Читать книгу The Baseball MEGAPACK ® - Zane Grey - Страница 6
ОглавлениеTHE TRUMP CARD, by Octavus Roy Cohen
All-players are born, not made. They’re like opera-singers and traveling salesmen and politicians: the temperament has got to be there when nursy first tells papa that it’s a boy, and mother and child are doing very well. Of course there are a bunch of men who attain more or less fame on the diamond, but that’s because there are a certain number of places in the big leagues that have to be filled by some one. But as to real, honest-to-goodness, dyed-in-the-wool, inspirational, instinctive ball-players—they come along about once in a decade.
Ty Cobb—you know the fellow—well, he’s one of ’em. Charlie Zimmer is another.
Charlie was bought by the Colts when they needed a crackerjack outfielder worse than an aviator with two busted planes and a balky motor needs a soft place to land. He was discovered by a scout in some bush league of the Middle West, clouting at an average close to .500, fielding one error short of perfect, and as wise to the inner workings of the game as a man can be.
He joined the Colts during their series with the Pheasants. He sat unassumingly and unconcernedly on the bench, acknowledged his introductions to the other players calmly and without the slightest exhibition of awe; criticized the method of handling a long relay in the third inning, and modestly explained how he would have done it.
Manager Clary sized him up carefully, and in the ninth inning, with the game hopelessly lost and one man on base, he sent Zimmer in as a pinch hitter. Charlie stepped into one of Dave Masterson’s fastest fast ones and lined it out for three sacks. Then he stole home.
He was oblivious to the delirious howls of the fans as he walked to the bench. He artfully dusted the trousers of his spick-and-span uniform, and ignored the wondering looks bestowed upon him by his new teammates.
“I’ll bet,” complimented Tommy Carey, the little second baseman, “that you’re the first man that ever stole home on Von Shaick.”
“Oh!” smiled Zimmer phlegmatically. “It’s no harder here than in the bushes.”
The next day Clary put Zimmer in center field. The new man did several things of an unusual nature. For instance, he poled out two doubles and a single in three trips to the plate; he stole second and third after his single; he tallied twice; and he nabbed a man at the plate on the throw-in from a line drive to center. The fans went wild over him.
Within a week Clary realized that he had unearthed one of the rarest gems in baseball: a born player. Zimmer was calm through it all; his head did not seem turned by the adulation he received through the newspapers, he never made mistakes of judgment and batting and base-running ability did not decrease. And he took chances which would have made the immortal Ty turn pale green with envy. The hook slide and fall away were easy for him, and he had invented one or two little deceptive dips which were all his own, and which his less confident teammates dared not try to imitate.
It was during the series with the Blizzards that the first clash came. Even though he realized that he owned the best player in either of the big leagues, Manager Clary had ideas of his own about running a ball team, and when Zimmer deliberately ignored his signal for a drive and bunted—and then beat the bunt to first—he called him down hard in the clubhouse after the game.
“Listen here, Zimmer,” he rasped, “that’s the fourth time in three days that you’ve crossed my signals, and I’ve stood all I intend to stand of that sort of thing.”
“Didn’t they expect me to line it out? Weren’t they all playing ’way back?”
“Yes.”
“And didn’t I fool ’em with that bunt?”
“That’s got nothing to do with it. You’re a busher with a busher’s ideas. I’m running this bunch, and I intend to run it. See?”
“But you act the bone-head at times.” Zimmer’s statement was made calmly, as though he were talking to a naughty child. The other players gasped, and Clary himself grew livid.
“You overgrown hunk of cheese you,” he snapped, “I’ve a good mind to ram that down your ugly throat!”
Zimmer grinned and rose to his feet.
“If you’re able to do that,” he said quietly, “I’ll obey any damn’ fool signal you give me after this.”
The mutual defi couldn’t have been more final. Immediately Clary started stripping to the waist. The men stood forth half naked, Clary slightly taller and heavier; both confident, and both smiling slightly.
Clary was known as one of the best boxers in baseball; for years it had been his way to rule with the iron fist when any of his players became too unruly. In this manner he had subdued a tendency toward heavy drinking and too much poker on his championship team of three years previous. O’Hare grinned pityingly at Zimmer.
“Our wisenheimer is in for it now, good and proper,” he volunteered. Charlie turned laughingly.
