Burt L. Standish

“ He was home, and Garrity held him in the hollow of his hand. On the morrow the owner of the Blue Stockings was to feel the crushing grip of the triumphant schemer.
Weegman watched the southpaw’s face, noting the look of consternation upon it. Suddenly snapping his fingers, he began speaking again: “That’s why I came to you, Locke. What’s done must be done quickly. After eleven o’clock to-morrow it will be too late. You know what that means for you. Garrity hates you like poison, and you won’t last any time after he gets control. You can raise that money.” ”

“ At one end of the desk sat Tom Garrity, smoking a big cigar and looking like a Napoleon who dreamed of no impending Waterloo. He was speaking. His words and manner were those of a conqueror.
“You can see how the land lies, Collier. You should have sold out your interest in the team before going abroad. Weegman made a mess of it. To-day you can’t realize fifty cents on the dollar. I’ve offered you my Northern Can stock for your holdings. That’s the best way out for you now. If you refuse you’ll lose Northern Can and the team, both. Better save one by sacrificing the other.” ”

“ Kennedy merely went in as a pinch hitter–”
“And pounded the only run of the game across the rubber. No matter how air-tight a pitcher’s work may be, to win games the team behind him has got to hit. Kennedy was there with the goods.”
“That’s ancient history now. What has he done since then? As a player, he’s a has-been. He’s lost his eyes so that he can’t even bat in the pinches now. His sun has set, and he may as well retire to his farm and settle down for old age.”
“He hasn’t lost his brains,” asserted Locke warmly. “Playing or pinch hitting is a small part of a manager’s business. ”

“ The agreeable look was wiped from Weegman’s face as Locke passed on.
Some time after breakfast Lefty returned to the Magnolia to learn if Cap’n Wiley and his ball players had arrived. Approaching, he perceived a queer assortment of strangers lounging on the veranda, and from their appearance he judged that they were members of the team. Many of them looked like old stagers, veterans who had seen better days; some were youthful and raw and inclined to be cock-a-hoop. There was a German, an Italian, an Irishman, and a Swede. ”

“ The owner of the Wind Jammers looked startled. “Tell me not in mournful numbers that your star is already on the decline!” he exclaimed, looking at Locke with regret. “That’s what the Big Leagues do to a good man; they burn him out like a pitch-pine knot. I’ve felt all along that the Blue Stockings were working you too much, Lefty. Without you on their roster ready to work three or four times a week in the pinches, they never could have kept in the running.”
“You’re more than complimentary,” said 52 Locke, after giving Weegman a look. ”

“ Where’s Ashton and Gerrish, who struggled with the Blue Stockings before Kennedy stepped in on the turn of the tide? One’s running a cigar store in Kewanee, the other’s drinking himself to death in Muskegon; both left the game with busted reputations and broken hearts. Where’s McConnell, who tried to make a ball team of the Hornets before Brennan’s day? He took to the coke, and his friends are paying for his keep in a private bug-house. Where’s Decker, who had a crack at the Panthers–But what’s the use! There’s no surer way for a good man to ruin his career than to manage a losing ball team. ”

“ Locke rose and faced him. The scorn and contempt upon his face would have withered a man less calloused. Weegman recoiled a little, and his hand dropped to his side.
“Weegman,” Lefty said, “you’re the most treacherous scoundrel I ever had the bad fortune to meet. You’re just about as trustworthy as a rattlesnake. Heaven knows I need money, and I certainly want to hold my job, but not even to save my own father and mother from being turned out of the home that has sheltered them so long would I enter into any sort of partnership with you.” ”

“ Then he came forward and around, as if he would put the sphere over with the speed of a cannon ball–and handed up a little, slow bender.
But he need not have troubled himself to put a curve on that first one, for Fred Hallett, leading off for the Grays, stood quite still and stared like a person hypnotized. The ball floated over, and the umpire called a strike, which led Hallett to shake himself and join in the laughter of the crowd.
“What’s the matter? What’s the matter?” spluttered Wiley. “Was my speed too much for you? Couldn’t you see it when it came across? Shall I pitch you a slow one?” ”

“ Should he attempt it, even should he succeed, perhaps the morrow would find him with his salary wing as weak and lame and lifeless as it had been after that last heart-breaking game in the Big League.
Involuntarily, as he left the mound, he looked around for Weegman, who had disappeared. It gave Lefty some satisfaction to feel that, for the 80 time being, at least, he had wiped the mocking grin from the schemer’s face.
Cap’n Wiley jogged down from third, an expression of injured reproof puckering his countenance. “I am pained to the apple core,” he said. ”

“ Of course he had then sent word to Weegman, who was now on his way to New York.
“But he can’t get here before six o’clock to-night,” thought Lefty, “and my train for the South leaves at three-thirty-four.”
He did not relish running away from Weegman, and it had gone against the grain when, upon the advice of Kennedy, he had suddenly left Indianapolis. But he knew old Jack was wise, and the more he could accomplish without being interfered with by the rascal he despised, the stronger his position for open fighting would be when it became necessary to defy him to his face. ”

“ It’s the lowest-salaried team in the league. We have men getting twenty-five hundred or three thousand who should be drawing down twice as much, and would be with 15 any other winning Big League club. Only a man with Kennedy’s magnetism and tact could have kept them going at high pressure, could have kept them from being dissatisfied and lying down. What they’ve accomplished has been done for him, not for the owners. And now you tell me he’s to be canned. There’s gratitude!”
“My dear man,” chirruped Weegman, “baseball is business, and gratitude never goes far in business. ”

