“The little chap did well,” Sands was saying; “I don’t dispute that. He’s a clever little player. What we want is a big player, a hard, experienced, steady man who can swat the ball for two or three bases when he hits it, and can stand the strain of the season without going up in the air.”
“I’d rather have a man that can hit often than one who sometimes hits hard,” replied the coach; “and as for throwing, give me brains and skill rather than muscle behind a ball any time. There is good baseball in the boy, and you ought not to discourage him. I don’t ask you to put him on the team; keep him as substitute if you wish, but watch him and help him and see what you can make of him.”
So it happened that Phil was retained as substitute when the great majority of the candidates were dropped. Some said he ought to be on the team, some that it was gross favoritism not to fire him with the rest; but Phil himself was content to sit and watch, and do what he was told, and play when he had a chance with all the earnestness and strength and skill he had. And twice a week he turned out early for the six o’clock practice with Rowley.
CHAPTER XVII
A NOCTURNAL MYSTERY
For weeks Phil sat on the bench, a perpetual substitute, getting plenty of practice on practice days in all sorts of positions where he was useful, but always seeing others go into the game. The fielders that year were a remarkably healthy lot; they played game after game without accident or illness. Taylor, whose position at left-field Phil coveted, was playing his second year on the team, and felt his importance as a veteran who had already been tested under fire in a Hillbury game. He had the name of being a great hitter, and though his work during the season so far had not borne out this reputation, he occasionally made long drives that delighted the great mass of student supporters whose admiration is as intense as it is fitful. He was a safe catch on flies, and now and then did spectacular feats that had the same effect on the spectators as the occasional three-baggers. He had also acquired a striking way of opening his hands for the ball, which his admirers called an “awfully graceful catch”; and he took much apparent satisfaction in his general bearing and clothes. The other fielders, Vincent at right and Sudbury at centre, were steady, hard-working fellows, who did their duty at bat and in the field to the best of their ability, and did not know or care whether any one looked at them or not.
Curtis sat watching the play one Saturday afternoon, with Marks on the seat beside him emitting deep gulps of cigarette smoke and the usual unbroken stream of baseball chatter. It was a game with a team from one of the smaller colleges, which had defeated Hillbury eight to four and was now threatening to shut Seaton out altogether.
“What a fool that Taylor is!” said Curtis. “He’s just struck out again, and now pretends the umpire is unfair! That’s to save his face. I wonder why Sands doesn’t try some other man.”
“Some other man!” cried Marks, for a brief instant speechless with astonishment. “Why, he made a home run in the Colby game, and he’s about the prettiest fielder on the team.”
“Oh, yes; he’s pretty enough,” returned Curtis, “and knows it, too, but I’d have some other quality than prettiness on the field if the team were mine.”