“Ye-es,” Meggy replied slowly, “and I suppose that should make him my first cousin! But it doesn’t. I never saw him before, nor heard of him either. Uncle doesn’t tell me much about the laboratories. There are always so many secret investigations going on down there, so many processes being developed—things he can’t talk about—that—well, I guess he thinks it’s best to say nothing at all about any of it. And I suppose,” she added, “this pitcher is just one more secret.”
“But why would he hide out so?” Doug Danby asked.
“He just doesn’t wish to be recognized, that’s why,” Johnny said in a tone that carried conviction.
“In a town like this?” Doug exclaimed. “It sure does seem strange!” Had he but known it, those were the very words that were passing from lip to lip all over this quiet little city. “A strange pitcher! A mysterious dark stranger! And in a town like this!” That was what they were saying. And, almost without exception, the answer was, “Just think, in a town like this!”
“Well anyway,” Fred said, “he can pitch! And that’s just what we need. We’ll just have to have him next Wednesday when we go against Fairfield. They’re the toughest battling bunch we’ll play for a long time. You can’t count on me to lick them.”
“The ‘Prince’ only lasted two and a half innings,” Doug suggested.
“Yes, but some—” Johnny did not finish. What he started to say was, “Something rather terrible happened to him.” After all, he had only guessed that; could not prove it.
“Well,” Johnny said, “I gotta be anklin’ on home. Goodbye, Meggy. Goodbye, boys.”
A half hour later he was seated on a ridge that lay above the town. Beneath him was a long, low building.
“The laboratories!” he whispered. “Place of mystery. Home of the mysterious ‘Prince.’”