Winning his game

by Ralph Henry Barbour

“Great work, Dud!” he said. “We made ’em look like pikers, didn’t we?”

“You!” laughed Parker, sitting next him. “What did you do, Eddie? Baker scratched every signal you gave him!”

“Me?” asked Brooks sarcastically. “Oh, nothing! I just held him, that’s all! You get up there and put your mitt against some of Dud’s fast ones and see how simple it is! Say, Dud, it would be fine if we could send them down in the next inning the same way, eh? Only thing is, that fellow Dollard, who bats second, is a pretty good hitter. He’s made two already out of three times up.”

“What’s the first fellow like?” asked Dud.

“Chapman? I guess that’s his name. Plays third. Oh, he’s not dangerous. He wants his base. Sneak over the first one for a strike and then tease him a couple of times with high ones. He’ll go after them every time. But Dollard’s not so easy. He waits for the good ones.”

“Then we’ll have to see that he doesn’t get them,” replied Dud simply.

“Well, if you can keep on working the corners the way you did last inning you’re all right. That ump has his eyesight with him. If he didn’t you’d get the worst of it lots of times.”

Grafton tallied twice more in her half of the eighth and then Dud went back to the mound and faced the small and stocky third-baseman. But he wasn’t hard. Once Dud thought he had lost his wish, but the ball rolled foul before it reached the third sack. After that there was no more trouble. Chapman, if that was his name, bit at a high one and missed it badly, let a ball go by and then again swung too late at a fast one that crossed the plate and retired disgruntled to the bench.

But Dollard was more canny. Dollard had to have good ones. Dud tried him on two that looked fair until they broke, but the batter treated them with contempt. Then Dud tried him out with a slow one and caught him napping. Dollard fouled the next one into the stand and the score was two-and-two. Brooks signaled for a straight one, hoping to finish him off, but Dud shook his head. Instead, he changed his position in the box a mite, wrapped his fingers about the ball, wound up, stepped forward and swung his arm wide at the height of his elbow. Brooks had to jump for that ball, for it proved a cross-fire indeed, and there was a perceptible moment of hesitation before the umpire reached his verdict. But when he did he said “You’re out!” so decisively as to make up for the hesitation. Dollard voiced objections all the way to the bench and let it be known by the manner in which he slammed his bat to earth that he was totally out of sympathy with that umpire! But the crowd cheered the strike-out and jeered the victim and the next batsman stepped to his place.

Then, for once, and for the first time since he had profited by Ben Myatt’s advice, Dud went back to his hooks and that third batter swung and dodged and swung again while Dud brought the game to an end with exactly four deliveries!