“Maybe,” he said significantly, “I can scrap as well as I can play ball.”
“For Clary’s sake,” breathed Vardon, “I hope not.”
Tommy Carey assumed the rôle of referee. “By rounds?” he inquired.
They nodded.
“Three minutes—one minute’s rest?”
“Yes.”
“Very well—go!”
The smile vanished from the outfielder’s not unattractive face. He sparred with his guard extended, dancing lightly in and out, attentive, catlike. Clary hunched himself into a ball, waiting an opening.
It came when Zimmer jabbed tentatively with his left. Clary uncorked and catapulted close, slamming with both hands for the body and jaw. Zimmer didn’t move his body—but his right streaked upward with mule-kick power and landed flush on the side of the manager’s jaw. Clary struck the ground with a thud, and rolled over.
At the count of ten he was up.
“That wasn’t quite a knock-out,” said Zimmer critically. “Your knee was off the ground when he said ‘ten.’ Have you had enough?”
“I have—not.”
“Well, I won’t hit you in the condition you’re in now. Take a minute’s rest. I want to convince you that you’re easy for me.”
Clary rushed weakly. Zimmer clinched.
“I told you I wasn’t goin’ to beat you up when you were groggy,” he repeated, “and I ain’t. You’ll get what’s coming to you next round.”
For the balance of the three minutes Zimmer held Clary helpless. At the end of the minute’s rest, they met in the center of the clubhouse floor, with Clary somewhat recovered, and the victim of a berserk rage.
As they got within range of each other Clary stepped in and hooked a vicious fight for the jaw. Zimmer moved his body forward with the glide of a panther, and his left crashed to the stomach. Clary sank to the floor, where he writhed in agony for many minutes after he had been counted out.
“I hate to hit a man in the stomach,” condoled Charlie, “but a blind man couldn’t pass up that opening.”
After that incident personal comment regarding Zimmer was seldom heard. His exhibition of pugilistic prowess was effective. And Zimmer went on crossing signals and doing what he deemed best—and worst—of all, getting away with it.
Clary chafed. After a terrific two weeks, during which he felt himself the butt of his teammates, the men had another set-to in the clubhouse. Zimmer landed three times: two were knock-downs and the last was a knock- out. Clary was finally convinced that he could never whip Zimmer.
He tried benching him. Immediately there arose a howl from the papers and from the fans. What right had he to bench the heaviest hitter on the team? For three days Clary stood the gaff of public censure. Then he made the mistake one day of sending in Zimmer as a pinch hitter with the score tied, a man on second, and two out. Zimmer promptly lined one to deep right and the game was won. After that there was nothing for Clary to do but put Zimmer back in the game. The race was too close to spare him. The first time he played after his reinstatement he crossed the manager’s signals twice. And the worst part of it was that Zimmer seemed infallible. He never miscalculated. All of his featherbrained schemes turned out for the best. But it is never pleasant for a manager to have an unruly member on his team, and Clary chafed and was miserable.
He could not bench Zimmer. In so far as internal peace was concerned, he would have done it in a minute, but he was man enough to admit that Zimmer was too good to cool his heels while a far inferior man cavorted none too nimbly in the center garden. And when a team is one of a quartet which is pennant- scrapping, a .360 hitter cannot be casually laid aside.
But Clary knew that matters would not stand as they were. Zimmer’s series of successes, after doing things which had been forbidden or ordered otherwise by the Manager, made a subtle impression on the other and less brilliant members of the aggregation. Disaffection made its appearance. The Blizzards shoved the Colts into third place and increased a slight lead by a double victory.
If he could only whip him once! Clary carefully doubled his big fists and realized that that was beyond the realm of possibility. If only Zimmer were an ordinary player, instead being a star of the greatest magnitude. If only the fans didn’t adore him so! And, finally, if he could only be brought under the direct domination of the manager, what a wonder he would be.
* * * *
It was less than two weeks later that Myrtle Scott, sister-in-law of Tommy Carey, joined the team. She was a winsome little thing, pretty, bright, vivacious—learned in the lore of the diamond; an ardent fan, and intensely feminine. If anything had been needed to crystallize the feeling which existed between Clary and Zimmer, Myrtle furnished it. From the jump they both made dead sets for her.
