CHAPTER XV
Baldwin Baits a Trap
"Willie says that one petticoat will ruin the best ball club that ever lived, but lands knows that if some of us women don't get busy right away there's one ball club that's goin' to be ruined without any rustlin' skirts to be blamed."
Mrs. William Clancy, her ample form loosely enveloped in a huge, flowered kimono, dropped her fancy work into her lap and fanned herself with a folded newspaper.
"Why, Mother Clancy," ejaculated Betty Tabor, sitting on a stool by the window of the Clancy apartment, "one would think to hear you talk that we had lost the pennant already."
"Now, there's Willie," continued Mrs. Clancy, ignoring the protest, "goin' round with a grouch on all the time like he could bite nails in two. There's that nice McCarthy boy frettin' his heart out because you haven't treated him nicely, and Swanson worryin' about something. And there's Williams sneakin' round like he'd been caught robbin' a hen roost."
"Mother Clancy," protested the girl, reddening, "you have no right to say I haven't been treating Mr. McCarthy well. A girl cannot throw herself at a man—especially an engaged man."
"How do you know he's engaged?" demanded Mrs. Clancy. "Lands sakes, I haven't heard him announcing his engagement, and he looks at you across the dining room as sad as a calf chewing a dish rag."
"I overheard—I saw the girl," admitted Betty Tabor, blushing as she bowed her pretty head over her work. "She was telling him she wouldn't marry him if he continued to play ball—besides, Mr. Williams met her uncle, and he said they were engaged."
"Is she pretty?" demanded Mrs. Clancy.
"Beautiful," admitted Miss Tabor. "She's tall and fair and graceful, and she had on such a wonderful gown all trimmed"——
"It looks to me," interrupted Mrs. Clancy, cutting off the description of the dressmaking details heartlessly, "as if someone was just jealous."
"Why, Mother Clancy," said the girl, shocked and red, "you must think me perfectly frightful to believe I'd act that way."
"Oh, girls your age are all fools," said Mrs. Clancy complacently. "I reckon I was myself at your age. Why, if Willie even spoke to another girl I'd go out and hunt up two beaux just to show him I didn't care. You went out with Williams when we came in last night, didn't you?"
"Yes; he asked papa and me to late supper," the girl admitted. "But it really wasn't what you think. I wanted to find out something from him—something that's been worrying me."
"Did you find out?" asked the older woman skeptically.
"I don't know, Mother Clancy." The girl's face grew troubled. "I'm worried. I know Mr. Williams hasn't any money. Papa says he is so reckless he always is in debt, and lately, whenever he talks to me, he talks about the big sums he's going to have. I asked papa what it was, and he only grunted."
"He'd better pitch a lot better than he has been if he's counting on any of that world's series money," remarked Mrs. Clancy savagely. "McCarthy saved yesterday's game twice."
"You think Mr. Williams didn't want to win the game?" The girl's voice was tense with anxiety.
"I hate to say it—but it looked that way."
"Oh, Mother Clancy, I haven't dared to say a word to anyone about it," said the girl hesitatingly, "but I've been afraid for days. He said something to me that almost frightened me. He hinted that Mr. McCarthy was losing games on purpose. I didn't believe it—and somehow I got the idea Mr. Williams was betting on the Panthers."
"Now, you just keep your mouth shut about this," replied Mrs. Clancy, pressing her lips together determinedly. "I've had that same idea, and I think that's what's worryin' Willie. You just lead that fellow on to talk and I'll put a bug in Willie's ear. Only," she added, "Willie is likely to snap my head off for buttin' into his business. He's got to know, though."
Clancy came into the apartment soon afterward and Betty Tabor, making a hasty excuse, gathered up her fancy work.
"It's going to rain," remarked Clancy resignedly. "I think the game will be called off. If the game's off, I've got tickets to a theatre, and you and mother and I can go. Which one of the boys shall I ask to go with us?"
"If you don't mind," replied Betty Tabor steadily, "ask Mr. Williams."
The rain came down steadily and before one o'clock the contest was called off. The postponement was believed to lessen slightly the chances of the Bears to win the pennant, and they lounged dismally around the hotel, watching the bulletin board record the fact that the Panthers were winning easily, giving them the lead in the race by a small fraction in percentage.
