Читать книгу Round Up: The Stories of Ring W. Lardner - Lardner Ring - Страница 9

Table of Contents

And you ought to heard him out there on that field! They wasn’t a day when he didn’t pull six or seven, and it didn’t make no difference whether he was goin’ good or bad. If he popped up in the pinch he should of made a base hit and the reason he didn’t was so-and-so. And if he cracked one for three bases he ought to had a home run, only the ball wasn’t lively, or the wind brought it back, or he tripped on a lump o’ dirt, roundin’ first base.

They was one afternoon in New York when he beat all records. Big Marquard was workin’ against us and he was good.

In the first innin’ Ike hit one clear over that right field stand, but it was a few feet foul. Then he got another foul and then the count come to two and two. Then Rube slipped one acrost on him and he was called out.

“What do you know about that!” he says afterward on the bench. “I lost count. I thought it was three and one, and I took a strike.”

“You took a strike all right,” says Carey. “Even the umps knowed it was a strike.”

“Yes,” says Ike, “but you can bet I wouldn’t of took it if I’d knew it was the third one. The score board had it wrong.”

“That score board ain’t for you to look at,” says Cap. “It’s for you to hit that old pill against.”

“Well,” says Ike, “I could of hit that one over the score board if I’d knew it was the third.”

“Was it a good ball?” I says.

“Well, no, it wasn’t,” says Ike. “It was inside.”

“How far inside?” says Carey.

“Oh, two or three inches or half a foot,” says Ike.

“I guess you wouldn’t of threatened the score board with it then,” says Cap.

“I’d of pulled it down the right foul line if I hadn’t thought he’d call it a ball,” says Ike.

Well, in New York’s part o’ the innin’ Doyle cracked one and Ike run back a mile and a half and caught it with one hand. We was all sayin’ what a whale of a play it was, but he had to apologize just the same as for gettin’ struck out.

“That stand’s so high,” he says, “that a man don’t never see a ball till it’s right on top o’ you.”

“Didn’t you see that one?” ast Cap.

“Not at first,” says Ike; “not till it raised up above the roof o’ the stand.”

“Then why did you start back as soon as the ball was hit?” says Cap.

“I knowed by the sound that he’d got a good hold of it,” says Ike.

“Yes,” says Cap, “but how’d you know what direction to run in?”

“Doyle usually hits ’em that way, the way I run,” says Ike.

“Why don’t you play blindfolded?” says Carey.

“Might as well, with that big high stand to bother a man,” says Ike. “If I could of saw the ball all the time I’d of got it in my hip pocket.”

Along in the fifth we was one run to the bad and Ike got on with one out. On the first ball throwed to Smitty, Ike went down. The ball was outside and Meyers throwed Ike out by ten feet.

You could see Ike’s lips movin’ all the way to the bench and when he got there he had his piece learned.

“Why didn’t he swing?” he says.

“Why didn’t you wait for his sign?” says Cap.

“He give me his sign,” says Ike.

“What is his sign with you?” says Cap.

“Pickin’ up some dirt with his right hand,” says Ike.

“Well, I didn’t see him do it,” Cap says.

“He done it all right,” says Ike.

Well, Smitty went out and they wasn’t no more argument till they come in for the next innin’. Then Cap opened it up.

“You fellas better get your signs straight,” he says.

“Do you mean me?” says Smitty.

“Yes,” Cap says. “What’s your sign with Ike?”

“Slidin’ my left hand up to the end o’ the bat and back,” says Smitty.

“Do you hear that, Ike?” ast Cap.

“What of it?” says Ike.

“You says his sign was pickin’ up dirt and he says it’s slidin’ his hand. Which is right?”

“I’m right,” says Smitty. “But if you’re arguin’ about him goin’ last innin’, I didn’t give him no sign.”

“You pulled your cap down with your right hand, didn’t you?” ast Ike.

