Chapter XXIV: Jerry Loses His Title

Save for the substitution of Royce for McGee on second, and of Thacher for Grinnel as pitcher, North Bank went into the second Cumbridge Hall game with the same team that had played before. McGee had a bad leg as a result of trying to block a runner in Monday’s practice game. His injury was not serious and there was no question of his ability to play should Royce not prove satisfactory. Jerry’s secret hope of getting in at center field was blighted when manager Birkenside read out the batting order. Ted Beech was again slated for the position and Jerry joined the benchwarmers, disappointed but uncomplaining.

Cumbridge had brought along a goodly proportion of her students and one whole section of the third base stand was vivid with dark-blue banners. Across the diamond, the North Bank color showed more profusely if less brilliantly and North Bank cheers were incessant as the warming up ended and the two rivals took their places, Cumbridge at bat and the Light Blue in the field. Thacher threw in five wild ones to Tub Keller, the umpire called play and the first Cumbridge batsman took his place.

Hal Thacher caused his friends a lot of uneasiness that first inning, for he appeared to be suffering from stage fright and had much difficulty in finding the plate. He passed the first man up and put himself promptly in a hole with the second. Fortunately the latter, when he did hit, knocked out an easy fly to short left that Wayne Sortwell captured easily. Again Thacher pitched four balls and there were two on. Cumbridge cheered and shouted and stamped hopefully. In an effort to catch the runner on second napping, Thacher wheeled and pegged hurriedly to Jackson and the ball slammed into the dust and trickled into the field. Before it was retrieved the runner had slid to third. A moment later the man on first took second without challenge. With but one gone and men on third and second, the outlook seemed far from rosy for the home team, but Thacher settled down long enough to strike out the fourth batsman, and then, when the next man hit a weak one to the infield, to get the ball ahead of Royce and slam it to Keller at the plate in time for a put-out.

Thorogood, like Thacher, began with a bad inning, but, as in the other’s case, escaped punishment. Jackson was hit in the ribs and took his base, Lord hit safely for one and Conway flied out to shortstop. Royce was passed, advancing the runners and filling the sacks, but Tom Hartley fanned and Wayne Sortwell was an easy third out, second to first. After that the contest proceeded uneventfully to the fifth inning. Both Thacher and Thorogood had found their stride and hits were scarce and runs entirely missing. In the fourth Conway reached third with two out and died there when Royce fouled out to catcher, and that was as near to a score as either team got in the first half of the game.

The fifth opened with Cumbridge’s hard-hitting left fielder at bat, and that youth, a canny judge of balls, waited until Thacher had to offer him something reasonable. And when he did he laced it into far center for three bases. That punishment seemed to grieve the Light Blue’s pitcher so that he had no heart for his work in the succeeding five minutes, with the result that two more singles were added to Cumbridge’s column and two runs came across. A fine double play by Jackson and Lord stopped the visitors.

North Bank went out in one, two, three order in her half of the inning, but in the sixth after holding the enemy she brought delight and confidence to her adherents by scoring her first tally. This came as the result of a pass to Tub Keller, followed by a nice sacrifice fly by Thacher that placed Tub on second. Jackson fanned and then Pop Lord found something he liked and slammed it through the pitcher’s box and Tub scored. Lord went out a moment later in an ill-advised attempt to steal second.

There was no scoring in the seventh by either side, although Cumbridge got men on second and first before a batting rally was nipped by some fine pitching. That inning witnessed the replacement of Beech in center field by Jerry Benson and the return to his position in the infield of McGee as a result of loose playing on the part of the hard-working but inexperienced Royce. For Cumbridge just four men faced the pitcher in the seventh.

For North Bank, Conway started things with a bunt that placed him on first by a hair’s breadth. The umpire’s decision brought loud criticism from the visitors, but, since he was ten feet from the base and they at the other side of the diamond, it is fair to assume that he was in a better position to judge the play. At all events, that decision brought North Bank her tying run. McGee’s attempt to sacrifice resulted in his retirement, the ball dropping softly into second baseman’s hands. Jerry, amidst joyful acclaim from the Light Blue, faced Thorogood with a calm and earnest expression and set his feet in their accustomed straddle. The outfielders, at the command of the shortstop, who was also Cumbridge’s captain, wandered further backward. Thorogood had heard of Jerry, as had his catcher, and, while the Light Blue’s rooters expressed dissatisfaction in numerous ways, the catcher stepped to the right and Thorogood threw out to him. There was no question of reaching any of those balls and Jerry had to stand there helpless until four of them had drifted past and the umpire motioned him to his base. For Jerry that was a heartbreaking and degrading experience, and he ambled to first with drooping head quite as though he were personally responsible for what had occurred.

It was left to Tom Hartley to deliver the hit that would bring Conway home and place Jerry on second, and Tom delivered it nicely in the shape of a screaming single just out of shortstop’s reach. But that ended the scoring in the inning, for Wayne Sortwell struck out and Keller lifted a fly to right field that retired the side.

There was no scoring in the eighth. For that matter, no one reached first base for either team. The rival pitchers were going strong again and two strike-outs fell to each.

