“I never had a nickel saved. But $2,000 is just about what I’m behind.”
“Good lord, Bill!” I says to him. “What have you done, bought a limousine?”
“No, sir,” he says. “I ain’t bought nothin’ only clothes and food and not much o’ that. But I was way in the hole before, and just this week they’ve ran up about $200 more on me.”
“What for?” I ast him.
“Well, Frank,” he says, “the wife presented me with a little boy last Sunday mornin’. If it hadn’t been for that, and the way she worried about things, I’d of never been down here to sign for $4,000. It was a case of have to, that’s all.”
I’d left orders for the boys to be out for practice at a quarter to two, and I knew Mr. Edwards would be out there with ’em. I and Bill was pretty near to the hotel by this time, but I stopped him short.
“Bill,” I says, “you ain’t givin’ me no bull like that $2,000 fortune, are you?”
“No, Frank,” he says, “I’m tellin’ you the truth.”
“All right, Bill,” I says; “I’m takin’ your word. They’s a northbound local train leavin’ here at three bells. You go down and get aboard it and ride to Silver Creek. That’s a station about twenty miles up the line. They’s a hotel there, and that’s about all. You go there and stay till I send for you.”
“What’s the idear?” he says.
“You’ll find out later,” I says. “I just tell you now that it’s to your interest to do what I say.”
“I can’t go nowheres,” he says. “I’ve got just forty cents.”
“I’ll stake you,” says I, “and you’ll hear from me in three or four days.”
“But I want to get out there and see this here Lahey,” says Bill. “I want to get busy showin’ him up.”
“He’ll tend to that end of it himself,” I says. “But you’re on this ball club and I’m manager of it, and if you want to stick on this ball club you’ll obey the manager’s orders.”
So Bill took the local for Silver Creek and I beat it out to the orchard to see that nobody got killed.
I set down with the boss at supper that night.
“Mr. Edwards,” I says, “I’ve changed my mind about Hagedorn.”
“What do you mean?” he says.
“I mean that I think he’s through with us,” I says.
“But good lord!” says the boss. “We can’t get along without him.”
“Well,” says I, “we can get him by givin’ him $6,000.”
Mr. Edwards shook like he had a chill.
“Give in to him now!” he says. “When he’s tried to hold us up! And I thought you was so sure he’d come round.”
“I did think he would,” says I, “but I’m sure now that he won’t. He’s stuck this long, and he’ll stick forever. He’s gamer’n I figured.”
“But I’d rather lose another $18,000 than let him hold us up,” says the boss.
“Well,” I says, “that’s up to you. But you’ll lose the $18,000 all right, and maybe then some, if you don’t get him. Because without him on first base we’ll be the worst ball club in the league.”
Mr. Edwards didn’t say nothin’ more for maybe five minutes. Then he give up.
“I got a lot o’ confidence in you, Frank,” he says. “I’ll go by what you tell me. If you want to you can wire Hagedorn. Tell him we’ll meet his terms, and tell him to get here on the first train.”
“I think it’s the best thing to do,” I says. And I went out and pretended to send Bill a wire.
It takes two days and a half to get to the Springs from home. So I called Bill up at Silver Creek and had him blow into camp on the Sunday train. I met him and tipped him off. He fell all over himself thankin’ me and says he was goin’ to name the boy Frank. And then he made a request.
“Keep this a secret from my missus,” he says. “I want her to think that I got what I was after because I insisted on it. Because she kept tellin’ me all winter that I wouldn’t never get it and was a sucker to try.”
“Don’t worry,” I says; “I want it to be kept a secret from certain people myself, and I certainly ain’t goin’ to spill it to no woman.”
Mr. Edwards was on the walk in front o’ the hotel when I and Bill showed up.
“Well, Hagedorn,” he says, “you got what you wanted and I hope you’ll try and earn it.”
“I’ll earn it all right, Mr. Edwards,” he says, “and I’m mighty grateful to you for comin’ acrost.”
The boss turned to me.
“How about our little bet?” he says.
“What bet?” says I.
“You bet me five,” he says, “that we’d hear from Hagedorn before the week was over. And this is another week.”
“So you want me to pay you that five?” I ast him.
“I certainly do,” he says.
Well, I give him the five, and afterwards Bill told me he’d make that up to me as soon as he could. But I can’t accept it from him. I’d feel like I was takin’ candy from a baby, a baby named Frankie Hagedorn.
Ball-a-Hole
Riverside’s only got a nine-hole course, but they’ve bought some more land and by the end of this summer they’ll have eighteen holes. They’re planning a new clubhouse too. You know the other one caught fire and burnt down. This one’s just supposed to be temporary. When they get the new course done and the clubhouse built they expect to take in about a hundred more members; and then, of course, they’ll have to have some more of us kids.
By that time, though, I hope I’ll be doing something else. I wouldn’t keep ahold of this job now, only it gives me a chance to practice golf when there’s nobody on the course. I and Jake—he’s the second oldest kid that’s caddying here—him and I come out early Saturday mornings, and