And in the game of love-making, Zimmer sorrowfully arrived at the conclusion that he was outclassed. A .360 batting average and a fielding average of .998 did not help much when Clary was ensconced on the observation platform with the girl, and the other members of the team set themselves to see that Zimmer did not interrupt. For two weeks on the important road trip, Clary kept his mouth shut as to the continued breaches of discipline of which Zimmer was guilty. Instead, he monopolized Myrtle and paraded her wherever he was sure Zimmer would be.
She showed but slight partiality, however. She accepted the attentions with which she was showered by both, and treated them alike. Of course if Clary happened to be more clever at making engagements then Charlie, that was Charlie’s lookout and not hers. She was mortgaged to neither.
Had Zimmer been an ordinary man or an ordinary player, the internal turmoil might have affected his playing injuriously. But, instead his average rose to very near the .400 mark and he pulled down line drives and sky- scrapers to the outfield with apparent ease. On the bases he was a demon; taking chances which other men would have scoffed at and refused to try—and making good. When Clary signaled a bunt, Zimmer usually hit it out; he stole on all occasions; he played the game in his own sweet way, and begot a reputation for being unique and deliciously eccentric.
On one occasion Zimmer’s unruliness passed the bounds of reason, and Clary summoned him into managerial conference.
“I’m sick and tired of this sort of thing, Zimmer,” he said hotly. “You’ve allowed your feelings to get personal, and you’re jeopardizing the team’s chances.”
“Have I ever failed to get away with it?”
“No, you haven’t. But that makes it none the less bad. You forget that you’re not in the bushes any more. Baseball in the major leagues is a scientific proposition, and by the time we make our next swing around the circuit, there won’t be a player in the league who won’t have doped you out to a fare-you- well; and then—good night! They’ll cop you at every turn, and your averages will sink to nothing.”
“That’s my lookout.”
“You’re another—it’s mine! I’m manager of the Colts, not you. And I mean to be obeyed. You’ve whipped me twice, and I see that I can’t subdue you that way; but I’m going to get you under my thumb if I have to break a neck to accomplish it.”
“Threats?” inquired Zimmer mildly.
“No, not threats! Facts! I’ve a good mind to bench you!”
“You wouldn’t dare. The fans wouldn’t stand for it—neither would this bunch of syndicate owners who dip their finger into the club’s pie all the time.” Clary bit his lips. He had not given Zimmer credit for knowing that the club’s owners interfered with him. “Besides, it wouldn’t matter much to me. I have enough kale laid aside to last me for quite a little while, and you’d be forced to take me back sooner or later. Glenn is rotten in the outfield.”
“Why in hell”—Clary was off on a new tack—“why in hell don’t you make yourself amenable to discipline? Why don’t you ever obey my signals?”
“I do—when they’re sensible.”
The manager gasped at the insolence of the reply.
“Of all—th’—nerve—”
“You’re a good manager,” tantalized Zimmer, “but you don’t know all about baseball there is to know. It’s like poker, when you study it, and it oughtn’t to be played according to Hoyle. You know that when a man’s on second or third, and no one down, the right thing to do is to pole out the ball. Sure it is—and that’s what the other guys are looking for. But suppose I come along and drop a little dribbler down the third base-line, don’t I get to first a heap easier? Sure I do—”
“That’s tomfoolishness. It may get by a few times, but as soon as they’re on to you they’ll nab your game in the bud. You don’t seem to realize that the science of baseball has been working itself out for years. You can’t upset the dope in a minute.”
“No?” insolently. “Well, I can play the game with my head as well as with my hands—and better both ways than some guys I know.”
The interview was over. Clary shook his head hopelessly and sought solace in Myrtle’s company. Five minutes after he joined her Zimmer careered around the music-room door.
“Miss Myrtle—” he started invitingly, when he espied Clary standing next to the piano.
“Well?” she asked sweetly. “Mayn’t I go walking with—”
“I’m awf’ly sorry, Mr. Zimmer, but I have a date with Mr. Clary.”
“How about to-night?”
“I’m going to see ‘The Baby Doll’ with
Mr. Clary.”
“Well,” desperately, “to-morrow evening after the game?”
She laughed.
“Too bad—I’ve got an engagement with Mr. Clary.”