Manager Clancy, his wife and Betty Tabor, with Williams rode away in a taxicab to the theatre. McCarthy declined Swanson's proposal to play billiards, and, going to their rooms, he commenced to read. Presently five of the players trooped in, led by Swanson, to play poker, and, shoving McCarthy's bed aside, ignoring his protests, they dragged out chairs and tables and started the game. Scarcely had they started when the telephone bell rang and Swanson answered:
"No, he's not up here," he said. "No. Who wants him? All right, put them on. Hello! Who is this? Oh, all right. No, Williams isn't here. Yes, I'm sure. He went out with the manager an hour ago—to a theatre, I think. All right. I'll tell him."
"Fellows," he said, as he hung up the receiver, "some friends want Williams to meet them as soon as he can. He'll know where. Fellow says it's important."
He glanced meaningly at McCarthy, who nodded to show that he understood, and as he sat down he remarked:
"Kohinoor, I guess it's up to us to go to a show or something to-night."
"All right," replied McCarthy, striving vainly to continue his reading, while puzzling over the fresh development.
At that same instant there was an acrimonious conversation in progress in the room from which the telephone summons for Williams had just come. Easy Ed Edwards hung up after his brief talk with the player at the other end of the line, an ugly gleam in his cold eyes.
"He isn't there," he reported to Barney Baldwin, who was sitting by the table, jangling the ice in a high-ball glass. "Either he's trying to cross us or he's playing wise and keeping his stand-in with the manager."
"Sure he isn't trying to cross us?" asked Baldwin. "He won yesterday's game instead of losing as he agreed to do."
"He tried hard enough to lose it," sneered the gambler. "He tossed up the ball and those dubs couldn't beat him. I tell you you've got to handle that red-headed kid at third base as you promised you would. He saved that game twice. We've got to get rid of him."
"He's stubborn," snarled Baldwin. "I tried to get him to quit the team and go back home. He's as bull-headed as his uncle, and that's the limit."
"You know who he is?" queried the gambler in surprise. "Why don't you tell the newspaper boys and show him up. That would finish him. He's under cover with his identity, and if we can prove he hasn't any right to play with the Bears they'll have to throw out the games he's won."
"That's just the trouble," replied Baldwin bitterly. "He's straight as a string. He never played ball except at college. We can't tell who he is because that would prove he's all right and make him stronger than ever."
"Who is he?" inquired the gambler.
"He's the nephew of old Jim Lawrence, of Oregon, one of the richest men out there. Lawrence is his guardian. They had some sort of a run-in and the boy left."
"How do you know these things?" demanded the gambler.
"The boy and my niece were sweethearts at home. I coaxed her to tell me when I discovered she knew him. They were engaged once, I understand, but it was broken off."
"Then," said Edwards determinedly, "get your niece on the job. If anyone can handle that fellow a woman can."
"Oh, I say," protested Baldwin, with a show of indignation, "I can't ask her to get into anything like this."
"She probably was willing enough to get into it until she thought the boy didn't have any money," replied Edwards coldly. "I don't want the girl to do anything wrong. Just get her to make up with this McCarthy, or whatever his name is, and get him away from this ball team for a week. Baldwin, this is getting to be a serious matter with me, and with you, too, if you want to hold your political power."
"All right, all right," said Baldwin hastily. "Maybe I can persuade the girl to help us out. I'll try."
"You'd better succeed—if you want to send your man to the Senate," said Edwards threateningly.
"I'll go right away," assented the politician.
Baldwin arose leisurely, went down to his limousine that was waiting and ordered the man to drive home, although it was his custom to remain downtown until late. At home he sent at once for his niece, and, after a brief talk, during which he was careful to hint that McCarthy had made overtures toward reconciliation with his uncle, the girl went to the telephone.
McCarthy, summoned to the telephone, talked for a few moments and, as the poker game broke up, he called Swanson aside and said:
"You'll have to go alone to-night. I've got to make a call."
"Who is she?" asked Swanson insinuatingly.
"Barney Baldwin's niece—and at his house."
"Run on, Kohinoor," said the big shortstop. "I'll take Kennedy with me and if I'm not mistaken you'll find out more than I will."