“ Wiley made some deft and rapid movements 59 with his hands and fingers, using the deaf-and-dumb language to make Jones aware of the identity of the famous Big League pitcher. Already the mute had lapsed into disappointed indifference, but he accepted Locke’s offered hand and smiled in a faint, melancholy way.
“He’s feeling especially downcast to-day,” explained Wiley, “and so he’ll pitch like a fiend this afternoon. He always twirls his best when he’s gloomiest; appears to entertain the delusion that he’s taking acrimonious revenge on the world for handing him some sort of a raw deal. ”

“ I wanted to see what the next twist of the joke would be.”
“Let me assure you that you will find playing against the Wind Jammers no joke. I have conglomerated together the fastest segregation of baseball stars ever seen outside a major league circuit, and I say it with becoming and blushing modesty. Look them over,” he invited, with a proud wave of his hand toward the remarkable group of listeners. “It has always been my contention that there are just as good players to be found outside the Big League as ever wore the uniform of a major. ”

“ I shall ask no advice from you, and any suggestion you may make I shall look upon with distrust.”
They fought it out, eye to eye, and presently Weegman’s gaze wavered before that of the unawed southpaw. The man he had sought to make his blind tool was defying him to his face.
“I see your finish!” he declared.
“And I see yours,” countered Locke. “You think you’re a clever crook. You’re merely an instrument in the hands of a bigger and cleverer scoundrel who doesn’t care a rap what happens to you if he can put his own miserable scheme over. Your partnership with him will be your ruin, anyhow. ”

“ The reporter lighted a fresh cigarette. “How does it happen,” he asked, “that Parlmee is buying up all the small blocks of the club stock that he can get hold of?”
Lefty started as if pricked by the point of a knife. Parlmee, an automobile salesman, a man who had found it necessary to get out and show that he could make good in the business world, buying the stock of the club!
“Is he?” asked the pitcher.
“He is,” asserted Stillman positively. “I know of three lots that he has purchased, and in each instance he has paid a little more than it was supposed to be worth.” ”

“ To them the unearthing of a ball player of real ability and promise is like striking the outcroppings of a Comstock or a Kimberly; and among the cheering surface leads that they discover, a hundred peter out into worthlessness, where one develops into a property of value. ”

“ Unless the eccentric and humorously boastful manager of the Wind Jammers had lost much of his judgment and cunning during the recent years that he had been out of the public eye, the fastest independent team would have to keep awake and get a fair share of the breaks in order to trounce him. ”

“ Now I like you, Locke; I’ve always liked you, and I hate to see you go down and out for good. That’s what it means if you don’t accept my offer. As manager of the Blue Stockings, you can hold your job this season if you don’t pitch a ball; it’ll enable you to stay in the business in a new capacity, and you’ll not be dependent on your arm. A pitcher’s arm may fail him any time. As a manager, you may last indefinitely. ”

“ They have accumulated together no special knowledge of Simon poor baseball talent, and so they don’t know enough to be scared. Even the great Mathewson has confessed that the worst bumping he ever collided with was handed out by a bunch of bushers who stood up to the dish, shut their blinkers when he pitched, and swung blind at the pill. These lobsters don’t realize that Jonesy’s fast one would pass right through a batter without pausing perceptibly if it should hit him, and so they toddle forth without qualms, whatever they are, and take a slam at the globule. ”

“ Rickey then lifted a high fly just back of first base, and Colby put him out of his misery. Plum batted an easy one to second.
“There’s only one thing for me to do,” thought Locke. “I’ve got to work the strike-out stuff in the next two innings, just as if men were on bases, and see if I’ve got it. The game will be over if I wait any longer for a real pinch.” ”

“ Our scouts have scoured the bushes from one end of the country to the other.”
“I never collided with any baseball scouts in Alaska,” said Wiley.
“Oh! You found Jones in Alaska?”
“Pitching for a team in Nome.”
“But baseball up there! I didn’t know–”
“Oh, no; nobody ever thinks of baseball up there, but in the all too short summer season there’s something doing in that line. Why, even modern dances have begun to run wild in Alaska, so you see they’re right up to the present jiffy.” ”

“ I know I could never get along with Kennedy. The manager must work with me; we’ll work together. Of course, in most respects he’ll be permitted to do about as he pleases as long as he seems to be delivering the goods; but it must be understood that I have the right to veto, as well as the right to direct, policies and deals. With that understanding to start with, we’ll get along swimmingly.” He finished with a laugh.
Lefty rose to his feet. “You’re not looking for a manager, Weegman,” he said. “What you want is a putty man, a figurehead. ”

“ In order to make him show his hand, the southpaw asked:
“What do you want for Mundy and Pendexter?”
Garrity considered for a minute. “Well,” he answered slowly, “I’ll trade them with you for Spider Grant–and cash.”
Lefty stared at him in amazement. Was it possible the man could think he was such a soft mark? He laughed loudly.
“You don’t want much, do you, Garrity? The ‘and cash’ was a capper! Man, I wouldn’t trade 231 you Spider Grant for your whole team–and cash!”
The owner of the Rockets scowled, glaring at Locke, the corners of his thick-lipped mouth drooping. ”

“ There’s a good reason: the crookedest magnate in the business–and, believe me, there’s one who can look down the back of his 144 own neck without trying to turn round–knows it would spell ruin to put over a frame-up on the open field. By nature the players themselves are like the average run of human critters, honest and dishonest; but experience has taught them that they can’t pull off any double deals without cutting their own throats. People who talk about fixed games, especially in the World’s Series, show up their ignorance. ”