Then the strange pitcher and his stammering friend “a-hawed” in unison, while the crowd shouted and applauded.
“What sort of a wizard are we up against?” muttered the captain of the Minneapolis team.
The catcher was on edge now, for he realized that he was catching a pitcher who stood far ahead of any one he had ever supported before.
The next batter was fooled quite as easily as the first had been, fanning wildly at the first two balls and then letting the third one pass, although it cut the plate, and he was declared out on three strikes.
The third man was looking for something of the same sort, and he was keyed to a high pitch to hit speed, which caused him to swing far too soon when the first ball came in dead slow, rocking in the air without turning, so that the stitches in the covering could be distinctly seen.
“That’s my dope ball,” laughed the strange pitcher. “Ain’t it a baby?”
Under his breath the batter swore and gripped his bat. The stranger was “making monkeys” of the hitters as fast as they came up to strike.
“That pitcher is worth five hundred dollars a month to any team!” declared the pale-faced Minneapolis man. “He must be some old-timer.”
“He doesn’t look very old,” said the dark-faced man, who had confessed to having money bet on the game. “It must be nothing but a streak of luck.”
These two men were well known in Western sporting circles, the pale-faced man being Charley Bates, who had inherited a million and lost it all in two years of fast living, while the dark-faced one was Hank Dowling, a notorious gambler and race-track man.