She was a lot more interestin’ than the national pastime and I guess we was all gettin’ a eyeful when, all of a sudden, she smiled right at us. Our club was in the field and they was only a few of us on the bench—me and Pat and Davis and the pitchers, and one or two others. Well, I was one of a number that returned the salute; but after doin’ it oncet I remembered I was a old married man and cut it out. But Fogarty and Smitty give a correct imitation of a toothpaste advertisement all the rest o’ the time they sat there. Every three or four minutes she’d smile and then they’d smile back. They was wise to each other and it was a battle to see which one could give her the prettiest grin.
Just before the last half o’ the eighth Fogarty ast Red whether he could go in and dress. He hadn’t no more’n got permissionwhen Smitty wanted to go too. I had ’em guessed right, and I and Pat was wonderin’ which one’d cop. They raced to the clubhouse and Smitty beat him in. Now them two birds was usually awful slow about gettin’ their clo’es changed, ’cause they was so partic’lar; but they beat the world’s record this time. They was in their street clo’es and down in front o’ that box just as the game ended.
Smitty was there first, but lots o’ good it done him! He tipped his hat to the girl and got a cold stare. Then Fogarty come up and spoke to her. He was gave just as much encouragement as Smitty.
I begin to laugh, but I stopped quick. Before I knowed what was comin’ off, little Davis grabbed a bat and started for the stand. Smitty was leanin’ agin the box, with his left hand flat on the rail. Without a word o’ warnin’ Davis swung the bat overhand and it come down on poor Smitty’s hand like a ton o’ brick. Smitty yelled and fell over on the ground. Fogarty tried to duck, but he was too late. The little busher aimed the bat at his bean and catched him square on the right arm as he throwed it up to protect himself.
That’s all they was to the bout. The first punch is a lot—’specially if you use a baseball bat. Neither o’ them showed signs o’ fightin’ back. Besides, we was all on the job by that time and grabbed Davis. Little as he was, it took three of us to hold him. But, say, they was the devil to pay in the clubhouse! Red was goin’ to shoot Davis till the truth come out.
“They went too far with it,” says Davis. “They ain’t no man can go up and talk to my wife without a introduction! I seen ’em tryin’ to flirt with her. Them big bugs is so swell-headed that they think no girl could smile at nobody but them.”
“You’d ought to of tipped ’em off,” says Red.
“I hadn’t ought to of did no sucha thing,” says Davis. “They’d ought to of knew by lookin’ that she wasn’t the kind o’ girl that’d flirt. But I didn’t feel in no danger o’ havin’ my home broke up, so I let ’em go.”
Then Red jumped on me.
“That’s what you get for eggin’ ’em on,” he says. “Where’s our chancet in the World’s Serious now?”
“Have some sense!” I says. “You wouldn’t be thinkin’ o’ no World’s Serious if I hadn’t of egged ’em on.”
We called a doctor for Smitty and Fogarty, and the news he give us didn’t cheer us up none. He said he thought Smitty’s hand was broke, but he’d have to take a X ray. The mitt was swole up as big as a ham. Fogarty’s souper was hangin’ limp as a rag, and the doc didn’t believe he’d be able to raise it for a month. Afterward he found out that they was no bones busted in Smitty’s hand, but it was in such shape that he couldn’t hold a han’kerchief, let alone a baseball. There we was, three days before the start o’ the serious, and our pitchin’ staff shot to hellangone!
Red sent me and Pat and the trainer home that night with the pair o’ cripples. We was to report up to the club’s offices next mornin’ and have all the doctors in Philly called in. Me and Pat was so sore that we couldn’t talk to each other, and I don’t think they was a word said on the trip. Yes, they was too; just before Smitty went to sleep he ast me a question:
“Who was that girl?”
“You’d ought to know by this time,” I says. “That wasn’t nobody but Davis’ wife.”
“Then what was she smilin’ at me for?” he says.
Well, the Philly doctors told us they was absolutely no chancet o’ havin’ either o’ them in shape for the serious and we was gettin’ ready to count the losers’ share. Red’d been figurin’ on alternatin’ the two, cause none o’ the rest was in real shape; but now we didn’t have nothin’ that you could call a airtight pitcher.
Rixey and Alexander and Mayer would of made ’em step some if they’d been right, but they wasn’t.
I says to Pat:
“Looks like as though I and you and the bat boy would have to work.”
“Looks that way,” he says, “unless we can bring them two fellers round.”
“How can we do that?” I says. “You heard what them doctors said.”
“Yes,” says Pat; “but they’re the only hope we got, and I ain’t
