“Yes, sir, Mr. Riley, what about it?” wheezed the fat man, digging up a limp handkerchief, and painfully mopping around inside his collar, his face becoming still more beetlike during the process. “That’s what we want to know.”
Riley removed the cigar from his mouth, and spat on the floor. “You’re all wrought up, ain’t ye?” he sneered. “Goin’ to jump on me good and hard, hey? There’s some poor losers in this burg.”
“Bancrofters’ll never stand losing to Kingsbridge,” declared Jorkins. “You were dead certain their left-hand kid pitcher couldn’t repeat the trick he played on us in their town last Saturday, but he did it, and everybody’s chewing the rag. If he can keep that up, they’ll grab the pennant away from us. They’re getting the jump on us at the beginning of the season. It’s plain we haven’t a pitcher to hold his own with that man Locke. Hoover blew up to-day. Locke got his goat, and he won’t be any more use against that team. They’ll keep Locke just to run against us.”
“Has Bancroft ever had a losin’ team with me managin’?”
“No, but—”
“She won’t this year, either. Leave it to me. Don’t go off your nut so soon.”
“What do you propose to do?” asked Butler.
“I ain’t had much time to figger on it yet, but you can bet your life that I’ll do somethin’.”
“I lost a hundred on the game to-day,” said Dyke mournfully.
“Where did they get hold of Locke?” questioned the lawyer.