Rival Pitchers of Oakdale Part 9

"You're out!" shouted the umpire, and Pratt turned sadly and disgustedly toward the bench.

"Wonder what that Barville bunch is going to do with those horns and cowbells," cried Cooper, as the Oakdale cheer died away.

Whiting, the next batter, poked a hot one directly at Chipper, who plunged forward to get it on the first bound and made a miserable fumble. Chasing the ball, the little fellow snapped it up and threw wild to Crane.

Whiting improved his chance to take second, where he laughingly came to anchor, chaffing Cooper, who was making some very uncomplimentary remarks about himself.

"Here we go! Here we go!" roared Larkins. "Now we score. On your toes, Whiting! Here's the boy to drive you home."

Springer shivered suddenly as he saw the stocky, red-headed catcher of the visiting team step into the batter's box. Something told Phil that Copley would hit the ball, and in keen apprehension he pitched the first two so wide of the plate that Eliot was forced to stretch himself to get them. Copley hunched his shoulders and grinned tauntingly at the nervous fellow on the slab.

"Aw, put one over," he urged. "Lost your nerve? Going to walk me?

You don't dare----"

Apparently, he had relaxed and was holding his bat carelessly, so Phil tried to push over a swift, straight one. With a smash Copley landed on the horsehide, driving it toward right field.

"Ah!" gasped the spectators.

"Go!" yelled Larkins. "Score on it, Whiting! It's a two-bagger!"

Out there in right garden Rodney Grant was sprinting after that ball almost as it left Copley's bat. There seemed scarcely a chance for Grant to reach the whistling sphere, but he covered ground with amazing speed and leaped into the air, thrusting out his bare right hand. The ball smacked into that unprotected hand and stuck there, as Grant dropped back to the turf.

A few too eager enthusiasts on the Barville bleachers had started to blow horns and ring bells when they beheld Copley's drive shooting safely, to all appearances, into that unoccupied portion of the field; now, of a sudden, these sounds were drowned by the great yell--almost a roar--of joyous relief and exultation which burst from the Oakdale sympathizers. On those seats boys wearing the crimson colors jumped up and down, shrieking wildly, while they pounded other boys, similarly decorated, over their heads and shoulders; girls likewise screamed, waving frantically the bright banners, on each of which was emblazoned a large white letter O.

At the smash of bat and ball Phil Springer's teeth had snapped together, as if to guard his heart from leaping from his mouth; and despairingly he had whirled around to watch the course of the ball, perceiving out of the corner of his eye Whiting, with a long start off second, fairly tearing up the ground as he flew toward third on his way to the plate.

Phil likewise saw Rod Grant stretching himself to get that whistling white sphere, and even as a voice within the pitcher's brain seemed to cry, "He can't touch it!" the Texan made that amazing leap into the air and held the ball.

"Mercy!" gasped Phil. "What a catch!"

He waited for Grant, who came loping in from the field, his face flushed, his eyes full of laughter.

"Oh, you dandy!" cried Phil, giving his chum a resounding open-handed slap on the shoulder.

"That was reaching for it some."

"I sure didn't think I could touch it," confessed Rod; "but I was bound to try my handsomest for it." Which was characteristic of the young Texan.

"They're cheering for you," said Phil. Then jovially he reached and lifted Rod's cap with one hand, at the same time using the other hand to give his companion's head a push, thus forcing him to bow.

Newt Copley surveyed Oakdale's right fielder disgustedly. "That was a fearful blind stab," he said sourly. "Didn't know you had it, did you?"

"Not till I looked to see," acknowledged Rod pleasantly.

Eliot gave the boy from Texas a look of approval. "That's the way to get after them," he said. "That's playing baseball and supporting a pitcher."

"I was pretty rotten, wasn't I?" said Phil with a touch of dejection.

"Far from it," returned the captain, "you were pretty good. Copley was the only man who really made a bid for a hit."

"Sure," chipped in Cooper. "I was the real, rank thing, and if they'd scored I'd been responsible for it. I should have nipped Whiting without a struggle."

Phil suddenly felt better, as it was true that none of the first four men to face him, the pick of the enemy's batters, had hit safely; for which, cutting out Grant's performance, he was immediately inclined to take the credit, due quite as much, however, to Eliot as to him.

Sanger warmed up a bit by whipping a few to Larkins at first, while Copley was buckling on the body protector and adjusting the mask.

Oakdale had put her second baseman, Jack Nelson, at the head of the batting order, and Jack did not delay the game by loafing on his way into the batter's box.

"Get the first one, Sang!" barked Copley, squatting behind the plate and giving a signal. "He looks like a mark. Keep him off the pan, Mr.

Umpire; make him stay in his box." Then, under his breath, speaking just loud enough for Nelson to hear, he added: "Not that it makes any difference, for you couldn't hit a balloon."

"Couldn't I!" muttered Jack, strangely annoyed, for there was something indescribably irritating about the manner in which the red-headed catcher had sneered those words.

This irritation grew when Sanger warped over two zig-zags, and Nelson missed them both. Copley made no further remark, but his husky chucklings over the batter's failures, sent the blood to Nelson's head and a.s.sisted him in finally misjudging a high one on the inside corner.

"You're out!" p.r.o.nounced the umpire.

"That's the pitching, cap!" laughed Larkins. "They had their fun with you last year; now it's your turn."

Berlin Barker, regarded as an excellent batsman, was almost as easy for Sanger. True, Barker did foul the ball once, but that was the only time he touched it, and he likewise returned to the bench in a much disturbed frame of mind.

"Mr. Umpire," called Eliot, "will you keep that catcher from talking to the batters?"

"Go on!" growled Copley. "Who's talking to them? I can talk to the pitcher if I choose, and I've got a right to have a little conversation with myself."

"Don't pay any attention to him, Springer," warned Roger; "that's his trick."

Phil also missed the first ball delivered by Sanger.

"This fellow thinks he can pitch," cried Copley. "He's had a dream."

"There he goes, Mr. Umpire," cried Roger. "He's talking to the batter again."

"Oh, say, forget it!" scoffed the red-headed backstop. "I'm talking about our pitcher. He can't pitch a little bit--oh, no! He just dreamed he could, that's all. Put another one right over the pan, cap; there's no danger."

But Sanger, taking Copley's signal, bent one wide, and Phil fouled it off into the first base bleachers, where it was deftly caught by a spectator.

"He's in a hole," said Copley. "I wonder how these people ever got a hit off you, Sang."

The batter tried to steady himself. Two "teasers" he disdained, and then bit at a drop and was out, Sanger having fanned the first three men to face him; which seemed to justify the Barville spectators in breaking forth with their horns and bells at last, and they did so tumultuously.

CHAPTER X.

THE CRUCIAL MOMENT.

On the bleachers Roy Hooker breathed easier. "Len Roberts certainly told the truth," he thought. "Sanger is a crackerjack pitcher."