Lefty Locke Pitcher-Manager

CHAPTER XXII

A DOUBTFUL VICTORY

“Who sent you here?” demanded the belligerent individual. “What business have you got coming poking your nose into my affairs? You’d better chase yourself sudden.”

Instead of exhibiting alarm, Lefty laughed in the man’s face. “Don’t make a show of yourself, Mit,” he advised. “Bluster won’t get you any ball players; at least, it won’t get you this one. I’ve already made a deal for Jones.”

“You haven’t got his name on a contract; you hadn’t time. If you had, Wiley’d told me.”

“I made a fair trade for him before I went North.”

Into Skullen’s eyes there came a look of understanding and satisfaction. His lips curled back from his ugly teeth.

“You didn’t have any authority to make a trade then, for you weren’t manager of the Stockings. You can’t put anything like that over on me. If you don’t chase yourself, I’ll throw you over the fence.”

Sensing an impending clash, with the exception of the mute and the catcher, the Wind Jammers ceased their desultory practice and watched for developments. A portion of the spectators, also becoming aware that something unusual was taking place, turned their attention to the little triangular group not far from the visitors’ bench.

“You couldn’t get Jones if you threw me over into Georgia,” said Locke, unruffled. “It won’t do you any good to start a scrap.”

“Permit me to impersonate the dove of peace,” pleaded Cap’n Wiley. “Lefty is absolutely voracious in his statement that he made a fair and honorable compact with me, by which Jones is to become the legitimate chattel of the Blue Stockings. Still,” he added, shaking his head and licking his lips, “flesh is weak and liable to err. If I had seen fifty thousand simoleons coming my way in exchange for the greatest pitcher of modern times, I’m afraid I should have lacked the energy to side-step them. The root of all evil has sometimes tempted me from the path of rectitude. But now Lefty is here, and the danger is over. It’s no use, Skully, old top; the die is cast. You may as well submit gracefully to the inveterable.”

Muttering inaudibly, Skullen turned and walked away.

“I have a contract in my pocket ready for the signature of Jones,” said Lefty. “Will you get him to put his name to it before the game starts?”

“It will give me a pang of pleasure to do so,” was the assurance.

There on the field, envied by his teammates, Mysterious Jones used Locke’s fountain pen to place his signature–A. B. Jones was the name he wrote–upon the contract that bound him to the Blue Stockings. What the initials stood for not even Wiley knew. For a moment the mute seemed to hesitate, but the Marine Marvel urged him on, and the deed was done.

“If you cater to his little giddyocyncracies,” said the sailor, “you’ll find him a pearl beyond price. Unless you’re afraid Skully may return and mar your pleasure, you may sit on the bench with us and watch him toy with the local bric-a-brac. It is bound to be a painfully one-sided affair.”

“Skullen,” laughed Lefty, “has ceased to cause me special apprehension. The contract is signed now.”

So Locke sat on the bench and watched his new pitcher perform. When he walked to the mound, Jones seemed, if possible, more somber and tragic than usual, and he certainly had his speed with him. Yet neither the ominous appearance of the mute nor his blinding smoke was sufficient to faze the Vienna batters, who cracked him for three clean singles in the last half of the opening inning, and then failed to score because of foolish base running.

“He seems to be rather hittable to-day,” observed Locke. “What’s the matter, Wiley? This Vienna bunch doesn’t look particularly good to me; just a lot of amateurs who never saw real players, I should say.”

“That’s it; that’s what ails them, for one thing,” replied the manager of the Wind Jammers. “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. Next round I’ll have to get out there on the turf and warn them; I’ll put the fear of death into their hearts. Get them to quaking and they won’t touch the horsehide.”

But such a program didn’t suit Locke. “If all Jones has is his speed and the fear it inspires, he won’t travel far in fast company. You ought to know that, Wiley. Big League batters will knock the cover off the fast one unless a pitcher puts something else on it. Sit still once, to please me, and let’s see what Jones can do without the assistance of your chatter.”

“It’s hardly a square deal,” objected the Marine Marvel. “The jinx has been keeping company with us ever since we struck Fernandon. From that occasion up to the present date, Anno Domino, we haven’t won a single consecutive game. Such bad luck has hurt my feelings; it has grieved me to the innermost abscess of my soul.”