“Damn Mr. Clary!” snapped Zimmer under his breath, and stumped away. For the first time in a month, Owen Clary had a hearty laugh.
“Well, I reckon.” he grinned, “that will hold him for a while.”
Her eyes sparkled into his.
“It was funny,” she agreed; “terribly funny!”
The Colts finished the Chicago series and entrained for the East. The train had not pulled out of the Smoky City before Zimmer was seated beside Myrtle.
“Is this seat Mr. Clary’s?” he asked significantly.
“Why, no—”
“Oh! I thought maybe he had a lien on you.”
She giggled.
“That was too funny for words the other day, wasn’t it?”
“Yes. Lovely. How about dinner—won’t you eat with me this evening? The dining-car service is really good.”
“Thanks, I’ll be delighted.”
Purposely, Zimmer waited until the second call for dinner. Then he marched into the diner, very straight and very proud, with Myrtle on his arm. Clary was not there.
The car was crowded, and the car-manager sat them at a table built to accommodate four persons. And scarcely had they been seated when into the car walked Clary and Franklin—and seated themselves at the same table.
Zimmer glared at Clary and Clary smiled at Zimmer. Then the manager set himself out to monopolize the conversation. Repartee rolled from his tongue; every joke that was told reminded him of two other and better ones. Zimmer mooned in silence and vented his anger by stepping on his own pet corn under the table. Every few minutes Clary would turn vindictively to the big outfielder with a “Don’t you think so, Zim?” It was the Zim that got Charlie’s goat worse than the remarks.
And the climax came when the waiter handed Charlie checks for the quartet. Furiously, Zimmer paid them; the girl was watching. Then he escorted her back to the Pullman. They sank into their seats again.
“You don’t look very happy,” she remarked naively.
“I’m happy now, all right. But that boob Clary gave me a pain with his remarks while we were in the diner.”
“Why, Mr. Zimmer, I think he’s one of cleverest men I ever met.”
“Yeh! Clever—like a mule!”
The girl giggled. “I just laughed and laughed at what he said about—”
“Aw, say—for th’ love o’ mike, Miss Myrtle, let’s drop Clary for a while. Let’s talk about—us. We’ve got a whole evening together.”
As though in answer to Zimmer’s remark, Clary sauntered down the swaying aisle and stopped by their section.
“Hello, Myrt!”
“Hello!” Clary smiled easily, and Zimmer writhed at the familiar use of the given name.
“Listen, kiddo; you’re fond of set-back, ain’t you?”
“Crazy about it.”
“S’pose you an’ me, an’ Bull, an’ Zimmer have a little game?”
“Don’t feel like set-back,” growled
Charlie.
“G’wan. Don’t be a killjoy. Seems to me you’d like the sassiety even if you didn’t care about the game.”
About that time Myrtle managed to throw Charlie a glance from the corners of her eyes. She smiled—and when she smiled she dimpled. Charlie played!
He was Myrtle’s partner, and he played a miserable game, and they lost; and because they lost he became more grouchy, and they lost worse than ever. At ten o’clock he surlily excused himself, smoked sullenly for half an hour, and then retired with the girl’s care-free laughter—begotten of some quip from the irrepressible Clary—ringing in his ears.
That night Zimmer dreamed dreams—vivid, rich, delicious dreams which veered inevitably to the same finale—Clary prostrate on the ground, with Zimmer couchant over his body, strong fingers engaged in the delightful occupation of squeezing the last ounce of breath from the manager’s body. Always in the background was Myrtle—applauding.
For the first three days of the series at home Zimmer was about as happy as an ex- suitor at the wedding of the girl he wouldn’t suit; or happy as the husband of that same girl three years later when she meets the aforesaid ex-suitor. Clary was with the girl on all occasions, and it was not until desperation gripped him that Zimmer took the bull by the horns and begged the girl to take an old-time stroll with him in the park that evening. Desperation is the father of many events.
The park was receptive: it was cool, and filled with dark and cozy nooks. They passed a couple which found perfect oblivion in each other’s arms. Zimmer sighed a mighty sigh.
“Gee! Some guys is lucky!”
“Lucky?”
“Yeh. That chap back yonder for one instance.”
Darkness mercifully hid the flush which overspread the girl’s face.
“I wish I had a girl,” pursued Zimmer doggedly—even though his voice fairly quavered.
