[CHAPTER XVII]
ERSKINE VS. HARVARD
The nine took its first long trip when it journeyed to Cambridge and played Harvard in a warm drizzle of rain that made the ball slippery and hard to hold, and set the players to steaming like so many tea-kettles. Erskine met her second defeat of the season that afternoon. She had an attack of the stage-fright usual to the teams of lesser colleges when confronting those of the “big four,” and it lasted until the fifth inning, when, with the score 9 to 0 in her favor, Harvard’s pitcher slumped and allowed the bases to fill for the first time during the contest.
Erskine awakened, then, to the fact that her opponents were only human beings, after all, and not supernatural personages protected by the gods, a fact which Hanson had been seeking to convince them of all day long, but without success. With bases full, one man out, and Bissell at bat, there seemed no reason why the Purple should not place a tally in her empty column. This was evidently the view that Bissell himself took, for after having two strikes and two balls called on him, he found what he wanted and drove it hard and straight between first and second. Gilberth scored, but Billings was caught out at the plate. Motter reached third and Bissell went to second. Hanson whispered to Lowe as he selected his bat. Harvard shortened field.
“Last man!” called the crimson-legged first-baseman.
“Last man!” echoed the shortstop.
Lowe’s first attempt at a bunt missed fire and the umpire called a strike on him. Then came two balls, each an enticing and deceptive drop. Lowe was the last man on the batting list, but if he wasn’t much of a hitter he at least was capable of obeying orders. He watched the balls go by in a disinterested manner that was beautiful to see. Then came another strike, and for an instant his round, freckled face expressed uneasiness. The Harvard pitcher decided to end the half, and threw straight over base. Lowe shortened his bat a trifle and found the ball, and the next moment both were going toward first base, the ball very slowly, Lowe about as rapidly as he ever moved in his life.
It was the pitcher’s ball, and the pitcher ran for it. Motter, at third, started pell-mell for home, only to stop as suddenly and dive back to the bag. But the pitcher knew better than to throw there, and as soon as Motter had turned he sped the ball to first. But he had delayed an instant too long, and the umpire dropped his hand in the direction of Lowe, who, with both feet planted firmly on the bag, was obeying Perkins’s repeated command to “Hold it, Ted!” It was a close decision, but there was no reason to judge it as unfair, and the game went on with the bases again filled and Erskine’s heavy batters up.