CHAPTER XXII

THE FINAL GAME

Graduation Day was all that it should have been as regarded weather. The morning was warm, but there was a fresh breeze from the southwest that stirred the maples along the village streets. Long before the exercises commenced the vicinity of the school was thick with cars, the Inn overflowed with visitors, and the little town had assumed the festal look that it wore once each year in June. The day belonged, of course, to the first class fellows, and they were much in evidence, some thirty-two in all, looking usually a bit self-conscious, sometimes rather self-important. The exercises were held out of doors on the lawn, the platform set against a background of trees, the settees ranged in semicircles before it. The scene was a fair one, colorful with the dresses of mothers and sisters and aunts dotting a lawn of emerald, with the bluest of blue skies above. One by one the graduates stepped to the platform and received their diplomas from Doctor Wyndham, shook the Doctor’s hand and turned to face a salvo of cheers from their fellows. An orchestra, hidden by the branches, played softly. The Doctor made his address, and Mr. Clendennin, Head of the Junior School, spoke. Then came the announcement of the prize winners, and finally a prayer. Clif, who had volunteered as a “roustabout,” hurried away to help a score or so of other boys prepare the assembly hall for the buffet luncheon to be served to the guests. There were long trestles to be set up, settees to be borne back from the lawn, a dozen other duties to be performed.

After luncheon the Doctor held a reception that lasted until half-past two, but Clif had nothing to do with that and set forth in search of Tom. The latter, though, was not to be found. Clif suspected that he had gone back to the Inn with Mr. Cooper after the exercises and had taken lunch there. He gave over the search at last and went up to his room and spent half an hour packing, he and Walter Treat getting horribly in each other’s way during the operation. At two he made his way to the gymnasium, decorated with gay bunting and flowers for the school entertainment and dance to be held that evening, and found the elusive Tom in the locker room getting into baseball togs.

Clif stared a moment in surprise. Then he gave a shout of joy that brought inquiring looks from the few other early arrivals. “You’re going to play!” he cried. “Say, that’s great! How’d it happen? Gee――”

“Let go of me and shut up,” said Tom, grinning. “Some one went and spilled an earful to Steve. I don’t know who it was. I thought it might be Wink, but he swears it wasn’t. Anyway, Steve said he’d been a bit too rough, and he guessed I’d been punished enough and told me to report for practice. He didn’t say he was going to let me play, but Wink thinks he is. Tough on Wink, but he acted mighty decent about it. Says he’s only getting what’s coming to him. A pretty nice guy, that fellow, Clif.”

Further remarks were prevented by the arrival of Hurry Leland. He had to shake hands with Tom earnestly, clap him on the back and punch him playfully in the ribs. “The million dollar infield again, Tom!” he chortled. “There’s nothing to it, fellows! It’s all Dark Blue!”

The rest of the team drifted in, heard the news and acclaimed it loudly. A quarter of an hour later they were out on the scrub diamond beginning an easy practice. Wolcott was already in evidence and the nearer stand had a brown tinge, although the game was not to start until three. After twenty minutes of work Coach Connover led the squad to a corner of the second team stand and talked to them a few minutes. Finally he read the batting-list: Tyson, 3B; Raiford, R.F.; Leland, S.S.; Bingham, C.F.; Talbott, L.F.; Kemble, 2B; Van Dyke, 1B; Cobham, C; Ogden, P.

“Let’s play this game steady, fellows,” ended the coach. “Make everything sure. Squeeze the ball every time you get it. If you do that, and hit the way you can hit when you make up your minds to, you’ll get the game, the series and the championship. No cheers, fellows. Let’s go.”

Wolcott retired from the first team diamond, and Wyndham took possession for five minutes amidst the wild applause of the crowded stand. In practice the “million dollar infield” showed wonderful form, and more than once Captain Leland, Tyson, Van Dyke or Tom pulled stunts that brought approval from the spectators. There was plenty of speed and vim to-day. Finally a short man in the traditional blue serge of his profession waved his mask and addressed the stands.

“La――dies ’n gen’mun! Batteries for the game! For Wolcott, Osterman ’n Bailey! For Wyndham, Ogden ’n Cobham! Play ball!”

It was the Wolcott captain and center fielder who started the scoring, in the first half of the second, with a clean hit past Hurry. He was advanced on a sacrifice, pitcher to first baseman, took third on a sacrifice fly to left field and scored on a hit over second. Wyndham tied the game up in the same inning, however. Clif, first of the Dark Blue to face Osterman in that frame, hit to third baseman who fumbled badly. With three balls and one strike on Tom, Clif got the signal and set out for second. Tom swung, but missed, and Bailey, the Brown’s catcher, pegged to the base. Clif slid under the ball safely. Tom struck out on the next delivery.

