“I demand an apology!” croaked Wiley, barely able to speak.
“I apologize,” said Frazer. “Your dummy can pitch! But a team with one real pitcher is scarcely equipped to cut much figure in the race. Who’ll you use to-morrow, Locke?”
“I am thinking of trying out another one of our uncertainties,” answered the southpaw, with an enigmatical smile.
CHAPTER XXXVII
THE RETURN OF LEFTY
The work of patching up his team and whipping it into shape had kept Lefty Locke busy pretty nearly every minute of his time while awake, since the beginning of the training season. With that task before him, and knowing how little attention he could spare for Janet, he had raised no objections when she had asked to accompany Mrs. Vanderpool and Virginia on the California trip. While he was not foolish enough to believe that the reconstructed team could become a pennant contender that season, he did have hopes of finishing in the first division, which, under the circumstances, would be a triumph indeed.
He had found Janet’s letters interesting enough, but his concentration on other matters had prevented him from giving them much thought once they were read through. She had told him of the rumor that Bailey Weegman, having been lucky in escaping prosecution for his part in the conspiracy, had started some sort of mail-order business and was said to be taking in money “hand over fist.”
Far more interesting, however, although almost as quickly forgotten, was the gossip about Virginia and Franklin Parlmee. Having returned from his hasty and fruitless voyage across the pond, Parlmee had felt not only injured but outraged by the treatment he had received. It was impossible for Virginia honestly to deny that she had been led to distrust him–and by Weegman! That cut the deepest. She had kept him ignorant of the fact that she had returned home, thus allowing him to go rushing off to Europe in an attempt to find her. That had been his sole purpose; he had been in no way concerned with Garrity in a scheme to wrest the control of the Blue Stockings from Collier. It was true that, having come into a limited inheritance, he had purchased two or three small lots of the club’s stock. His judgment had told him that the price to which it had dropped made it a good investment. Garrity had been anxious to get hold of that stock. He had pursued Parlmee and endeavored to buy the certificates at a price that would have permitted the holder of them to realize a good profit. But what Garrity had wanted so badly Parlmee had considered still more valuable, and he had refused to part with a single share.
A sense of injury on one side and shame and false pride on the other had prevented complete reconciliation between Parlmee and Virginia. But Janet wrote that Miss Collier was not happy, although she made a brave pretense of being so. Once or twice Janet had detected her alone, crying.
Lefty had practically forgotten about these things until, on that second day of battle with the Wolves, only a few minutes before the game was to begin, he looked toward the club owner’s box, occupied as he knew by Virginia and Janet, and made the discovery that Franklin Parlmee was likewise there. The southpaw stood still in his tracks, and stared, smiling; for he saw that Parlmee and Virginia were chatting and laughing, while Janet watched them with an expression of complete satisfaction and pleasure.