“Do you mean to say that these country teams have been trimming you, with Jones in the box?”

“Alas and alack! I can’t deny it unless I resort to fabrication, which I never do. The Euray Browns tapped Jonesy for seventeen heart-breaking bingles, and the Pikeville Greyhounds lacerated his delivery even more painfully. My own brilliant work in the box has been sadly insufficient to stem, the tide of disaster.”

Locke frowned. What success, or lack of it, Wiley had had as a pitcher was a matter of no moment; but the statement that amateur teams of no particular standing had found Mysterious Jones an easy mark was disturbing. Was it possible that he had been led, with undue haste, to fritter away good money for a pitcher who would prove worthless in the Big League? True, the mute had seemed to show something in the Fernandon game, but in similar contests Lefty had seen many a pinheaded, worthless country pitcher give a fine imitation of Walter Johnson in top-notch form. The test of the bush was, in reality, no test at all.

Throughout five innings the southpaw succeeded in restraining Wiley, and during that portion of the game the Viennas found Jones for nine singles and two doubles, accumulating four runs. Only for bad judgment on the paths they might have secured twice as many tallies. In the same period the local pitcher, using a little dinky slow curve, held the visitors to one score. The mute seemed to be trying hard enough, but he could not keep his opponents from hitting.

With the opening of the sixth, Wiley broke the leash of restraint. “I’ve got to get out and get under,” he declared. “You can’t expect me to sit still and watch my barkentine go upon the rocks. Here’s where we start something. Get into ’em, Schepps! Begin doing things! We’ll back you up, for in onion there is strength.”

Schepps led off with a hit, and immediately the Wind Jammers, encouraged by Wiley, leaped out from the bench, dancing wildly and tossing the bats into the air. Locke smiled as he watched them. He had seen Big League teams do the same thing in an effort to drive away the jinx and break a streak of bad luck. But although Lefty smiled, he was not wholly happy.

“If Jones is a quince,” he thought, “I’ve wasted my time trying to brace up our pitching staff. Even Mit Skullen will have the laugh on me.”

His anxiety had led him to come straight from New York to Vienna, without stopping at Fernandon. He had sent a message to Janet telling her that he would be home the following day.

The Wind Jammers kept after the local twirler, and succeeded in pounding two men round to the registry station. Then Wiley did some wigwagging to Jones, and the gloomy mute nodded assurance. After which he walked out and fanned three batters in a row.

“You see, Lefty!” exulted the Marine Marvel. “That’s what he needs. Give him proper encouragement, and he’s there with the damsons.”

“Temperamental or yellow, which?” speculated the southpaw. “Either sort of a pitcher is worthless in pinches.”

The visitors failed to continue their hitting streak in the seventh. Whether or not Jones was disheartened by this, he let down in the last half of the inning, and Vienna added another score, Wiley’s warnings having no impression upon them. Nor did the mute show any remarkable form in the remainder of the game, which terminated with the score six to four in favor of the locals.

“The old jinx is still with us,” lamented the dejected manager of the Wind Jammers. “Wouldn’t it congeal your pedal extremities!”

“It is enough to give one cold feet,” admitted Locke. “But with Jones doing any real pitching to-day four tallies would have been sufficient for you.”

Picking up his overcoat and traveling bag, he started to follow the well-satisfied crowd from the field. As he approached the gate, Mit Skullen stood up on the bleachers and singled him out. Mit’s face wore a leering grin.

“You’re welcome to that lemon, Locke!” he cried. “I wouldn’t take him now for a gift. You’ve got stung good and proper.”

Lefty walked on without replying.

CHAPTER XXIII

ALL WRONG

When Locke reached Fernandon, he found, as he expected, a furious message from Weegman awaiting him. In it he was savagely reprimanded, and warned under no circumstances to make any further deals without consulting Collier’s private secretary. He was also commanded to report at the office of the Blue Stockings baseball club without unnecessary delay.