Talbott, following Tom at bat, reached first on an error, this time by second baseman, and on the throw to first Clif scuttled to third. The Wolcott infield appeared pretty well demoralized then. Talbott made an easy pilfer of second, the catcher making a short throw in hopes that Clif would try to score. But there was only one away and Clif hugged the bag. Van Dyke, after getting in the hole, began lifting fouls, and when he had sent right fielder twice across the line after them he managed to put the next fly fair. Clif brought in the tying run while the ball was being relayed to the plate. Cobham ended the inning with a strike-out.

In the next inning Ogden passed the third Wolcott batsman, but with two down he wasn’t risking much. The subsequent man flied out to Tom. Wyndham proved that she had lost her awe of Osterman by getting two hits in her half. Pat Tyson made the first, after Jeff Ogden had fanned, and stole second on the next pitch. Raiford flied to short center and made the second out. Captain Leland advanced Tyson to third and went to first on a hit through the box. Clif, however, had no luck this time, and his easy grounder to Osterman was fielded for the third out.

Clif got his first chance in the field when Wolcott’s shortstop selected Ogden’s first offering in the fourth and crashed it well toward the running track. Clif had determined to follow Mr. Connover’s instructions and “squeeze them” to-day, and when this ball landed in his hands he did his best to push it out of shape before he returned it to the infield. The previous batter had hit to first baseman for an easy out, and now, with two away, the next man secured Wolcott’s third bingle by poling a fast one into left field. When, however, he tried to go down to second Cobham’s perfect throw caught him standing up.

Talbott got his first hit in the last of the fourth, a Texas Leaguer back of shortstop, but he, too, was caught stealing. Tom hit a long fly to right for the second out, and Van Dyke fouled to first baseman. The game was going fast and honors were so far about even. Each team had scored once and each had three hits to its credit. Only in the matter of errors did Wyndham have the better of the argument, for the Dark Blue still had a clean slate while Wolcott had two miscues scored against her. There were thrills in every inning, and excitement was more intense than at either of the previous contests. Loring, seated to-day in the stand between Mr. Cooper and Wattles, had a simply frightful time with his scoring. Scoring calls for a steady hand and a cool head, and to-day Loring possessed neither!

But three men faced Ogden in the fifth, and but three faced Osterman. Each pitcher accumulated a strike-out, Jeff his first one of the game. In the sixth Wolcott started with the head of her list at bat. Ogden fanned him, however. The Wolcott left fielder smashed one at Tom and Tom tried hard to get it. He failed to reach it, though, by somewhat less than a foot and the ball traveled out to Raiford for a hit. Tom pulled down an easy fly and Talbott got under another.

Raiford swung hard at Osterman’s first delivery but missed it. Osterman coaxed him with two wide ones and then sent one about waist-high, and Raiford shortened his grip and laid down a pretty bunt that placed him on first by the skin of his teeth. Hurry sacrificed with a slow one to shortstop. As Raiford had started for second with a big lead he was safe before second baseman was in position to take a toss and the ball went to first for the out. Clif found his batting eye and smashed out a pretty liner to left field for two bases, scoring Raiford. On Tom’s out, second to first, Clif went to third and tallied when Talbott got his first hit which bounced off second baseman’s shins. Talbott himself was thrown out when he tried to steal.

Wyndham celebrated those two runs with some of the loudest, most riotous shouting ever heard on the field. With a two-run lead it seemed that the game was as good as won! And Wolcott offered nothing in her half of the seventh to throw doubt on the assumption. The “million dollar infield” disposed expeditiously of the first two batsmen and Raiford of the third. Wyndham arose for the lucky seventh, cheered, stretched and remained standing while Van Dyke went out; first baseman to pitcher, Cobham lost his race to the bag by inches against shortstop’s peg and Ogden lifted a fly to center fielder. Wyndham sat down again only mildly disappointed. Two runs was two runs!

Wolcott threw a scare into the Dark Blue’s camp in the first half of the eighth when, with one down, Osterman seemingly decided to do his bit toward winning the game. The Wolcott pitcher had been at bat twice before, and had been thrown out at first each time. Now, however, he let Ogden get himself in the hole and then straightened out the fifth delivery for a two-bagger into right field. Had Osterman been satisfied with two bases the final score might have been different, but he rashly tried to stretch what was a generous two base hit into a skimpy three with the result that Raiford’s throw to Hurry Leland and Hurry’s fast peg to Tyson landed the ball at third while the Wolcott pitcher was still a yard from his goal. Wyndham breathed deeply with relief and yelled uproariously. The third man was an easy out, Hurry to Van Dyke.

Wyndham again failed to hit in her portion of the inning, Tyson, Raiford and Leland falling victims to the infield. Then Wolcott went to bat in what was presumably to be the final inning, Wyndham took the field confidently and cheerfully and the less enthusiastic fans prepared to depart.