No further runs were made by either side, and the first game of the Western invasion went into the Giants’ column by a score of ten to two.
In the clubhouse, after the game, Joe asked Jackwell and Bowen to stay after the others had gone, in order that he might have a word with them.
“I don’t want to pry into your personal affairs, boys,” he said to them kindly, when they were at last left alone. “I’d be the last one to do that. But I’m captain of this team, and I’ve got to see that my men are in fit condition to play. And if there’s anything that prevents you showing your best form, it’s up to me to find just what it is.”
“I notice that whatever it is that’s bothering you seems to affect you both. You both were sick, or said you were, at the same time the other day. You, Jackwell, told me that you were not feeling fit to-day, and although Bowen didn’t say anything, I suppose it was because you told him it was of no use. I noticed that right after your talk with me, you went back to Bowen and held a whispered conversation with him. And when you went out on the field, you both pulled your caps over your faces more than usual.
“Then, too, neither of you played your usual game to-day. Luckily, we had such a big lead that the errors didn’t lose the game, but in a close game any one of them might have been fatal. That was a ridiculously easy grounder, Jackwell, that you fumbled in the fourth, and in the sixth you failed to back up Iredell on that throw-in by Curry. And that was a bad muff you, Bowen, made of Haskins’ fly to center, to say nothing of the wild throw you made to second right afterwards.
“Now, what’s the trouble? Let’s have a showdown. Speak up.”
Still Jackwell and Bowen stood mute, neither of them venturing to meet Joe’s gaze.
“If you don’t tell it to me, you’ll have to tell it to McRae,” suggested Joe. “I’m trying to let you down easy, without calling it to his attention. If we can settle it among ourselves, so much the better. Is it some trouble at home that’s weighing on your mind? Is it something about money matters? If it’s that, perhaps I can help you out.”
“That’s very kind of you, Mr. Matson,” said Jackwell, who seemed by common consent to be the spokesman for the two. “But it isn’t either of those two. It’s something else that neither Ben nor I are quite ready yet to talk about.
