LITMIR.BIZ

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      “Nan, what could you expect?” was the cool reply. “You sat up in the stand with your handsome friend. I reckon I couldn’t pitch. I just gave the game away.”

      “Whit!—Whit!—”

      Then I whispered to Milly that it might be discreet for us to move a little way from the vicinity.

      It was on the second day afterward that I got a chance to talk to Nan. She reached the grounds early, before Milly arrived, and I found her in the grand stand. The Rube was down on the card to pitch and when he started to warm up Nan said confidently that he would shut out Hartford that afternoon.

      “I’m sorry, Nan, but you’re way off. We’d do well to win at all, let alone get a shutout.”

      “You’re a fine manager!” she retorted, hotly. “Why won’t we win?”

      “Well, the Rube’s not in good form. The Rube—”

      “Stop calling him that horrid name.”

      “Whit’s not in shape. He’s not right. He’s ill or something is wrong. I’m worried sick about him.”

      “Why—Mr. Connelly!” exclaimed Nan. She turned quickly toward me.

      I crowded on full canvas of gloom to my already long face.

      “I’m serious, Nan. The lad’s off, somehow. He’s in magnificent physical trim, but he can’t keep his mind on the game. He has lost his head. I’ve talked with him, reasoned with him, all to no good. He only goes down deeper in the dumps. Something is terribly wrong with him, and if he doesn’t brace, I’ll have to release—”

      Miss Nan Brown suddenly lost a little of her rich bloom. “Oh! you wouldn’t—you couldn’t release him!”

      “I’ll have to if he doesn’t brace. It means a lot to me, Nan, for of course I can’t win the pennant this year without Whit being in shape. But I believe I wouldn’t mind the loss of that any more than to see him fall down. The boy is a magnificent pitcher. If he can only be brought around he’ll go to the big league next year and develop into one of the greatest pitchers the game has ever produced. But somehow or other he has lost heart. He’s quit. And I’ve done my best for him. He’s beyond me now. What a shame it is! For he’s the making of such a splendid man outside of baseball. Milly thinks the world of him. Well, well; there are disappointments—we can’t help them. There goes the gong. I must leave you. Nan, I’ll bet you a box of candy Whit loses today. Is it a go?”

      “It is,” replied Nan, with fire in her eyes. “You go to Whit Hurtle and tell him I said if he wins today’s game I’ll kiss him!”

      I nearly broke my neck over benches and bats getting to Whit with that message. He gulped once.

      Then he tightened his belt and shut out Hartford with two scratch singles. It was a great exhibition of pitching. I had no means to tell whether or not the Rube got his reward that night, but I was so happy that I hugged Milly within an inch of her life.

      But it turned out that I had been a little premature in my elation. In two days the Rube went down into the depths again, this time clear to China, and Nan was sitting in the grand stand with Henderson. The Rube lost his next game, pitching like a schoolboy scared out of his wits. Henderson followed Nan like a shadow, so that I had no chance to talk to her. The Rube lost his next game and then another. We were pushed out of second place.

      If we kept up that losing streak a little longer, our hopes for the pennant were gone. I had begun to despair of the Rube. For some occult reason he scarcely spoke to me. Nan flirted worse than ever. It seemed to me she flaunted her conquest of Henderson in poor Whit’s face.

      The Providence ball team came to town and promptly signed Henderson and announced him for Saturday’s game. Cairns won the first of the series and Radbourne lost the second. It was Rube’s turn to pitch the Saturday game and I resolved to make one more effort to put the love-sick swain in something like his old fettle. So I called upon Nan.

      She was surprised to see me, but received me graciously. I fancied her face was not quite so glowing as usual. I came bluntly out with my mission. She tried to freeze me but I would not freeze. I was out to win or lose and not to be lightly laughed aside or coldly denied. I played to make her angry, knowing the real truth of her feelings would show under stress.

      For once in my life I became a knocker and said some unpleasant things—albeit they were true—about Henderson. She championed Henderson royally, and when, as a last card, I compared Whit’s fine record with Henderson’s, not only as a ball player, but as a man, particularly in his reverence for women, she flashed at me:

      “What do you know about it? Mr. Henderson asked me to marry him. Can a man do more to show his respect? Your friend never so much as hinted such honorable intentions. What’s more—he insulted me!” The blaze in Nan’s black eyes softened with a film of tears. She looked hurt. Her pride had encountered a fall.

      “Oh, no, Nan, Whit couldn’t insult a lady,” I protested.

      “Couldn’t he? That’s all you know about him. You know I—I promised to kiss him if he beat Hartford that day. So when he came I—I did. Then the big savage began to rave and he grabbed me up in his arms. He smothered me; almost crushed the life out of me. He frightened me terribly. When I got away from him—the monster stood there and coolly said I belonged to him. I ran out of the room and wouldn’t see him any more. At first I might have forgiven him if he had apologized—said he was sorry, but never a word. Now I never will forgive him.”

      I had to make a strenuous effort to conceal my agitation. The Rube had most carefully taken my fool advice in the matter of wooing a woman.

      When I had got a hold upon myself, I turned to Nan white-hot with eloquence. Now I was talking not wholly for myself or the pennant, but for this boy and girl who were at odds in that strangest game of life—love.

      What I said I never knew, but Nan lost her resentment, and then her scorn and indifference. Slowly she thawed and warmed to my reason, praise, whatever it was, and when I stopped she was again the radiant bewildering Nan of old.

      “Take another message to Whit for me,” she said, audaciously. “Tell him I adore ball players, especially pitchers. Tell him I’m going to the game today to choose the best one. If he loses the game—”

      She left the sentence unfinished. In my state of mind I doubted not in the least that she meant to marry the pitcher who won the game, and so I told the Rube. He made one wild upheaval of his arms and shoulders, like an erupting volcano, which proved to me that he believed it, too.

      When I got to the bench that afternoon I was tired. There was a big crowd to see the game; the weather was perfect; Milly sat up in the box and waved her score card at me; Raddy and Spears declared we had the game; the Rube stalked to and fro like an implacable Indian chief—but I was not happy in mind. Calamity breathed in the very air.

      The game began. McCall beat out a bunt; Ashwell sacrificed and Stringer laced one of his beautiful triples against the fence. Then he scored on a high fly. Two runs! Worcester trotted out into the field. The Rube was white with determination; he had the speed of a bullet and perfect control of his jump ball and drop. But Providence hit and had the luck. Ashwell fumbled, Gregg threw wild. Providence tied the score.

      The game progressed, growing more and more of a nightmare to me. It was not Worcester’s day. The umpire could not see straight; the boys grumbled and fought among themselves; Spears roasted the umpire and was sent to the bench; Bogart tripped, hurting his sore ankle, and had to be taken out. Henderson’s slow, easy ball baffled my players, and when he used speed they lined it straight at a Providence fielder.

      In the sixth, after a desperate rally, we crowded the bases with only one out. Then Mullaney’s hard rap to left, seemingly good for three bases, was pulled down by Stone with one hand. It was a wonderful catch and he doubled up a runner at second. Again in the seventh we had a chance to score, only to fail on another double play, this time by the infield.

      When

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