TIEING THE SCORE
Ping! The ball came in between Joe’s palms with a vicious thud, but there it stuck, and a moment later the newcomer had tossed it back over the fence with certain and strong aim.
“I guess some one will pick it up,” he said.
“Sure,” assented Tom. “Say, that was a good stop all right. Have you played ball before?”
“Oh, just a little,” was the modest and rather quiet answer. In fact Joe Matson was rather a quiet youth, too quiet, his mother sometimes said, but his father used to smile and remark:
“Oh, let Joe alone. He’ll make out all right, and some of these days he may surprise us.”
“Well, that was a pippy stop all right,” was Tom’s admiring, if slangy, compliment. “Let’s go in, I may get a chance to play.”
Joe turned toward the main entrance gate, and thrust one hand into his pocket.
“Where you going?” demanded Tom.
“Into the grounds of course. I want to get a ticket.”
“Not much!” exclaimed his companion. “You don’t have to pay. Come with me. I invited you to this game, and I’m a member of the team, though I don’t often get a chance to play. Members are allowed to bring in one guest free. I’ll take you in. We’ll use the players’ gate.”
“Thanks,” said Joe briefly, as he followed his new friend.
“Here’s a good place to see it from—almost as good as the grandstand,” said Tom, as they moved to a spot along the first base line. “Though you can go up and sit down if you like. I’m going to put on my things. I may get a chance at first.”
“No, I’ll stay here,” said Joe. “Then I can see you make some good stops.”
“I can if Sam doesn’t put ’em away over my head,” was the reply.
“Oh, yes, that’s so. You started to say that you thought our side—you see I’m already a Silver Star rooter—that our side would win, if something didn’t happen.”
“Oh, yes, and then that ball came over the fence. Well, we’ll win, I think, if Sam doesn’t go to pieces.”
“Who’s Sam?”
“Sam Morton, our pitcher. He’s pretty good too, when he doesn’t get rattled.”
“Then we’ll hope that he doesn’t to-day,” said Joe with a smile. “But go ahead and dress.”
“All right,” assented Tom, and he started off on a run to the dressing rooms. It was only just in time, too, for at that moment Darrell came hastening up to him.
“Why haven’t you got your suit on?” the manager asked. “You’ll probably play some innings anyhow, and I don’t want any delay.”
“All right—right away,” Tom assured him. “I’m on the job.”
“Who do you think will win?” asked a youth sitting next to Joe on the grass.
“Oh, I don’t know,” began Joe slowly. “I haven’t seen either team play.”
“Oh, then you’re a stranger here?”
“Yes, just moved in.”
“I saw you with Tom Davis. You must be that Matson lad he told me lived back of him.”
“I am, and I hope Tom’s side wins.”
“That’s the stuff! So do I. But those Resolutes have a good nine.”
“Aw, go on!” broke in a lad back of Joe. “They haven’t any good batters at all.”
“What’s the matter with Hank Armstrong?” demanded some one.
“Well, he’s pretty good, but Ford Lantry or Seth Potter on our team can bat all around him.”
“How about their pitcher?” asked Joe.
“Well, he’s pretty good,” admitted the lad who had first addressed Joe.
“But he can’t come up to Sam Morton when Sam is at his best,” said some one else, joining in the conversation.
“Yes—when he’s at his best,” repeated another lad. “Those Resolutes have it in for us, but we’re going to wipe up the ground with them to-day all right.”
“Like fun!” exploded a Resolute sympathizer. “I’ll bet you——”
“Play ball!” broke in the voice of the umpire, and the clanging of the gong warned the players and others to clear the field.
“We’re last at the bat,” said Tom, “and that means a whole lot.”
“Yes,” assented Joe, and then the Silver Star pitcher took his place in the box and exchanged a few preliminary balls with the catcher, Bart Ferguson.
“Play ball!” yelled the young umpire again, selecting some pebbles with which to keep score.
