“What—he made the finest catch you ever saw? Come off! This is a jolly!”
But Jeffers found it was no jolly, for the umpire declared he was out, and he walked in to the bench, railing at the luck.
Bink Stubbs was gasping for breath. It was some time before he could say a word, and then he faintly cried:
“Take me home to mommer! It always makes me sick to witness a frightful accident like that.”
“Of course it was an accident,” said Capt. Hardy, who was not playing, although on hand in a suit.
“Of course nothing of the sort,” laughed Frank Merriwell. “Might just as well say it was an accident that Jeffers hit the ball, and I do not claim that.”
“We know that wasn’t an accident,” cried Sydney Gooch, getting behind a knot of students as he shouted the words.
“That’s right,” nodded Bink Stubbs, laughing as if it was a joke; “that wasn’t an accident. Merry is easy. They’ll hammer him out of the box.”
He said this openly, but Frank knew him well enough to understand that it was intended for a sneer. Bink Stubbs seldom joked.
Frank paid not the least attention to the cries of his enemies, but caught the ball, which was flung in to him, and took his position in the box.