Then it was the ninth, with Steve Brown up and only one run needed. Steve and Mr. Gifford and Ed Thursby consulted a minute ere Steve stepped to the plate. “You’ve got to get your base somehow, Steve,” said Mr. Gifford. “Think you can hit him?” Steve looked doubtful.
“I’m going to make an awful try,” he said grimly.
“Maybe if you can get him in a hole——” began Ed.
“Bunt,” said Mr. Gifford. “That’s your best chance. Swing like fury on one and then watch for a good one and just hold your bat in front of it. If you connect, run like the dickens, Steve!”
“If I should get to first don’t you sacrifice, Ed. Make the bluff, but don’t swing. That fellow Hanford’s slow on throwing-down and I can beat him easily.”
“Batter up!” called Mr. York.
[CHAPTER XV]
STEVE SCORES
Mr. Williams motioned the infielders in and Steve’s hopes dropped. Evidently the pitcher was looking for an attempt at a bunt. At all events, Steve’s chance of “getting away with it,” as he mentally phrased it, seemed pretty slim. He wished he could manage to lay against the ball just hard enough to carry it out of the diamond, since, with the infielders all inside the base lines, a short, low fly would be the safest sort of a hit. But it was soon evident that Mr. Williams had no idea of letting him so much as touch that ball! The Mount Placid pitcher was never more deliberate or careful. The first offering went as a ball and the second looked low, but was called a strike by Mr. York. Mr. Gifford and Sam were shouting encouragingly. “Hit it out, Steve!” “Choose your alley!” “All the way ’round this time, Steve!” Mr. Williams studied the catcher’s signal very attentively, hesitated, shook his head, looked again, nodded, wound up, and pitched. The ball broke to the right and Steve stepped warily back only to realise the next instant that the sphere had crossed the inner corner of the plate and to hear the umpire fatefully announce, “Strike—two!”