Only an Irish Boy Andy Burke's Fortunes

CHAPTER XI A GAME OF BALL

“Come here,” said Con­rad Fletch­er; “come here, Char­lie, and choose up for a game. We must make haste, or re­cess will be over.”

“All right, Con­rad.”

The first choice de­volved up­on Con­rad. He chose Ephraim Pinkham, not­ed as a catch­er.

“I take Elmer Rhodes,” said Char­lie.

“John Park­er,” said Con­rad.

“Hen­ry Strauss.”

“God­frey Pre­ston,” was Con­rad's next choice.

“Can you play, Andy?” asked Char­lie.

“Yes,” said Andy.

“Then, I take you.”

“I've a good mind to re­sign,” said God­frey, in a low voice, to Ben Travers. “I don't fan­cy play­ing with that Irish boy.”

How­ev­er, he was too fond of play­ing to give up his place, notwith­stand­ing his an­tipa­thy to Andy.

Char­lie Flem­ing's side went in first, and Char­lie him­self went to the bat. The pitch­er was God­frey. He was re­al­ly a fair pitch­er, and con­sid­ered him­self very su­pe­ri­or. Char­lie fi­nal­ly suc­ceed­ed in hit­ting the ball, but rather fee­bly, and nar­row­ly es­caped los­ing his first base. He saved it, how­ev­er.

Next at the bat was Elmer Rhodes. He hit one or two fouls, but not a fair ball. Fi­nal­ly he was put out on three strikes; mean­while, how­ev­er, Char­lie Flem­ing got round to third base. Hen­ry Strauss suc­ceed­ed in strik­ing the ball, but it was caught by cen­ter field, rapid­ly sent to first base, be­fore Hen­ry could reach it, then thrown to the catch­er in time to pre­vent Char­lie Flem­ing from get­ting in. He ran half-​way to home base, but see­ing his dan­ger, ran back to third base. Next Andy took the bat.

“Knock me in, Andy,” called out Char­lie Flem­ing.

“All right” said Andy, qui­et­ly.

“Not if I can pre­vent it,” said God­frey to him­self, and he de­ter­mined by send­ing poor balls, to get our hero out on three strikes. The first ball, there­fore, he sent about six feet to the right of the bat­ter. Andy stood in po­si­tion, but, of course, was far too wise to at­tempt hit­ting any such ball. The next ball went sev­er­al feet above his head. Of this, too, he took no no­tice. The third would have hit him if he had not dodged.

“Why don't you knock at the balls?” asked God­frey.

“I will, when you give bet­ter ones,” said Andy, cool­ly.

“I don't be­lieve you know how to bat,” said God­frey, with a sneer.

“I don't be­lieve you know how to pitch,” re­turned Andy.

“How's that?” send­ing an­oth­er ball whizzing by his left ear.

“I want them waist-​high,” said Andy. “My waist is about two feet low­er than my ears.”

God­frey now re­solved to put in a ball waist-​high, but so swift­ly that Andy could not hit it; but he had nev­er seen Andy play. Our hero had a won­der­ful­ly quick eye and steady hand, and struck the ball with such force to left field, that not on­ly Char­lie Flem­ing got in, with­out dif­fi­cul­ty, but Andy him­self made a home run.

“That's a splen­did hit,” ex­claimed Char­lie, with en­thu­si­asm. “I didn't think you could play so well.”

“I've played be­fore to-​day,” said Andy, com­pos­ed­ly. “I told you I would get you in, and I meant what I said.”

God­frey looked cha­grined at the re­sult. He meant to demon­strate that Andy was no play­er, but had on­ly con­tribut­ed to his bril­liant suc­cess; for, had he not sent in so swift a ball, the knock would not have been so forcible.

As there were but six on a side, two outs were con­sid­ered all out.

“Who will catch?” asked Char­lie Flem­ing; “I want to pitch.”

“I will,” said Andy.

“All right! If you can catch as you can bat, we'll cut down their score.”

Andy soon showed that he was no novice at catch­ing. He rarely let a ball pass him. When God­frey's turn came to bat, one was al­ready out, and Andy de­ter­mined to put God­frey out if it was a pos­si­ble thing. One strike had been called, when God­frey struck a foul which was al­most im­pos­si­ble to catch. But now Andy ran, made a bound in­to the air, and caught it--a very bril­liant piece of play, by which God­frey and his side were put out. The boys on both sides ap­plaud­ed, for it was a piece of bril­liant field­ing which not one of them was ca­pa­ble of. That is, all ap­plaud­ed but God­frey. He threw down his bat spite­ful­ly, and said to Flem­ing:

“You didn't give me good balls.”