“Well, s’pose I did,” says Smitty. “That don’t mean nothin’. I never told you to take that for a sign, did I?”

“I thought maybe you meant to tell me and forgot,” says Ike.

They couldn’t none of us answer that and they wouldn’t of been no more said if Ike had of shut up. But wile we was settin’ there Carey got on with two out and stole second clean.

“There!” says Ike. “That’s what I was tryin’ to do and I’d of got away with it if Smitty’d swang and bothered the Indian.”

“Oh!” says Smitty. “You was tryin’ to steal then, was you? I thought you claimed I give you the hit and run.”

“I didn’t claim no such a thing,” says Ike. “I thought maybe you might of gave me a sign, but I was goin’ anyway because I thought I had a good start.”

Cap prob’ly would of hit him with a bat, only just about that time Doyle booted one on Hayes and Carey come acrost with the run that tied.

Well, we go into the ninth finally, one and one, and Marquard walks McDonald with nobody out.

“Lay it down,” says Cap to Ike.

And Ike goes up there with orders to bunt and cracks the first ball into that right-field stand! It was fair this time, and we’re two ahead, but I didn’t think about that at the time. I was too busy watchin’ Cap’s face. First he turned pale and then he got red as fire and then he got blue and purple, and finally he just laid back and busted out laughin’. So we wasn’t afraid to laugh ourselfs when we seen him doin’ it, and when Ike come in everybody on the bench was in hysterics.

But instead o’ takin’ advantage, Ike had to try and excuse himself. His play was to shut up and he didn’t know how to make it.

“Well,” he says, “if I hadn’t hit quite so quick at that one I bet it’d of cleared the center-field fence.”

Cap stopped laughin’.

“It’ll cost you plain fifty,” he says.

“What for?” says Ike.

“When I say ‘bunt’ I mean ‘bunt,’ ” says Cap.

“You didn’t say ‘bunt,’ ” says Ike.

“I says ‘Lay it down,’ ” says Cap. “If that don’t mean ‘bunt,’ what does it mean?”

“ ‘Lay it down’ means ‘bunt’ all right,” says Ike, “but I understood you to say ‘Lay on it.’ ”

“All right,” says Cap, “and the little misunderstandin’ will cost you fifty.”

Ike didn’t say nothin’ for a few minutes. Then he had another bright idear.

“I was just kiddin’ about misunderstandin’ you,” he says. “I knowed you wanted me to bunt.”

“Well, then, why didn’t you bunt?” ast Cap.

“I was goin’ to on the next ball,” says Ike. “But I thought if I took a good wallop I’d have ’em all fooled. So I walloped at the first one to fool ’em, and I didn’t have no intention o’ hittin’ it.”

“You tried to miss it, did you?” says Cap.

“Yes,” says Ike.

“How’d you happen to hit it?” ast Cap.

“Well,” Ike says, “I was lookin’ for him to throw me a fast one and I was goin’ to swing under it. But he come with a hook and I met it right square where I was swingin’ to go under the fast one.”

“Great!” says Cap. “Boys,” he says, “Ike’s learned how to hit Marquard’s curve. Pretend a fast one’s comin’ and then try to miss it. It’s a good thing to know and Ike’d ought to be willin’ to pay for the lesson. So I’m goin’ to make it a hundred instead o’ fifty.”

The game wound up 3 to 1. The fine didn’t go, because Ike hit like a wild man all through that trip and we made pretty near a clean-up. The night we went to Philly I got him cornered in the car and I says to him:

“Forget them alibis for a wile and tell me somethin’. What’d you do that for, swing that time against Marquard when you was told to bunt?”

“I’ll tell you,” he says. “That ball he throwed me looked just like the one I struck out on in the first innin’ and I wanted to show Cap what I could of done to that other one if I’d knew it was the third strike.”

“But,” I says, “the one you struck out on in the first innin’ was a fast ball.”

“So was the one I cracked in the ninth,” says Ike.