The old-time player laughed at Joe’s delight, but he would have been more or less than human if he had not been pleased by it.
“I’m afraid you make too much of it,” he said, with a deprecating wave of the hand. “You young fellows have the center of the stage just now. We old boys are the has-beens. There are only four of our old team left. All the others have crossed the Great Divide.”
“Their memory won’t die, though, as long as there is a baseball fan left in these United States,” declared Joe. “Why, there’s scarcely a ‘fanning bee’ that I’ve ever been in, but what the name of the famous old Red Stockings comes up in some way or other. They’ve left a mark upon the game that will never grow dim.”
“It’s good to hear you say so, anyway,” said Wilson. “We thought ourselves that we were ‘some pumpkins’ when we started out, especially after we’d handed a few lacings to some of the other teams, but we never thought we were going to win fifty-seven games right off the reel. We used to look at each other, as one team after the other fell by the wayside, and wonder when our turn would come. It certainly seemed a miracle that we should escape with a whole skin every time. I suppose we would have gone under toward the end of the season if our reputation hadn’t scared the other teams so that they were licked before they came on the field. As it was, the scores as a rule weren’t even close. Our tightest squeeze was when we whipped the Mutuals of New York by four to two. But the way we treated the Buckeye team was a sin and a shame,” he chuckled. “We walloped them by one hundred and three to eight.”
The veteran was getting warmed up now and his eyes flashed as he recalled the glorious exploits of his young manhood.
Just then the waiter came along and placed two checks on the table. Wilson reached for his, but Joe was too quick for him.
“No, you don’t,” he laughed, as his hand closed over both checks. “This is on me. It isn’t often that one has a chance of having a Red Stocking for a guest, and I’m going to make the most of it.”
“‘Youth will be served,’” quoted Wilson, with a smile, as he acquiesced good-naturedly.
“I hope you’re not traveling with anybody,” said Joe, as they rose to leave the table, “because if you’re not I hope to have your company for the rest of the evening.”