“I don’t know what to do,” and Bill’s tone was despondent.
“Maybe you can get along without them now, for the few remaining games,” suggested Cap.
“No,” and Bill shook his head. “I’ll need them, for I tried to pitch without them to-day, and my curves were away off. And as for the remaining games—they’re the most important of the season. We’ve just got to win them to make good and keep the pennant. I don’t see what could have happened to the glasses.”
“You might have lost them anywhere between the diamond and here,” said Whistle-Breeches. “We’ll look again in the morning.”
“Say!” cried Pete. “Can’t you get some oculist in town to fix you up a pair that will do? It can’t be that they were such peculiar glasses that they can’t be duplicated.”
“Maybe not,” half-agreed Bill, “but the old rain-maker-astronomer said the lenses had to be ground in a certain way, and I don’t know where he had them made.”
“We’ll try some one in town,” went on Cap. “I believe they can fix you up,” and they spent some time talking of that possibility.
Bill was worried, and with good reason. He wanted to maintain his position as pitcher, and he knew he could not do so if he did not “deliver the goods.” That he could pitch without the glasses he did not believe, but he was anxious for morning to come that he might test himself again.
Bright and early he and Cap went out to the diamond, not only to look for the glasses but to do some work with the horsehide. It is needless to say that the glasses were not recovered, and to Bill’s despair he found that he was throwing wild.
“It won’t do,” spoke Cap despondently, as he tossed back the ball which he had had to reach away outside of the plate to gather in.