Frank had stretched a three-bagger into a home run, and the score was tied.
Of a sudden, a great change had come over the game.
“It’s all over, boys!” laughed Ready. “We can’t help winning now! It’s another scalp for us!”
“That’s Frank Merriwell!” cried an excited boy on the bleachers. “You can’t beat him! The whole world can’t beat him!”
Batch was sore. A short time before he had been smiling, but now there was no smile on his face. He looked serious enough as Ready came up. Jack was determined to “keep the ball rolling,” and he got a nice hit off the second ball pitched.
Among the spectators were two men who were watching the game with deep interest. One man was stout and red-faced, with a stubby mustache, while the other was slender and dark, wearing a suit of blue. The stout man choked and gurgled when the umpire declared Merry safe at the plate.
“Rotten!” he snarled. “He was out by a foot!”
“I don’t think so, Hazen,” said the other man.
“Why, what ails you?” gurgled the portly man. “Do you want to see us lose this game, Wescott?”
“Not much,” answered Wescott. “It means something to me. I have over two hundred dollars bet on the Stars.”
“Two hundred!” exploded Hazen. “I have almost a thousand! I spent half of last night hunting bets, and I took everything I could get at any odds.”
“Well,” said the man in blue, “I’m afraid we’re in a bad box. This fellow Merriwell is lucky. He has a way of winning at anything and everything.”
“What’s the use to fret? It won’t win the game.”
“Fret! fret! If you had staked as much as I have, you’d not be so cool.”
“You can afford to lose a thousand as well as I can two hundred. You made three thousand on the Ryan-Cummings fight.”
“That was a sure thing. I was tipped off the way that mill was going.”
“And you thought this a sure thing to-day?”
“Yes. Why not? Those chaps are a lot of boys. The Stars are veterans.”
“But that lot of boys have the best man for a captain who stands in shoe-leather to-day. He makes them win games--when he can’t win them alone.”
“He does. He hasn’t been pitching at his usual standard to-day. He had to open up in the last inning, and he will in the next. See if he doesn’t shut the Stars out.”
Carson was in position to strike. Batch tried all the tricks he knew, but Berlin waited till three balls had been called.