The face of the wrothy Hoover was twisted into a snarl, and, as the ball came back to him, he betrayed momentary indecision.
Immediately Locke caught a signal from Stark, given by the Kingsbridge captain with his back toward third, his attention seemingly focused on the man on the slab, and the runner knew Larry would seek to hit the next pitched ball if he could possibly reach it without stepping out of the box. Crouching like a runner ready for the crack of the starter’s pistol, Locke crept off third.
The ball was wide of the rubber, but, reaching far across, Stark found it with the end of his long bat, and tapped it into the diamond, immediately getting away on the jump for first.
Locke had not failed to obey the signal for the “squeeze,” and he was coming like the wind when the bat and ball met. Hoover forked fruitlessly at the ball as it caracoled past, but it was McGovern who scooped it, and lined it home in hope of nipping the runner.
A blighted hope it was, for the flying man slid safely, and Bangs, recognizing the uselessness of trying to tag him, winged the sphere to first, where it arrived a moment too late to get Stark.
Far better than words, imagination may picture the uproar of that hysterical moment.
Gradually the cheering ceased, and the hoarse and happy Kingsbridgers became semirational. To Stark, in a way, as much credit was due for that finely worked squeeze as to Locke; but it seemed that the name of the latter was on every lip. He had made the play possible by his hit and steal, and the delighted crowd howled blessings at him long after he was seated on the bench.
Locke’s manager looked him over unemotionally, and then sent Crandall out to the pan, with instructions. Hutchinson did not believe in spoiling a youngster with praise. Furthermore, the game was far from over, and experience had taught him that the time to count chickens was after the hatching.
One man, at least, was wholly happy; Henry Cope was confident that, after this, his fellow members of the Kingsbridge Baseball Association, who had given him carte blanche to secure a star pitcher, at any price, could not make much protest when they learned that he had contracted to pay Tom Locke one hundred dollars a week and board, a sum far greater than many a minor-league pitcher of promise received.