“The airplane!” he whispered excitedly. “Like the eagle, it is circling back.”
It was strange the excitement this stirred up within his being. Why was it? It seemed absurd, yet in his soul there was a feeling that the dark pitcher must hurry, that the men who came up to bat must go down as they had before, one, two, three, or else the eagle would drop. “What nonsense!” he muttered once more.
For all that, the airplane did circle lower and lower. There was too in the mysterious pitcher’s action a suggestion of tense nervousness that was hard to explain.
A bat cracked. A ball popped into the air. The pitcher had it. One man down.
A second man came up. Ball! Strike! Ball! Crack! Up went the ball again. Down it came, right into that pitching wizard’s mit. Two out.
The plane circled lower. In the damp, cloudy air it seemed nearer than it really was.
Third man to bat. Strike! Strike! Strike! You’re out!
“Just like that!” Johnny exulted. He did not so much as glance at the plane. He knew that once again it had gone skimming away.
“It’s strange,” he murmured.
“What’s strange?” Meggy asked.