No answer.
“I’m in love,” he went on. “Are you?” very faintly. “Yes.”
A conversational impasse, which extended through an eon of fully five minutes.
“Guess who with?”
“How should I know?”
“You got a sixth sense, ain’t you?”
“Sixth sense?”
“Intooition?”
“Maybe.”
“You know who I’m in love with, all right.”
“No, I don’t.”
“You do so.”
“Who?”
“It’s—it’s—dog-gone it! It’s you!”
“Oh!”
They found themselves together on a bench. Possibly neither noticed in advance that their selected nook was very secluded. On the other hand, who can speak authoritatively of the mind of a man and a maid under like circumstances?
“I know,” he said with painful distinctness, after several valuable minutes had rolled into the past, “that when it comes to bein’ fitten for a classy kid like you, I ain’t such a shakes. But I—I—”
“You—what?”
“L-l-l-love y—’.”
“Oh!”
“I do.” Silence.
“I swear it.”
Ditto silence. She spoke. “Well?”
“Well—what?”
“Why don’t you—ask me?”
“Huh?”
“Why don’t you ask me—if I love you?”
“Oh! My Gawd!”
Ten minutes later a strangled, happy little voice came from the darkness:
“Oh! Charlie, ain’t we just too happy for anything.”
“Ain’t we—just!”
If Zimmer’s lips had not spoken the words, his radiant face would have given away the news to the members of the team the following morning. The antipathy to the man seemed to drop from the other members of the team like magic. They shook Zimmer’s hand until he fondly imagined that the bones would crack. The happy young couple was jollied to within an inch of their lives. And Zimmer strutted about like the one rooster in a hennery at sunrise.
It was none other than Clary who suggested that there wasn’t a bit of use waiting for the ceremony. Why not have it that morning in the palm-room of the hotel? Zimmer was delighted, although he was a mite surprised and disappointed at the philosophical calm with which Clary had taken the news. A hilarious committee headed by Zimmer and the now vociferous Clary, repeated the suggestion to Myrtle. She coyly refused. Zimmer took her into executive session and brought back her blushing consent.
The ceremony was a wonder. The hotel employees still tell of it with bated breaths. And Clary was the first man to pump the groom’s hand and wish him all the happiness in the world, and many of them. They made the light noonday meal a festal occasion—a bridal luncheon. Then they all went to the ball park.
The entirely new Mrs. Zimmer sat in the box behind the catcher with the wives of two other members of the team. Zimmer distinguished himself as he had in the old days. The team played air-tight ball; but so did the Buccaneers. When the eighth frame arrived the score stood 0-0.
With one man down in the eighth, and Carey on second, Zimmer cast a prideful smile at his new wife and carefully selected a bat from the layout before the players’ dugout. Clary raised his voice just a trifle and called a curt command.
“Zimmer,” he said firmly, “bunt!”
“Bunt nothin’!” snorted the big outfielder disdainfully. “I’ll slam it out!”
The fans were impatient. The Buccaneers were laying back for a drive.
“I said bunt!”
Zimmer smiled superciliously and started for the plate, swinging two heavy bats.
“Zimmer!”
Charlie turned to find Clary close beside him. The manager’s eyes flashed with the light of victory, of strategy triumphant.
“I might as well explain this to you now as later. Long ago I made up my mind to bring you to terms. And I doped you out to a fare- you-well. It was I who got Carey to bring Myrtle on the trip with the team, and I played her off against you all along. She wasn’t wise, but I was. You’re married. I’m engaged—to the greatest little dame in the world out in Spokane!
“I’m gonna be obeyed after this: get that? You’re a married man, and you can’t afford to lay off. But that’s just what you’re gonna do if you don’t obey signals and orders—warm that bench indefinitely without pay, if I lose my job for it. Think it over between here and the plate—and you bunt!”
Zimmer ambled to the plate dazedly. He turned his head and glanced at Clary’s implacable countenance.
On the second ball pitched he bunted prettily down the first-base line. The surprise of it enabled him to reach first safely, while Carey went to third.
He glanced sheepishly toward the grinning Clary and then to his demure little bride in the grand stand. Then he chuckled.
“Aw,” he muttered, “that boob thinks he’s put one over on me. Why, dog-gone it! I’d even obey a bone-head like him for—her!”
