Oulds, his confidence completely restored, grinned through the meshes of the wire mask. “I reckon you was jest monkeyin’ with ’em boy,” he said. “They’ll all look alike to ye from now on. This one’s jest as easy as any.”
And so it proved, for Big Mace slashed again, and found nothing but empty air; whereupon the Kingsbridge crowd rose in a body and roared a splendid salvo for the man they had been reviling and threatening a short time before.
As that burst of applause died away, a Neapolitan laborer, standing on the bleachers, his shirt open at the throat, the oily, blue-black hair of his bared head shining in the sun, his kindled eyes almost popping, and his teeth flashing like scimitars, shook his grimy fists in the air, and screamed:
“What’s-a da mat’ with-a da Lefty?”
The answer was a great shout of laughter, and another hearty round of applause, which told how suddenly and completely the humor of that recently raging and reviling assemblage had altered. He whom a few minutes before they were deriding and threatening, had, by his amazing performance, become the admired idol of the moment, the Horatius at the bridge, the Moses to find the promised land.
They were more than willing to accept him as king of warriors and savior of wilderness wanderers, but to retain his scepter he must still further demonstrate his prowess in battle or his ability to smite a dry-shod pathway across a mythical Red Sea.
CHAPTER X
A PITCHERS’ BATTLE
As Locke walked calmly toward the bench he found Captain Stark at his side, laughing. “You pulled outer that hole in great shape, old man,” said Larry; “but you sure had us all leery to start with. I reckoned you was plumb up in the air.”
“I was,” admitted the pitcher unhesitatingly; “but I managed to get my feet under me after a while.”