[CHAPTER VIII]
THE HIDDEN-BALL TRICK
“Oh, I wouldn’t tell Jim!” exclaimed Mabel, in alarm. “In the first place, we’re not clear enough about what Clara means to do. Perhaps it won’t amount to anything after all. And if it does, it’ll be bad enough when it comes without our doing anything to hasten it.”
“I can’t understand it,” said Joe, gloomily. “There never seemed to be two people more perfectly made for each other than Jim and Clara—always excepting ourselves,” he hastened to add, as he pressed her hand—“and it will be one of the greatest blows of my life if there should be any break between them. Clara seemed to be dead in love with Jim; and as for him, he fairly worships the ground she walks on. When he gets one of her letters, he’s dead to the world. And he’s one of the finest fellows that ever breathed. I look on him as a brother. He hasn’t any bad habits, is as straight as a string, a splendid specimen of manhood, handsome, well educated—what on earth could any girl ask for more? And he’s making a splendid income too. Has Clara suddenly gone crazy?”
“It’s beyond me,” replied Mabel. “Clara is the dearest girl, but just now I’d like to give her a good shaking. Lots of girls of course are dazzled by millions, but I never believed Clara would be one of them. And perhaps she isn’t, Joe dear. We may be doing her a great injustice. We’ll have to wait and see.”
“Well, promise me, anyway, that you’ll write to her at once,” urged Joe. “I’d do it myself, but you girls can talk to each other about such things a good deal better than any man can. Try to bring her to her senses and urge her not to wreck her own life and Jim’s simply for money or social position. She’d only be gaining the shadow of happiness and losing the substance.”
“I’ll write to-morrow,” promised Mabel. “But now let’s dismiss all unpleasant thoughts and remember only that we’re together.”
While Joe was desperate at the injury to his foot that kept him out of the game just at a time he was sorely needed by his team, he found some compensation in the fact that he could spend more time with Mabel than would otherwise have been possible. He did not have to take part in the morning practice, and in the afternoons he and Mabel attended the games together as spectators.
On the other hand, Mabel was deeply disappointed that she could not see Joe pitch, as she had joyously counted on doing. She was intensely proud of her famous young husband, and was always one of the most enthusiastic rooters when he was scheduled to take his turn in the box. More than once Joe had won some critical game because of the inspiration that came to him from the knowledge that Mabel was looking on. But there was no use murmuring against fate, and they had to take things as they were, promising themselves to make up for their disappointment later in the season.
Reggie, too, felt that fate had treated him unfairly.