Hank Armstrong, the sturdy left fielder of the Resolutes, was the first at the bat for his side, and with a vicious swing he hit the first ball which Sam pitched to him. Squarely on the bat he caught it with a resounding ping!
Away it sailed straight over Sam’s head and over the head of the second baseman. Farther and farther it went, until the centre fielder began running back to get it.
“Oh, wow! Pretty one! Pretty one!”
“Go on! Go on!”
“Make a three bagger of it!”
“Run, you beggar!”
These and many other cries speeded Armstrong on. He was running fast and reached second well in advance of the ball. But he dared not go on to third.
“Hum, if they hit Sam like that too often he won’t last very long,” commented Tom.
“Oh, that was a fluke,” declared Rodney Burke, who sat behind Joe.
There was a surprised and disconcerted look on Sam’s face as he gazed at the next batter. No sooner had the ball left Sam’s hand, that Armstrong was away for third like a shot, for he was a notorious base stealer. Bart threw to third, but the ball went too high and the baseman jumped for it in vain. Armstrong came in with the first run.
“Begins to look bad!” yelled Tom in Joe’s ear, for the cheers and exultant yells of the Resolute crowd made ordinary talking impossible.
But that was all the visiting team got that inning, for Sam struck out two men, and the third fouled to Bart.
“Now we’ll see what our fellows can do,” commented Tom.
Seth Potter, the left fielder, was first up, and he had two strikes and three balls called on him in short order. Then he got under a pretty one and made first.
“Watch out now, and run down when he throws!” cried Darrell, who was coaching.
Seth did run, but was caught at second. Jed McGraw, the centre fielder, was next up and knocked a safety, getting to first.
Then came Ford Lantry, who played right field, and he knocked a pretty three-bagger which brought in McGraw and the run. At that the Silver Star crowd went wild with joy, but it was all they had to crow over as the next two men struck out and Lantry died on third.
The next two innings were marked by goose eggs for both sides, and in the fourth inning the Silver Stars brought in two runs, while their opponents could not seem to connect with the ball.
“Old Sam is doing fine!” cried Tom.
“Yes, he seems to have good control,” commented Joe.
“But he lacks speed,” said Rodney Burke.
“Oh, cheese it! Do you want to give all our secrets away to these fellows?” asked Tom in a low voice, indicating the many Resolute sympathizers who were all about.
“Well, it’s true,” murmured Rodney, and Joe felt a sudden wild hope come into his heart.
The game went on enthusiastically, if not correctly from a professional or college baseball standpoint. Many errors were made and several rules were unconsciously violated. The young umpire’s decisions might have been questioned several times, and on numerous occasions the game was stopped while the respective captains, and some of the players, argued among themselves, or with the umpire. But the disputes were finally settled, though there was a growing spirit of dissatisfaction on both sides.
“Play ball!” yelled the umpire, at the conclusion of an argument in the fifth inning.
It was then that the Resolutes did some heavy stick work, and tallied three runs to the enthusiastic delight of the team and its supporters.
“We’ve got to do better than this,” murmured Darrell to Captain Rankin and Sam when they took the field at the end of that inning, and a big circle stared at them from the score board as the result of their efforts.
“I’m doing all I can!” snapped Sam. “I’m not getting decent support.”
“Aw, cut it out! Of course you are!” asserted Rankin.
A single tally by each side in the sixth, and two for the Silver Stars and one for the Resolutes in the seventh, brought the game to that usual breathing spot. The score was now a tie, and the excitement was growing.
“For cats’ sake beat ’em out, fellows!” pleaded Darrell. “Use your bats. They’re to hit the ball with, not to fan the air!”
Perhaps his frantic appeal had some effect, for in the next inning the Resolutes only got one run, while, when the Silver Stars came to bat to close the inning, they hammered out three, putting them well ahead.
