“Double fault, Bardek; you’re putting too many in the net.”
That was one way thoroughly to mystify the earnest student of English. Bardek studied hard, but never succeeded in getting the hang of American sporting terms. “Get a good lead! Go down with his arm! Two out; play for the batter! 68-22, through left-guard!” These phrases seemed to have meaning to Americans, but not one spark of intelligence was in them for the many-languaged Bohemian.
“I put too many into the net?” he repeated. “T’e English cannot be one of my native speeches, but when I see all these nice—” he drawled it into something like “nah-ees”—“young boys flying so like butterfly ’round Miss Gorgas I zink she do not put one into the net!”
Gorgas was busy sorting out some long branches of fresh willow for a corner decoration. She looked over sideways at Bardek, who tapped away with the air of a man who has made a hit. But she silenced him.
“Play in, boys; he’s going to bunt,” she remarked and watched with satisfaction the grin fade from Bardek’s face and in its place appear the rapt expression of a puzzled linguist.
“What is this—‘bunt’?” he asked at last, his mind completely off guard.
“It is an unexpected bingle, Bardek, that puts the infield in the soup,” she explained serenely as she left the “smitty” for more willow branches.
XVII
AN UNEXPECTED BINGLE
FOR awhile Bardek tapped away and struggled with the slang of the ’90’s. “‘Bingle,’” he murmured and shook his head. “‘Bunt,’ ‘Soup,’ I have lost the art of taking in languages. I grow old. My cerebellum turns to that same ‘soup.’”
Bardek sighed, a genuine old-fashioned sigh, full of undefined longing. Uncomfortable feelings swept over him, whose source he knew not.