Lefty merely smiled over this, but he did not smile over a long telegram from Franklin Parlmee, stating that he had not seen Virginia Collier nor heard anything further from her. Parlmee averred that he could not believe Virginia was in New York; he expressed the conviction that Locke had not seen her in the limousine with Bailey Weegman, but had been deceived by a resemblance. But if she were not in New York, where was she? And why had he received no word from her?

Janet watched Lefty frowning and biting his lip over Parlmee’s message. Her own face showed the anxiety she felt.

“What do you think?” she asked. “It doesn’t seem possible that Virginia could have been with that man, as you thought. You must have been mistaken.”

He shook his head. “I’m positive, Janet. I would be willing to wager anything that I made no mistake.”

“Then what does it mean? I can’t imagine Virginia being in New York without letting Frank know.”

“It’s got me guessing,” Locke admitted. “There’s a snarl that needs to be untangled.”

She grabbed his arm. “You don’t suppose–”

“What?” he asked, as she hesitated.

“You don’t suppose anything terrible could have happened to Virginia? Perhaps that villain has carried her off–shut her up somewhere! Perhaps she is helpless in his power this minute. He may be trying to force her into marrying him.”

Lefty laughed. “That sounds too much like a dime novel, my dear. Scoundrel though he is, Weegman would scarcely have the nerve to try anything like that with the daughter of Charles Collier. That’s not the answer.”

“But something’s wrong,” insisted Janet.

“No doubt about that,” her husband replied. “A lot of things seem to be wrong. Somebody is dealing the cards under the table.”

“I know,” said Janet, “that Virginia didn’t care for Mr. Weegman, and the more her father sought to influence her the less she thought of him. She was proud of Franklin because he had proved his business ability, and she thought Mr. Collier would give in soon. But I can’t understand why she stopped writing to me. She hasn’t written since arriving on this side.”

“We’re not getting anywhere by speculating like this,” said Lefty. “Can you be ready to go North with me to-morrow?”

“You are going back so soon?”

“Just as soon as we can start. I’m thinking I ought to have remained there. I only came South at all in order to make sure of Mysterious Jones, and now it looks as though I wasted both time and money by doing so. Perhaps I would have been better off if Skullen had succeeded in getting Jones away from me.”

“But the cottage–our lease runs another full month.”

“It can’t be helped. We’ll have to pay the rental and give it up.”

“And your arm–you thought another month down here might give you time to work it back into condition.”

“I’ve got plenty to worry about besides my arm. I’ve been told plainly that I’ve been picked to be the goat by a set of scoundrels who are trying to put over a dirty piece of work, and, if I fool them, I’ll have to do it with my head, not my arm. I’m going to stake everything on my ability to put the kibosh on their crooked game, and to stand any chance of succeeding I must be on the field of battle. So we must leave Fernandon to-morrow, my dear.”

To accomplish this necessitated no small amount of hustling, but Janet did her part. With the assistance of her maid and a colored man, the work was speedily done. There were tears in Janet’s eyes when she looked back at the deserted little cottage, as they drove away in a carriage to catch the train.

“It has been pleasant here,” she said. “I’ll never forget it. We were so quiet and so happy. Now, somehow, I have a feeling that there’s nothing but trouble ahead of us. You’ve taken a big contract, Phil.”

“Are you afraid?” he asked.

She looked up at him and smiled proudly. “Not a bit. You are not the sort of man who fails. I know you’ll win out.”

His cheeks glowed and a light leaped into his eyes. “After hearing you say that, I couldn’t fail, Janet, dear,” he said quietly but earnestly. “It’s going to be some fight, but let it come–I’m ready.”

The journey northward was uneventful. Locke had wired both Kennedy and Parlmee when he would arrive in New York, asking them to meet him at the Great Eastern. He did not stop off at the home town of the Blue Stockings, choosing to disregard for the present Weegman’s imperative order for him to report at once at the office of the club. By mail he had formally notified the secretary of the club of the trade with Frazer and the purchase of Mysterious Jones, directing that checks be sent immediately to the manager of the Wolves and to Cap’n Wiley. He had done this as a matter of formality, but he felt sure that Weegman would interfere and hold up the payments, even though they could, sooner or later, be legally enforced. Delay matters as he might, the rascal could not bring about the repudiation of business deals entered into by the properly authorized manager of the team. Locke hoped to have the situation well in hand before he should find it necessary to beard the lion in all his fury. The showdown must come before long, but ere that time the southpaw hoped to fill his hand on the draw.

