Page:Lefty o' the Bush.djvu/58

 "How'd you ever happen to think of it?" sneered the Bancroft captain.

Chuckling, Sockamore threw the ball to the pitcher, and capered back into center field. Harney, his mouth twisted and his cheeks burning, made slowly for the Bancroft bench.

"Accidents will happen," came from a coacher. "Never mind that. Take a constitutional, Wop; he'll accommodate ye."

Grady idled at the pan, laughing silently over the discomfiture of his captain. He was still idling when Locke, seeing Oulds ready, shot over a scorcher that clipped the inside corner.

"Strike!" declared the umpire.

"What's that? What's that?" cried the coacher. "It can't be poss-i-bill? Another accident!"

Surprise was general, but still, like the coacher, the spectators on the bleachers and in the stand fancied it related in a way to something "accidental," and not one in a hundred thought it probable that the left-hander could put over another without wasting several.

Oulds, wondering, called for an out-drop, but Locke, knowing the batter had not yet been egged into a condition that would make him easy to "pull," shook his head. The signal was changed