IV
It rained the first two days we was East. The sun was out the third mornin’ and I and Carey was standin’ in front o’ the hotel when Skull showed up.
“Swell day,” he says.
“Yes,” says Carey, “and you know what it means, don’t you? It means we’ll have to beat it for Brooklyn as soon as we digest our breakfast. Three games.”
“Three games,” says Skull. “They won’t play ’em all today, will they?”
“They’re liable to,” says Carey. “You can’t never tell about Brooklyn.”
“I ain’t had no breakfast yet,” says Skull.
“You better hurry it up, then,” says Carey. “We was just goin’ to start.”
“Wait for me, will you?” says Skull.
“Not a chancet,” says Carey. “I got to be there early to help direct the practice.”
“You’ll have to go alone,” I says. “All the rest o’ the boys will be gone before you’re through your breakfast.”
“How do I get there?” says Skull.
“They’ll be a taxi to take you,” says Carey. “You just come out here and look round and when you see a driver lookin’ at you, hop in his car and tell him where you want to go. The club’ll settle for it.”
Well, as soon as Skull had went in to breakfast, Carey tipped off the rest o’ the gang to keep out o’ sight for a wile. I and him went over in the park acrost the street and watched for Skull to come out. Finally he come and they was two taxis standin’ there. He hopped into the nearest one, told the driver to take him to the Brooklyn ball park, and off they went. It wasn’t much of a trip—only from Eighty-first and Columbus to hellangone.
I s’pose he landed there about ten or ten thirty. When we come, at a quarter to two, he was out in a suit, practicin’ with the Brooklyn bunch.
Robbie seen us and came over.
“What are you fellas pullin’?” he says. “Tryin’ to get our signs? This bird’s been here all day; landed in a taxi this mornin’. And he had a big brawl with the chauffeur about who was goin’ to settle. Finally the chauffeur said he’d have him pinched and then the guy come acrost. But he told me that your club was payin’ for the rig and he’d collect back from your secretary. Then he ast me if we was goin’ to play three games today and I says, No, the first two had been called off. So he’s been out monkeyin’ with my crowd ever since. I thought at first he was lit up, but afterward I seen he wasn’t.”
“We was tryin’ to do you a favor,” says Carey. “A fella that’s managin’ a club in Brooklyn deserves a treat oncet in a wile. We’re doin’ the best we can for you, and we’ll call it square if you don’t pitch Rucker against us.”
“But what’s this bird’s name?” says Robbie.
“That’s Scoville,” I says, “the boy that’s been doin’ all our winnin’.”
“I’m too old to be kidded,” says Robbie. “That fella’s too handsome to be a good pitcher.”
“If you think he can’t pitch, you ain’t too old to make a mistake,” I says.
“It’s a part of his system,” says Carey, “to visit all mornin’ with the club he’s goin’ to work against. He figures he’ll do better if he knows the batters.”
Well, sir, Skull pitched the game and Rucker pitched against him. Rucker outpitched him about two to one, but Skull copped.
“What do you think o’ the visitin’ system?” I says to Robbie, goin’ out.
But he didn’t have no comeback.
I and Carey and Skull rode back to the hotel together.
“Too bad you went over this mornin’ for nothin’,” says Carey. “As soon as we got there and found out they wasn’t only goin’ to play one game, we called you up to tell you about it, but you’d already left.”
“I didn’t go over for nothin’,” says Skull. “It was eight dollars and seventy-five cents. But o’ course the club’ll give it back to me.”
Carey seen where he was liable to get into trouble.
“Don’t say nothin’ to them about it,” he says. “I’ll go to the front for you. I know the sec. better’n you do and I can handle him.”
So after supper, Carey found Skull again and broke the news to him.
“I seen the sec.,” he says, “but they was nothin’ doin’. If you’ll remember, two taxis was settin’ out there when you got ready to go, and you took the wrong one. The other one was already paid for. So you’ll have to stand for it. That’s what you get for bein’ with a cheap club.”
Skull swallowed his medicine without a whimper. But after that you couldn’t get him into a taxi, not if he seen you pay for it in advance.
V
The mornin’ o’ the first day o’ the New York serious he set with us at breakfast.
“You want to get up to the Polo Grounds early,” says Carey.
“Maybe you’ll see part o’ the polo game.”
“Are you fellas goin’ early?” he says.
“No,” says Carey, “we’ve saw polo played already, and they won’t let a man in twicet. They’re afraid he’d learn the secrets o’ the game.”
“How do you get there without goin’ in no taxi?” ast Skull.
I guess I already told you where we was stoppin’—Eighty-first and Columbus. I was just goin’ to tell him to jump on the Elevated and stay on to the end o’ the line, but Carey flagged me.
“Go out here on the corner,” he says, “and take a car goin’ south. If the motorman don’t make no mistake, it’ll keep goin’ till it gets way down to the Battery—that’s where the pitchers and catchers all starts from. But if you don’t see no pitchers and catchers that you know, ask a policeman where the Sixth Avenue Elevated is, and then get on a Harlem