When he had sent out the players’ contracts from Indianapolis he had instructed the men, after signing, to mail them directly to him in New York. He had made this request emphatic, warning each man not to return his signed contract to the office of the Blue Stockings. He had Kennedy to thank for suggesting this procedure.

“If the contracts go back to the club office,” old Jack had said, “Weegman may get hold of them and hold out on you. That would leave you in the dark; you wouldn’t know who had signed up and who hadn’t, and so you couldn’t tell where you stood. It would keep you muddled so you wouldn’t know what holes were left to be plugged. If you undertook to find out how the land lay by wiring inquiries to the players, you’d make them uneasy, and set them wondering what was doing. Some of them might even try belated dickering with the Feds, and, while you could hold them by law, it would complicate things still more. If the newspapers got wise and printed things, the stock of the club would slump still more, which would help the dirty bunch that’s trying to knock the bottom out of it.”

Beyond question, Kennedy was foxy and farseeing, and Locke looked forward expectantly to another heart-to-heart talk with the old man at the Great Eastern.

A big bundle of mail was delivered to Lefty after he registered at the hotel. Immediately on reaching his rooms he made haste to open the letters.

“Look, Janet!” he cried exultantly, after he had torn open envelope after envelope. “Here are the contracts–Grant, Welsh, Hyland, Savage, Dillon, Reilley, and Lumley all have signed, as well as the youngsters who didn’t attract special attention from the Feds. Not a man lost that the outlaws hadn’t gobbled up before Weegman so kindly forced the management upon me. We’ve got the makings of a real team left. Some of the deadwood has been cleared away, that’s all.”

With scarcely an exception, the players had sent, along with their contracts, brief, friendly letters congratulating Locke and expressing confidence in his ability to manage the Blue Stockings successfully. He had won the regard of them all; in some cases that regard fell little short of genuine affection. With him as their leader they would fight with fresh spirit and loyalty.

“It’s fine, Lefty!” exclaimed Janet, as she read some of those cheery letters. “There was a time when I could not have believed professional ball players were such a fine lot of men.”

“I might have had some doubts myself before I was associated with them,” he admitted; “but experience has taught me that they measure up in manhood as well as any other class. Of course, black sheep may be found in every business.”

As he spoke, he hurriedly opened a letter that had just attracted his attention among those remaining. He read it aloud:

My Dear Hazelton: I am writing in haste before sailing for Liverpool on the Northumberland. As I thought, you were wrong about having seen Virginia in New York. She is in London, and in trouble. I’ve had a cablegram from her which, however, explains very little. She needs me, and I am going to her at once. If you should wish to communicate with me, my address will be the Cecil. As I know that both you and Mrs. Hazelton feel some anxiety about Virginia, I shall let you hear from me as soon as I have any news.

Wishing you the success and good fortune you deserve as a baseball manager, I remain, sincerely yours, Franklin Parlmee.

When he had finished reading, he stood staring at the letter in surprise.

CHAPTER XXIV

WHEELS WITHIN WHEELS

“Well, now, what do you know about that?” cried Lefty. “Sailed for Liverpool! The man’s crazy!”

“But he says he has had a cable message from Virginia,” said Janet. “She is in trouble in London. You were mistaken.”

“Was I?” queried the southpaw, as if not yet convinced.

“You must have been. All along I have thought it likely, but you persisted–”

“I saw her distinctly in that passing limousine, which was brightly lighted. True, I obtained only one passing glance at her, but it was enough to satisfy me.”

“You are so persistent, Phil! That’s your one fault; when you think you’re right, all the argument and proof in the world cannot change you.”

“In short, I’m set as a mule,” he admitted, smiling. “Well, there are worse faults. A mistake may prove costly or humiliating to an obstinate person who persists in his error, but, when he is right, such a person is pretty well qualified to win over all opposition. If I did not see Virginia Collier in that car, she has a perfect double in New York. I have great confidence in the reliability of my eyes.”

