Page:Barbour--Captain Chub.djvu/30

12 replace the weak batsman with players who can hit the ball, and when Chub Eaton stepped to the plate the Blue's catcher and pitcher assumed that they had a difficult person to contend with. The catcher signaled for a drop, for from the way Chub handled his bat it seemed that he would, in baseball slang, "bite at it," and Chub seemed to want to badly. He almost swung at it, but he didn't quite, and the umpire called "Ball!" Well, reflected the catcher, it was easy to see that he was anxious to hit, and so he signaled for a nice slow ball that looked for all the world like an easy one until it almost reached the plate; then it "broke" in a surprising way and went off to the left. Chub almost reached for it, but, again, not quite. And "Two balls!" said the umpire. Chub swung his bat back and forth impatiently, just begging the Blue pitcher to give him a fair chance. The pitcher did. He sent a nice drop that cleared the plate knee-high. "Strike!" announced the umpire. Chub turned on him in surprise and shook his head. Then he settled back and worked his bat in a way that said: "Just try that again! I dare you to!"

The pitcher did try it again; at least, he seemed