The Lawrencetown stand went wild and so did the team. With a man on and none out and the opposing pitcher visibly nervous, things certainly began to look brighter. The heavy artillery was up, too, and as Wild, one of their big guns, stepped up to the rubber, the crowd began to storm for a hit.
And Wild got it; a clean single almost in the same place where Southers had placed his ball. Southers went down to second and Wild was safe on first, and there were none out. Freeman, the heaviest slugger of the Lawrencetown team, was the next man at bat. Things certainly did look serious for the Pennington team and bright and cheerful for the visitors.
When Honey Wiggins saw Freeman step to the plate he seemed to take a long time to think things over. He certainly was in a hole. Whether to pitch to Freeman and take a chance or whether to pass him was the question that seemed to trouble him. Finally he appeared to decide on the latter course, for he was very careful to keep the ball out of reach of the heavy hitter’s stick, and presently the umpire called:
“Ball four.”
Freeman walked to first and the bases were full, with none out!
The stands shook under the wild behavior and ceaseless cheering of the Lawrencetown contingent, for they realized only too well that a single would sew up the game for them. “A hit! A hit! Just one little safe bingle!” roared the crowd.
Oleson was up. Oleson, the only man to score for Lawrencetown so far that day. His name pealed forth in a roaring cheer as he took his place at the plate.
Honey Wiggins was in a worse predicament than he had been during the entire game, and his nerves were all gone, that was evident. Already Coach Rice had Cy Gordon warming up, and Honey looked appealingly toward the bench, as if he hoped that the coach would “derrick” him from the mound and take him out of his mighty unpleasant position.
But the coach motioned him to continue with the game, and Honey, to steady himself, tried three times to catch the runner off of first.
Meanwhile, Jeff Thatcher, on third, all on edge himself, was watching the batter and the Lawrencetown bench, where their coach sat. He saw signals passed, and while he could not read them, he concluded that Oleson had been instructed to do the obvious thing: try a squeeze play in the hope of bringing in the necessary run to tie and still leave runners in a position to score.