Janet, however, thoroughly convinced that her husband had been deceived by a resemblance, made no reply.

Lefty had looked for some word from Kennedy, but had found nothing from him in his bundle of mail. It was possible, of course, that old Jack had found it inconvenient to make the trip to New York just then; but, naturally, if he could not come on he would have let Locke know.

Lefty and Janet had not dined on the train, preferring to do so after reaching their destination. As they were passing the desk on their way to the dining room, Locke stopped short, staring at the back of a slender, well-dressed young man who was talking to one of the clerks. Then the southpaw sprang forward and clapped a hand on the young man’s shoulder.

“Jack Stillman!” he exclaimed impulsively.

The man turned quickly.

“If it isn’t Lefty Locke!” he cried, grabbing the pitcher’s hand. “And you’re the one man I’ve been palpitating to get hold of. You’re like the nimble flea. But I’ve got you now!”

“Murder!” said the southpaw. “My joy at spotting you caused me to forget. I should have passed you by, old man. For the moment I completely forgot your profession, and your knack of digging a column or so of sacred secrets out of any old ball player who knows anything he shouldn’t tell.”

Stillman was the baseball man of the Blade, a newspaper with a confirmed habit of putting over scoops. With the exception of Phil Chatterton, who was more of a special writer than reporter, Stillman was almost universally acknowledged to be the best informed pen pusher who made a specialty of dealing with the national game. He possessed an almost uncanny intuition, and was credited with the faculty of getting wise in advance to most of the big happenings in the baseball world.

“So you would have ducked me, would you?” said the reporter reprovingly. “Well, I didn’t think that of you!”

“I believe I should, if I’d stopped to figure out the proper play in advance,” confessed Lefty. “I don’t care to do much talking for the papers–at present.”

“Hang you for an ungrateful reprobate!” exclaimed Stillman, with a touch of earnestness, although he continued to laugh. “Why, I made you, son! At least, I’m going to claim the credit. When you first emerged from the tangled undergrowth I picked you for a winner and persistently boosted you. I gave you fifty thousand dollars’ worth of free advertising.”

“And made my path the harder to climb by getting the fans keyed up to look for a full-fledged wonder. After all that puffing, if I’d fallen down in my first game, Rube Marquard’s year or two of sojourning on the bench would have looked like a brief breathing spell compared to what would have probably happened to me.”

“But you didn’t fall down. I told them you wouldn’t, and you didn’t. Let the other fellows tout the failures; I pick the winners.”

“Modest as ever, I see,” said Locke. “Here’s Mrs. Hazelton waiting. We’re just going to have a late dinner. Won’t you join us?”

Janet knew Stillman well, and she shook hands with him. “Mrs. Hazelton!” he said, smiling. “By Jove! I looked round to see who you meant when you said that, Lefty. Somehow I’ve never yet quite got used to the fact that your honest-and-truly name isn’t Locke. I’ll gladly join you at dinner, but a cup of coffee is all I care for, as I dined a little while ago. Shan’t want anything more before two or three o’clock in the morning, when I’m likely to stray into John’s, where the night owls gather.”

When they had seated themselves at a table in the almost deserted dining room, Lefty warned Janet.

“Be careful what you say before him, my dear,” he said. “He’s looking for copy every minute that he’s awake, and nobody knows when he sleeps.”

Stillman became serious. “Locke,” he said, “I’ve never yet betrayed a confidence. Oh, yes, I’m a reporter! But, all the same, I have a method of getting my copy in a decent fashion. My friends don’t have to be afraid of me, and close up like clams; you should know that.”

“I do,” declared the southpaw promptly. “I didn’t think you were going to take me quite so seriously. You have been a square friend to me, Jack.”

“Then don’t be afraid to talk. I’ll publish only what you’re willing I should. You can tell me what that is. And if you’ve seen the Blade right along you must be aware that it’s the one paper that hasn’t taken a little poke at you since you were tagged to manage the Blue Stockings. Nevertheless, here to your face I’m going to say that I’m afraid you’ve bitten off more than you can chew.”