Hayes was next in order. “Just a little hit, Haysey,” pleaded Tompkins. “Over second will do. Make a hit and I will.”
Hayes’s response was to whack the ball over third baseman’s head for two bases. Sudbury came in with the third run, and Tompkins went out ingloriously by batting an easy ball to the pitcher. The Seaton half of the inning was over, with the score now three to two in her favor.
Hillbury got no farther than third in her half. In the eighth the batsmen on both sides went down like pins before a bowling ball. The pitchers were on their mettle, every player was alert and keen, chance itself seemed to bring the hits into the fielders’ hands. Cunningham sprinted twenty feet to take Robinson’s liner; Watson gathered in a foul right in the midst of the Hillbury benches; Hayes made a one-handed stop of what promised to be a three-base hit. The in-field no longer wasted breath in exhortations; the cheer-leaders no longer tried to lead. The crowd was left to follow its own excited inclination, and incoherent yells took the place of cheers and songs.
The ninth began under the same spell of fast play. Poole went out on a fly to first base, Sudbury struck out, Sands hit to second base, and Hillbury came in for her last chance. Ribot sent a fly well over in short left-field, but Watson ran back and caught it. Kleindienst hit over the second baseman’s head; Haley dropped a fly in short right-field, and took second while Vincent was trying to catch the runner at third. With only one man out, and runners at second and third, the Hillbury cause looked bright. The blue banners waved wildly; but the Hillbury leaders brought back their companies once more to the old cheers, and gave Webster a ringing volley as he stepped up to the plate, bat in hand. Into every heart over the whole field, among players and audience alike, crept the conviction that the two runs necessary to give the victory to Hillbury were coming in, and that Webster’s hit was to bring them.
Phil drew in nearer the diamond. He knew Webster’s batting record like a book,—the note-book he had kept so long. If Webster made a hit at all, it would be in short left-field, out of reach of both third and short-stop.
Crack! went the bat. The Hillburyites rose and sent forth their shout of victory, as the ball sailed safely over the third baseman’s head. Haley started immediately from second; Kleindienst, on third, waited a little longer to make sure that Watson would not repeat his previous play. When he, too, saw that the ball was out of Watson’s reach, he threw care to the winds and started home, with Haley rounding the base only a dozen feet behind him.
Beyond third neither coachers nor runners thought to look. Sands himself, who had thrown his mask aside and now stood helpless at the plate, steeling himself to bear the sight of those two winning runs which were to transform a game almost won into a game certainly lost,—Sands himself had abandoned hope, and was watching the flight of the ball with indifference, stunned with the bitterness and humiliation of defeat.
Then, as he gazed, an abrupt change came over him. His whole figure grew radiant as with a mighty and unexpected joy. The hit was over the third baseman’s head, it was true; but the left-fielder, well within his usual position, had run rapidly forward to meet the ball, taken it on the bounce, steadied himself for a throw, and, with that splendid shoulder drive which Sands had so often envied, sent it straight to the waiting catcher. It came whizzing past the shoulder of the unsuspecting Kleindienst, and landed safely in Sands’s mitt. Leisurely, as if there were no chance of error; easily, as if such plays were a matter of everyday practice; with a smile on his lips at the folly of those who feared for him and his team,—the Seaton captain stooped and tagged the first runner as he slid in, then stepped forward to meet the second, plunging at the heels of the first. The two astonished men were out on the throw to the plate, and it was still Seaton’s game!
The score:—
| Seaton | AB | R | BH | TB | PO | A | E |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Vincent, r. f. | 4 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| Robinson, 2b. | 4 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 3 | 3 | 0 |
| Watson, 3b. | 4 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 1 | 1 |
| Poole, l. f. | 4 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 0 |
| Sudbury, c. f. | 4 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 0 |
| Sands, c. | 4 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 7 | 1 | 0 |
| Waddington, lb. | 3 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 7 | 0 | 0 |
| Hayes, s. s. | 3 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 1 |
| Tompkins, p. | 3 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 0 |
| Totals | 33 | 3 | 6 | 9 | 27 | 9 | 2 |