The ninth started with the head of Cumbridge’s batting list up. With one man out, a fly to short left eluded Sortwell and the runner, taking a desperate chance, went on to second and slid under McGee’s arm just as the latter swooped around with the ball. That, too, was a questionable decision, perhaps, in which case it evened up for the former one. When the dust had settled Thacher tried hard to strike out the Dark Blue’s captain. But, with two strikes on him and one ball, Jensen caught a hook on the tip of his bat and arched it nicely out of the infield just where no one, lacking wings, could possibly get under it. Captain Lord and McGee both tried for it, and Conway came in from right at top speed, but the ball fell safely to earth and the runner on second took third and was only prevented from going home by quick action on Lord’s part. As it was, he scuttled back to his base and was glad to reach it again. Jensen went to second on the first delivery. With men on third and second and but one out, North Bank’s chance to pull out safely looked very dim. But when, a few minutes later, the next batsman had hit weakly to shortstop and Jackson, after holding the runners, delivered the ball to Lord in the nick of time, the home team’s stock advanced many points. And presently the suspense was over, for, after knocking two fouls into the right field stand, the Cumbridge first baseman drove the ball straight at Lord’s head and Pop, more than half in self-defense, put up his hands and it stuck there!

“Another tie game!” was the prediction of many in the stands as the teams changed places for the last half of the ninth inning. But on the North Bank bench that belief didn’t hold. “Go after them, fellows,” said Captain Lord earnestly, and “Let’s take this game now,” said the coach quietly. “Don’t let him fool you, boys. Make him pitch to you. You know what to do, Conway. Let’s have it!”

“Conway up!” called Birkenside. “McGee on deck! Smash it, Dud!”

Yet, although Conway twice tried his hardest to lay down a bunt that would allow his fast legs to take him to first ahead of the throw, he failed, and, with two strikes and two balls against him, the best he could do was a weak grounder that was easily fielded by the third baseman and pegged to first ahead of the batsman. The North Bank cheers, which had dwindled away with the cheerers’ trust in Dud, began again as McGee strode to the plate. But McGee repeated Conway’s fizzle with the first pitched ball! Again third pegged unhurriedly to first for the out. Cumbridge yelled wildly and triumphantly. Many less interested spectators were already dribbling toward the gate, sensing an extra-inning contest that would drag along interminably without a decision. But North Bank was cheering again now, undismayedly, even with a new note of fervor, not only cheering but chanting! And the chant was this:

“_Benson! Benson! Three-Base Benson! Benson! Benson! Three-Base Benson!_”

“If he can deliver one of those wallops of his,” muttered Lord hopefully to Coach Keegan, “and get to third I’ll bet Hartley can bring him the rest of the way!”

“He will, I guess, if that pitcher will give him a chance,” was the reply. “If he knows his business, though, he will pass him, as he did before.”

But with two out, the bases empty and a tired arm at his side, Thorogood shook his head at the catcher’s signal for a throw out. He wanted to end the inning. He didn’t believe altogether in Benson’s ability as a hard hitter and felt fairly certain that, if he couldn’t dispose of him on strikes, he could make him hit a fly to the outfield.

Jerry, eying Thorogood anxiously, heaved a great sigh of relief as the first delivery, instead of passing wide of the plate, developed into a drop. In fact, he was so relieved that he didn’t even offer at it, nor show surprise or resentment when the umpire called it a strike. Instead, he grinned slightly, with his eyes more than his mouth, took a firmer grip on his bat, spread his legs by another inch and waited. The cheers from the right field stand were continuous, designed, I fear, as much to discourage the pitcher as to encourage Jerry.

Another delivery went past, this time a palpable ball, wide of the plate. Then Thorogood tried another drop. It had worked before, so why not again? Jerry watched the wind up, watched the ball start from the pitcher’s hand, watched it speed toward him like a gray-white streak, watched it―――― No, he didn’t watch it after that, for he had dropped his bat and was racing to first!

About him arose a thunder of shrill pæans of joy that, as he swung around first, dwindled to something approaching silence. But in another instant the shouting grew again, for far out on the green expanse of sunlit center fielder and right fielder had turned and were running back as fast as their legs would carry them! And around the bases went Jerry, past second and on to third, and would have stopped there in conformity to long custom had not Jackson waved and shouted him onward.

“_Go on, Jerry!_” roared Andy. “_Go on, you idiot! It’s a home run!_”

Some three and a half hours later Pop Lord arose at his place around the improvised table at The Cabin and held his tin cup aloft. They had eaten and sung and cheered and eaten more, those sixteen very happy banqueters, and now replete and comfortably weary, they had demanded a speech from the retiring captain.

“Fellows,” responded Pop, “and Coach Keegan. I’m a heap too tired to make a speech. I would if I could, but you’ll just have to excuse me, I reckon. All I’ve got to say is this. I’m mighty happy. And I’m mighty grateful to you fellows for the way you’ve worked with me to make this evening one of the jolliest of my short life. And I want to thank our host, on my behalf and on yours, for the corking feed he’s given us. After what he did this afternoon this banquet is laying it on, fellows, and we’re pikers if we don’t say so. So here’s a toast.” Pop waved his coffee cup in air. “To ‘Three-Base’ Benson――――”

He stopped short and shook his head.

“That won’t do! To ‘Home-Run Benson,’ best of hitters and finest of hosts! Let’s hear it!”

And he did hear it. And so did Jerry, who, shorn of his title, nevertheless looked strangely content and happy.

THE END

Transcriber’s Notes:

――Text in italics is enclosed by underscores (_italics_).

――Punctuation and spelling inaccuracies were silently corrected.

――Archaic and variable spelling has been preserved.

――Variations in hyphenation and compound words have been preserved.