“I gave you much bet­ter than you gave Andy,” said Char­lie.

“That's so!” chimed in two oth­er boys.

“I won't play any more,” said God­frey.

Just then the bell rang, so that the game was brought to a close. Andy re­ceived the com­pli­ments of the boys on his bril­liant play­ing. He re­ceived them mod­est­ly, and ad­mit­ted that he prob­ably couldn't make such a catch again. It was very dis­agree­able to God­frey to hear Andy praised. He was rather proud of his ball-​play­ing, and he saw that Andy was al­to­geth­er his su­pe­ri­or, at any rate in the opin­ion of the boys. How­ev­er, he in­ge­nious­ly con­trived to min­gle a com­pli­ment with a sneer.

“You're more used to base­ball than to books,” he said.

“True for you,” said Andy.

“You're a head taller than any of the boys in your class.”

“I know that,” said Andy. “I haven't been to school as much as you.”

“I should be ashamed if I didn't know more.”

“So you ought,” said Andy, “for you've been to school all your life. I hope to know more soon.”

“Any­way, you can play ball,” said Char­lie Flem­ing.

“I'd rather be a good schol­ar.”

“I'll help you, if you want any help.”

“Thank you, Char­lie.”

They had now en­tered the school­room, and Andy took up his book and stud­ied hard. He was de­ter­mined to rise to a high­er class as soon as pos­si­ble, for it was not agree­able to him to re­flect that he was the old­est and largest boy in his present class.

“Very well,” said the teach­er, when his recita­tion was over. “If you con­tin­ue to re­cite in this way, you will soon be pro­mot­ed.”

“I'll do my best, sir,” said Andy, who lis­tened to these words with plea­sure.

“I wish you were com­ing in the af­ter­noon, too, Andy,” said his friend, Char­lie Flem­ing, as they walked home to­geth­er.

“So do I, Char­lie, but I must work for my moth­er.”

“That's right, Andy; I'd do the same in your place. I haven't such fool­ish ideas about work as God­frey Pre­ston.”

“He ain't very fond of me,” said Andy, laugh­ing.

“No; nor of any­body else. He on­ly likes God­frey Pre­ston.”

“We got in­to a fight the first day I ev­er saw him.”

“What was it about?”

“He called my moth­er names, and hit me. So I knocked him flat.”

“You served him right. He's dis­gust­ing­ly con­ceit­ed. No­body likes him.”

“Ben Travers goes around with him all the time.”

“Ben likes him be­cause he is rich. If he should lose his prop­er­ty, you'd see how soon he would leave him. That isn't a friend worth hav­ing.”

“I've got one con­so­la­tion,” said Andy, laugh­ing; “no­body likes me for my mon­ey.”

“But some­one likes you for your­self, Andy,” said Char­lie.

“Who?”

“My­self, to be sure.”

“And I like you as much, Char­lie,” said Andy, warm­ly. “You're ten times as good a fel­low as God­frey.”

“I hope so,” said Char­lie. “That isn't say­ing very much, Andy.”

So the friend­ship was ce­ment­ed, nor did it end there. Char­lie spoke of Andy's good qual­ities at home, and some time af­ter­ward Andy was sur­prised by an in­vi­ta­tion to spend the evening at Dr. Flem­ing's. He felt a lit­tle bash­ful, but fi­nal­ly went--nor was he at all sor­ry for so do­ing. The whole fam­ily was a de­light­ful one, and Andy was wel­comed as a warm friend of Char­lie's, and, in the pleas­ant at­mo­sphere of the doc­tor's fire­side, he quite for­got that there was one who looked down up­on him as an in­fe­ri­or be­ing.

Dr. Flem­ing had him­self been a poor boy. By a lucky chance--or Prov­idence, rather--he had been put in the way of ob­tain­ing an ed­uca­tion, and he was not dis­posed now, in his pros­per­ity, to for­get his days of ear­ly strug­gle.

Andy found that, in spite of the three hours tak­en up at school, he was able to do all that was re­quired of him by the Miss­es Grant. They were glad to hear of his suc­cess at school, and con­tin­ued to pay him five dol­lars a week for his ser­vices. This mon­ey he reg­ular­ly car­ried to his moth­er, af­ter pay­ing for the new clothes, of which he stood so much in need.