Had it fully and permanently recovered? This was the question that must yet be answered, and answered favorably, before the apprehension that still lurked to some extent in his heart could be dispelled.
Of course, what Joe had said to Jim about a jinx hovering over him at the Polo Grounds had been a joke. Joe was too intelligent to be superstitious. He was not worried about being threatened by anything supernatural.
But he knew that there were many natural things that were so mysterious and bewildering that they might easily seem to be supernatural until their causes were ferreted out. Some such thing as that it must have been that had made his arm so powerless in New York but seemed to have no effect when he had left the city behind him.
So it was with some secret apprehension that he went into the box in the first game he pitched after returning to the Polo Grounds.
To his delight, he found that his arm worked as well as it had on the western trip. He mowed down the opposing batsmen with all his old skill and turned in a brilliant victory, in which only three hits were made by the enemy and one run registered.
“How about that jinx that was waiting for you at the Polo Grounds?” chaffed Jim at the conclusion of the game.
“Guess he must have pulled up stakes and vamoosed,” answered Joe happily.
Jim, too, was now at the top of his form and was pitching great ball. He had come along wonderfully since, fresh from Princeton, he had joined the Giants. He had a powerful physique that had not been weakened by dissipation and he had, as well, curves, slants and hops that were only second to those of Joe himself. And his association with Joe had aided him marvelously in the development of his powers and his knowledge of the weak points of the batsmen who faced him. There were few pitchers in the entire league who could hold their own against him.
With these two as the mainstays and the rest of the string to help out, the Giants were well fortified in the pitcher’s box. And as the rest of the team were doing excellent work both in the field and at the bat, the prospects of the Giants for winning the pennant could scarcely have been more promising.