Dick Prescotts's Fourth Year at West Point Part 27

"If he'll come," nodded d.i.c.k.

"He must come. But you'll hold yourself ready, anyway, won't you?"

"I'd hate to go in without Greg," replied d.i.c.k. "He and I generally work together in anything we attempt."

"That was just the kick Holmesy made when you---when things were different," corrected the captain of the Army nine hastily.

"Well, you see, 'Durry,' we were always chums back in the good old High School days. We always played together, then, in any game, and either of us would feel lonesome now without the other."

"Oh, of course," nodded Durville. "Well, I'll see Holmesy and try to round him up, if you say so."

"I think I can get him to come around," smiled d.i.c.k. "But you may be tremendously disappointed in both of us."

"Can you play ball as well as Holmesy?"

"Perhaps; nearly, I guess."

"Then we surely do need you both, for we've seen Holmesy toy with the ball, and we know where he'd rate. Do you think you play baseball at the same gait that you do football, old ramrod?"

"I think it's possible that I do," d.i.c.k half admitted slowly.

"Always modest, aren't you?" laughed "Durry" good humoredly.

"Somehow, Prescott, it seems almost impossible to think of you heading a charge, or graduating number one in your cla.s.s. You'd be too much afraid that someone else wanted either honor."

Prescott laughed good humoredly. Then, dropping his voice, he went on very gravely:

"Durry, you've behaved very nicely to me in more ways than one, after that time when I necessarily reported you. Are you sure that you wholly overlooked my act."

"Glad you asked me, Prescott. I've come to realize that you did your full duty, and the only thing you could do as the captain of my company. But I was terribly upset that night. Nothing but a matter of the first importance would ever have driven me to slip into 'cits.' and sneak off the post in that fashion."

"I can quite believe that," nodded d.i.c.k.

"Well, it---it was a girl, of course," confessed "Durry."

"You know, cadets have a habit of being interested in girls, and this girl means everything to me. She's up in Newburgh, and was ill. I thought she was more ill than she really was. But I knew that I could hardly get official permission to go and see her, so---so I chanced it and went without leave. I wouldn't have done such a thing under any other circ.u.mstances."

"Did the young lady recover?" asked Prescott with deep interest.

"Oh, yes; I dragged her to the hop the other night. She was stepping around the hall with another fellow, for one of the dances, and that was how I came to be out in the air alone. But I'll look for both you and Holmesy at practice this afternoon," ended "Durry,"

hastening away.

"Go to a diamond try-out?" asked Greg when d.i.c.k broached the subject.

"Of course I will, and crazy over the chance. All that has held me back so far, old ramrod, was the fact that you hadn't been invited.

But now that has all been changed."

When the diamond squad reported, Lieutenant Lawrence, the head baseball coach, ordered the young men outdoors to the field.

"Come over here, please, Prescott and Holmes," called the coach, who had been conferring in low tones with "Durry."

"What positions do you two feel that you would be at your best in?"

"Why, we have conceit enough, sir, to think that we might make at least a half-way battery," smiled d.i.c.k.

"Battery, eh?" repeated Lieutenant Lawrence. "Good enough! Get out and do it. Durville, you're one of the real batsmen. Run out there to the home plate, and see whether Prescott and Holmes can put anything past you."

How good it felt to be in field clothes again! And both Greg and d.i.c.k wore on the b.r.e.a.s.t.s of their sweaters the Army "A," won by making the football eleven the year before.

d.i.c.k fingered the ball carefully while Greg was trotting away to place behind the home plate. Lieutenant Lawrence went more deliberately, but took his place where the umpire would have stood in a game.

"What kind of a ball do you like best, Durry?" asked Prescott, smilingly.

"A medium slow one, close to the end of the stick, about here,"

replied Durville.

"I'll try to give you something else, then," chuckled d.i.c.k.

And give the batsman something else was just what he did.

Crack! Durville swatted the ball. It rose steeply at first, then sailed away gracefully towards the clouds.

"Get a fresh ball!" shouted one member of the training squad.

"That leather isn't going to come down again!"

It did, though a scout had to run far afield to pick it up.

Lieutenant Lawrence didn't look exactly disappointed, but he had hoped to see something better than this had been.

Five more d.i.c.k pitched in, and of these "Durry" put his mark on three.

"That will be enough to-day, I guess, Mr. Prescott," remarked Lieutenant Lawrence in an even voice.

Poor d.i.c.k flushed, but was about to turn away from the pitcher's box when Durville turned to the Army coach.

"If you really don't mind, sir, I'd like to see Prescott throw in a few more. He hasn't held a ball in his hands for a long time, and I think he has only been warming up."

"If you really think it worth while," nodded the lieutenant.

Then, raising his voice:

"We'll have you try just a few more, Prescott. Try to astonish everyone!"

Greg, whose face had flushed with mortification, now crouched a bit, sending d.i.c.k one of the old-time signals. Holmes was not even sure his chum would remember the signal.

It is doubtful if anyone noticed the return that d.i.c.k sent back to show that he understood.

Durville took a good grip on his stick, his alert gaze on the man in the box.

With hardly a trace of flourish d.i.c.k let the ball go. On it came, not very swift and straight over the plate. "Durry" himself felt a sinking of the heart that. d.i.c.k should let such an easy one leave him.