“That’s the stuff! No one knows it all—although maybe you think I talk as if I did! I don’t, not by a whole big lot. When I was catching for Warner I did a lot of the things I’m telling you not to. I was the worst old heavy hitter on the team. I was a regular joke on the batting list. About once in every game I’d come through with a regular whale of a slam, usually into right field. Sometimes it would be good for three bases, or sometimes two. More often, though, a fielder would pull it down. Or, if he didn’t, that hit would come along with the bases empty. When there was a man on third and the pitcher tightened up I was a frost. I pursued that misguided course for two years. Then one day—we were playing one of our big games—I happened to overhear a remark made by the other team’s pitcher. ‘York?’ he said. ‘I’ll pitch to him with my eyes shut. The man’s a “swinger”!’ That opened my eyes. I’d always thought the reason I couldn’t hit when I wanted to hardest was because the luck was against me or because the pitcher put a little extra on the ball, knowing my reputation as a long hitter. But that day it dawned on me that it was no one’s fault but my own. And the next morning I went out to the net and I started to learn to bat all over again. I never got into the three-hundred class, but I got where it wasn’t necessary to pull me out of the game in the eighth or ninth inning when a hit was needed to win.
“Mind you,” continued Mr. York, when he had lighted his pipe again, “I’m not saying there aren’t lots of ‘free hitters’ and ‘swingers’ with big reputations; some of them have headed the list in their time; but sooner or later the pitchers find their weakness and then they go down quickly. No, sir, it isn’t the ‘swinger’ who gets on oftenest, and it isn’t the ‘swinger’ who makes the best clean-up hitter. It’s the man who takes a short swing, not a ‘chop’; that’s poor stuff; but a healthy short swing, who comes across oftenest. You try it, Craig. Don’t stand back and have to reach for the ball, either. Crowd the plate a bit. Get ‘over the ball,’ as they say.”
“I will,” replied Sam. “I guess you’re right about a long swing. It is harder to judge the ball. I’ve noticed that, especially when the ball breaks close up. On a straight ball I can generally connect, but anything foxy has me guessing. I almost always get fooled on a drop or a floater.”
“It stands to reason. You’ve got to watch that sort until the last minute and then you’ve got to swing quick, and from the elbows and not the shoulders. As far as hitting for extra bases is concerned, why, I can point out men who can almost ‘chop’ the ball for a two-bagger. I sort of wish we had a ball and you were able to use that leg of yours,” added Mr. York wistfully, “and a bat.”
“That sounds like the old darky in Washington who used to say, ‘If I had a little milk I’d have a little mush if I had a little meal,’ doesn’t it?” asked Sam.
Later Mr. York went off in his automobile and Sam lay down on a couch in the big living-room, and, to please his host, tried to take a nap. He didn’t succeed, however. Dinner came at seven, with the dining-room windows wide open and the blue-black sky, a-twinkle with white stars, in sight whenever Sam looked away from the mellow radiance of the candles. And after that he had his initiation into the mysteries of chess. Mr. York said he did very well, but Sam feared that he had been terribly stupid when the chessmen were finally put away.
“That,” said Mr. York, seating himself again in a big easy-chair and taking one knee into his hands, “almost did me out of my diploma at college. One of the instructors and I used to play chess five evenings a week until all hours. I just scraped through my finals. Speaking of college, Craig, I suppose you’ve got yours all picked out, eh?”
“Me? No, sir. I—I guess I won’t go to college.”
“Won’t go! Why not?”
“Can’t afford it, sir,” replied Sam, with a twinkle. “They say it costs money.”