would come now?”
Roland Ditson shouted with laughter and waved his hat in the air.
“I told you he could not pitch!” he cried. “Oh, Virginia will pound him all over the lot!”
“And I’ll pound you a few after the game!” muttered Hodge, with deep fury in his heart.
The next batter advanced to the plate. The ball had been returned to Starbright, but the big fellow seemed dismayed. He stood there, looking around.
“Pitch the ball!” cried somebody in the crowd.
Starbright did not stir.
“Pitch the ball!” again was the cry.
The batsman was waiting.
“One ball!” declared the umpire, when more than twenty seconds had elapsed without Dick making an offer to deliver.
Then the giant freshman shook himself together, hearing, however, the guying of the crowd and feeling it keenly.
He began to pitch, and the batter soon got a clean hit off him, making first.
The next batter followed with a hit. Then an error filled the bases.
“Virginia does it right here!” said Ditson. “A good hit now means two or three more scores, which will clinch the game.”
What was that commotion amid the crowd? Men were standing and gazing down the road. A murmur arose; it swelled louder and louder.
“What is it? Who is it?” the crowd cried.
Two horses were coming at a mad gallop along the road, their hoofs ringing clear, a cloud of dust rising behind them.
The riders were urging their horses to the highest rate of speed, racing along side by side.
One was a man, a handsome, determined, beardless youth, who, though the horse he bestrode was without a saddle, rode like a centaur.
The other was a boy, and he clung like a monkey to the back of his horse, his eyes gleaming with excitement, every freckle on his face seeming to sparkle with excitement. On his upper lip was a strange black smooch.
“Here he comes!”
Then Dick Starbright uttered a little sigh of relief. But the batter sprang to his place, crying:
“Make him deliver the ball, Mr. Umpire, according to the rules. Don’t let him delay the game!”
A hit now meant the winning of the game.
Dick saw—Dick knew. Down to the ground he dropped, writhing in apparent pain, seemingly seized with cramps, while nearer and nearer came the hoofbeats of the galloping horses.
“Call a ball on him, Mr. Umpire!” cried the batter.
“You can’t make a sick man pitch,” said the umpire, with a strange grin. “Mr. Hodge, where is your next pitcher?”
Into the enclosure by the open gate dashed the horses and their riders.
“He is here!” rang out the clear voice of Hodge, as Frank Merriwell flung himself from the back of one of those horses and advanced.