“Now Vinton will put one over,” said Cowles. “It’s all off. Let’s get away, fellows.”
“Hold on,” urged Nash. “An accident may happen. Heaven knows I am praying for one!”
Vinton, however, did not get the range of the plate, and still Mason remained motionless.
“Three balls,” said the umpire.
Then at that moment a great calmness came on Hock Mason. He knew Vinton must put the next one over, and he gripped the bat hard.
Vinton did it, and Hock hit the ball fairly. It did not seem to him that he hit it very hard, but that ball shot off straight as a bullet from a gun.
Then a frightful uproar arose, and every runner started. Mason ran as if his life depended on it. And the Yale bleachers were in such a mad tumult that it seemed as if a mob of maniacs were trying to destroy each other.
The ball was not caught, and out into the field it bounded, with a fielder chasing it.
Mason kept on to second. He could not hear the coachers, but he saw somebody at third wildly beckoning for him to come on. With a haze before his eyes he dashed for third. When he got there he seemed to see those arms waving him toward home. He did not stop. Into his head came a wild thought of the glory of this achievement, and he felt that he would willingly drop dead on the home plate if he could reach it in safety.
How the Yale men thundered and shrieked and screamed and went mad, as Mason tore down to the home plate.