But there was trouble brewing. Sam’s arm was giving out. He realized it himself but he dared not speak of it. Grimly he fought against it, but he saw that the other side was aware of it.
“Come on now, we’ll get his goat!” yelled the captain of the Resolutes. Then began what may be regarded as the cruel practice of yelling discouraging remarks at the man in the box. Sam was plainly told that he was “rotten” while other and less mild epithets were hurled at him.
These had their effect. He gave two men their base on balls, and he made a number of wild throws to first where Tom Davis had replaced Darrell Blackney. However, by a strong brace Sam managed to hold his opponents runless, though in this saving work he was nobly assisted by his fellows, and by the quickness of Tom in not letting the wild balls get by him. Tom was a magnificent high jumper, which served him in good stead.
The ending of the eighth saw the score nine to seven in favor of the Silver Stars, they having brought in three runs.
It began to look, in spite of Sam’s trouble, as if the home team would win. There was a riot of cheers when the Resolutes went to bat in the ninth inning, and despite the fact that they were two runs behind, their supporters did not fail them.
“Win! Win! Win!” they yelled.
“Oh, we’ll win all right,” said Captain Littell grimly.
And he and his men gave good evidence of doing so a few minutes later. Sam literally “went to pieces.” He lost all control of the ball, and was fairly “knocked out of the box.” There was a look of despair on the faces of his mates.
“What’s the matter with him?” demanded Joe, who was surprised at the sudden slump.
“Oh, that’s what he does every once in a while,” said a disgusted Silver Star supporter. “You can’t depend on him. Wow, that’s rotten!” for Sam had delivered a ball that was batted over the right-field fence.
Instantly there was a wild scene. Two men were on second and third base respectively when this “homer” was knocked and they came racing in. The home-run batter followed.
“Ring around the rosey!” yelled the Resolute captain. “If we had more on base they’d all come in. Hit at anything, fellows! Hit everything.”
It looked as if they were doing it, for they made six runs that inning, which brought the score to thirteen to nine in favor of the visitors.
“Five runs to win, and four to tie,” murmured Darrell as his men came in from the field for their inning. “Can we do it?”
How it was done even he scarcely knew, for so fierce was the rivalry between the teams, and so high the excitement, that several times open clashes were narrowly averted. But the four runs were secured, and though the Silver Stars played their best they could not get another one. But even to tie the score after Sam’s slump was something worth while.
“Ten innings! It gives us another chance for our white alley,” murmured Tom to Joe, as the first baseman made ready to go on the sack again. “If we can get one run, and hold them down to a goose egg it will do.”
But the Resolutes seemed to have struck a winning streak. Sam could not pull himself together, and got worse. Darrell was in despair, and there was gloom in the hearts of the Riverside residents.
“Haven’t they another pitcher they can put in?” asked Joe of one of his neighbors.
“No, and if they had Sam would raise such a row that it might bust up the team. He’ll play it out.”
In the tenth inning the Resolutes pounded out three more runs, batting Sam all over the field, and when the Silver Stars came up the score was sixteen to thirteen against them.
“Oh, for a bunch of runs!” pleaded Darrell, as his men went to bat.
But they couldn’t get them. The Resolute pitcher with a grin on his freckled face sent in curve after curve and struck out two men in short order. Then Tom Davis knocked a little pop fly which was easily caught, and the game ended in a riot of yells, as a goose egg went up in the tenth frame for the Silver Stars. They had lost by a score of sixteen to thirteen, and there were bitter feelings in their hearts against their rivals.
“Why don’t you get a pitcher who can pitch?” demanded one of the Resolutes.
“Don’t you insult me!” cried Sam striding forward. “I can pitch as good as your man.”
“Aw, listen to him! He’s dreaming!” some one yelled, laughingly.
“I am; eh? Well, I’ll show you!” cried Sam angrily, and the next instant, in spite of the effort of Darrell to hold him back, he had leaped for the lad who had mocked him, and had struck him a heavy blow.