The Zane Grey Megapack. Zane Grey

we’d sooner break our bad streak. Are you going to work me today?”

      “How’s your arm?”

      “Good. It’s getting strong. What I need is work. When I get my speed, I’ll make these puff-hitters lay down their bats.”

      With that Castorious swaggered into the dressing-room under the grandstand, followed by the little manager. Chase left his post, went to the door, hesitated when he saw the place full of ball players in the various stages of dressing, and then entered and walked straight up to the manager.

      “I heard you say you needed a shortstop. Will you give me a chance?”

      He spoke distinctly, so that everyone in the room heard him. The manager looked up to speak when Castorious bawled out:

      “Fellows, here he is! He’s been camping on our trail. I said somebody had Jonahed us. It’s the crooked-eyed hoodoo!”

      Ball players are superstitious and are like sheep, inasmuch that they follow one another. The uproar that succeeded upon Castorious’s discovery showed two characteristic traits—the unfailing propensity of the players to make game of anyone, and the real anxiety with which they regarded any of the signs or omens traditionally disastrous. How well they recognized Chase showed the manner in which they followed anything written about baseball.

      “Hello, there, Chaseaway!”

      “Where’s your pants?”

      “Hoodoo!”

      “Jonah!”

      “Don’t look at me with that eye.”

      “To the woods for yours!”

      Chase stood there bravely, with the red mantling his face, waiting for the manager to speak. Once or twice Mac attempted to make himself heard, and failing, turned on his gibing players and ordered them to shut up. Then he said:

      “Are you really the fellow they’re guyin’?”

      “Yes.”

      “But he was a pitcher. You said you could play short.”

      “I can play anywhere.”

      “Let me see your mitts; stick out your hands.”

      Chase’s hands were broad, heavy, with long, powerful fingers. “You’re pretty young, ain’t you? Where have you played?”

      Chase told his age and briefly outlined his late experience.

      “Name ‘Hoodoo’ followed you, eh? Been up against it hard?”

      “Yes.”

      Mac laughed and said he knew how that was, then thoughtfully pulled on his cigar. Now it chanced that he was not only an astute manager, but a born trainer of ball players as well. He never overlooked an opportunity. He had seen seedier-looking fellows than Chase develop into stars that set the baseball world afire. Nevertheless, having played the game himself, he was not exempt from its little peculiarities and superstitions. If his team had been winning, he certainly would have thrown any slant-eyed applicant out of the grounds.

      His small, shrewd eyes studied Chase intently.

      “I’ll play you at short today. Barnes, get this fellow a suit.”

      Barnes, the groundkeeper, opened a locker and threw a uniform on the floor at Chase’s feet. His surly action was significant of how thoroughly he had assimilated his baseball education. But he did not say anything, nor did the players, for at that moment there was a stern decision about the little manager which brooked no interference.

      Ordinarily Mac was the easiest-going fellow in the world, overrun and ruled by his players; sometimes, however, he showed an iron hand. But when he had left the dressing-room, a storm burst over poor Chase’s head.

      “You blank-eyed idiot! What do you want to queer the team for?”

      “This is a championship club, sonny.”

      “Don’t look at me with your bum lamp!”

      “I want my notice. I’m through with Findlay.”

      “Now for the toboggan! Last place for ours!”

      Used as Chase had become to the manner of badinage directed at him, he had never encountered it like this. The players spoke good-naturedly, and a laugh followed each particular sally; nevertheless they were in deadly earnest and seemed to consider his advent a calamity which he could have spared them. He dressed in silence, and avoided looking at them, as if indeed their conviction was becoming truth to him, and went out on the grounds.

      He got through the few moments of practice creditably, but when the gong rang calling the players in for the game to begin, a sudden nervousness and nausea made him weak, blind, trembling. The crowded grandstand blurred indistinctly in his sight. The players moved in a sort of haze, and what he heard sounded far off.

      Chase started into that game with a nightmare. When at the bat he scarcely saw the ball, and was utterly at the mercy of the Kenton pitcher. In the field he wobbled when the ball came toward him; it bounded at him like a rabbit; it was illusive and teasing, and seemed to lure him to where it was not; it popped out of his hands, and slipped like oil between his legs; it had a fiendish propensity for his shins, and though it struck sharply, seemed to leave no pain.

      On the solitary occasion when he did get his hands squarely on the ball he threw it far over the first-baseman’s head, far over the right-field bleachers.

      He was dimly conscious that the game was a rout; that the Findlay players, rattled by his presence, sore at his misplays, went to pieces and let Kenton make a farce out of it. He heard the growls of disapproval from the grandstand, the roar from the bleachers—the hooting and tin-canning from the small boys.

      And when the game ended, he sneaked off the field, glad it was all over, and entered the dressing-room in a sick and settled hopelessness.

      Roar on roar greeted him. He fell on a bench and bowed his head in his hands. The scorn, invective, anger, and caustic wit broke about his deadened ears.

      Presently Castorious stalked into the room, followed by Mac and several directors of the club. Cas was frothing at the mouth; big brown freckles shone through his pale skin; his jaw set like a bulldog’s. With the demeanor of a haughty chieftain approaching a captive bound to the stake, he went up to Chase and tapped him on the shoulder.

      “Say! Did anybody, did anybody, did anybody ever tell you you could play ball?”

      Chase lifted his face from his hands and looked at Cas. “Yes,” he said, with a wan smile, “but I guess they were mistaken.”

      Cas opened his lips to say something further, but the words never came. He took a long look at Chase, then went to his locker, sat down, and with serious, thoughtful brow began changing his clothes.

      Mac’s sharp voice suddenly stilled the babel in the room. “Gentlemen, either I run this team my own way, or not at all. That’s it. I’m ready to resign now.”

      “Here, here, Mac, cool down!” said one. “We’re perfectly satisfied with you. We know we couldn’t fill your place. Beekman was a little hasty. He’s a hard loser, you know. So never mind what’s been said. Pull the team out of this rut, that’s all we want. We’ve got confidence in you, and whatever you say goes. If you want money to get a new player or two to strengthen up, why speak out. Findlay must be in front.”

      “Gentlemen, I don’t need any money. I’m carryin’ sixteen players now, an’ I’ve got the best team in this league. All I want is a little luck.”

      “Well, here’s hoping you get it.”

      The directors shook hands with Mac and filed out of the dressing-room. When they were out of hearing, the little manager turned to his players. He seemed to expand, to grow tall; his face went white, his small eyes snapped.

      “Morris, go to the office an’ get your money,”