CHAPTER II

GLOWING HOPES

“And now!” exclaimed Joe, as soon as the door had closed on the unwelcome visitor, “tell me, Mabel, what that fellow said or did, and I’ll hunt him up and thrash him within an inch of his life. I’ll make him wish he’d never been born.”

“Don’t do anything like that, Joe,” urged the girl. “He’s probably had his lesson, and it isn’t likely I’ll ever be troubled by him again. He’s just an acquaintance that Reggie picked up somewhere, and I’ve only seen him once before to-day. He called at the hotel to see Reggie, and when he found he wasn’t in, he stayed to talk with me. He started in by paying me a lot of compliments and then became familiar and impudent. He seized my hand, and when I sought to pull it away from him he wouldn’t let me. I was getting thoroughly frightened and was going to call out when your knock came at the door. Oh, Joe, I was so glad when I saw who it was!”

She was perilously near to tears, and her beautiful eyes were dewy as they looked into his. Joe’s heart beat madly. The words he had been longing to say leaped to his lips, but he choked them back. He did not want to catch her off her guard, to take advantage of her emotions and of her shaken condition. Her acceptance of him at that moment might be due in part to gratitude and relief. He wanted more than that--the unconditional, unreserved surrender of her heart and life into his keeping, based only on affection.

So he held himself under control and recompensed himself for his selfdenial by an inward promise to make things interesting for Mr. Beckworth Fleming, if ever that cad’s path and his should cross.

“But come,” said Mabel more brightly, as she sank into a chair and motioned Joe to another, “let’s talk about something pleasant.”

“About you then,” smiled Joe, his eyes dwelling on her eloquently.

“Not poor little me,” she pouted in mock humility. “Who am I compared with the great Joseph Matson about whom all the world is talking--the man who won the championship for the Giants, the hero whose picture to-morrow will hold the place of honor in every newspaper in the country?”

“You’re chaffing me now,” laughed Joe.

“Not a bit,” she said demurely, her dimples coming and going in a way that drove him nearly distracted. “I really feel as though I ought to salaam or kow-tow or whatever it is the Orientals do when they come before the Emperor. But, oh, Joe,” and here she dropped her bantering manner and leaned forward earnestly, “you were simply magnificent this afternoon. The way you kept your nerve and won that game was just wonderful. I was so excited at times that I thought my heart would leap out of my body. I was proud, oh, so proud that you were a friend of mine!”

Joe had heard many words of praise that day but none half so sweet as these.

“Will you let me tell you a secret?” he exclaimed, half rising from his chair. “Do you want to know who really won that game?”

“Why, you did,” she returned in some surprise. “Of course the rest of the team did, too, but if it hadn’t been for your pitching and batting----”

“No,” he interrupted, “it was _you_ who won the game.”

He had risen now and had come swiftly to her side.

“Listen, Mabel,” he said, and before the note in his voice she felt her pulses leap. “You were in my mind from the start to the finish of that game. I looked up at you every time I went into the box. This little glove of yours”--he took it from his pocket with a hand that trembled--“lay close to my heart all through the game. Mabel----”

“Why, hello, Joe, old top!” came a voice from the door that had opened without their hearing it. “What good wind blew you here? I’m no end glad to see you, don’t you know. Congratulations, old man, on winning that game. You were simply rippin’, don’t you know.”

And Reggie Varley ambled in and shook Joe’s hand warmly, blandly unconscious of the lack of welcome from the two inmates of the room.

“How are you, Reggie?” Joe managed to blurt out, wishing viciously that at that moment his friend were at the very farthest corner of the world.

It is possible that Mabel’s feelings were most unsisterly, but she concealed them and rallied more readily than Joe from the shock caused by her brother’s inopportune coming.

“I was just telling Joe how proud we were of him,” she smiled. “But he’s so modest that he refuses to take any credit for what he has done. Insists that somebody else won the game.”

“Of course that’s all bally nonsense, don’t you know,” declared Reggie, looking puzzled. “The other fellows helped, of course, but Joe was the king pin. Those Chicagos were out for blood and Joe was the only one who could tame them.”

Joe listened moodily, and while he is recovering his composure it may be well, for the sake of those who have not followed the career of the famous young pitcher, to mention the previous books of this series in which his exploits are recorded.

His diamond history opened in the first volume of the series, entitled: “Baseball Joe of the Silver Stars; Or, The Rivals of Riverside.” Here he had his first experience in pitching. In that restricted circle he soon became widely known as one of the best of the amateur boxmen, but he had to earn that position by overcoming many difficulties.

In “Baseball Joe on the School Nine,” we find the same qualities of grit and determination shown in a different field. The situation here was complicated by the efforts of the bully of the school, who did everything in his power to frustrate Joe and bring him to disaster.

A little later on, Joe went to Yale, and his triumphs in the great university are told in the third volume of the series, entitled: “Baseball Joe at Yale; Or, Pitching for the College Championship.”

As may be imagined, with such redoubtable rivals as Harvard and Princeton, a very different class of baseball is required from that which will “get by” in academies and preparatory schools.

Joe got his chance to pitch against Princeton in an exciting game where the Yale “Bulldog” “put one over” on the Princeton “Tiger.”

But in spite of his athletic prowess and general popularity, Joe was not entirely happy at Yale. His mother had set her heart on Joe’s studying for the ministry. But Joe himself did not feel any special call in that direction. While always a faithful student he was not a natural scholar, and outdoor life had a strong appeal for him. His success in athletics confirmed this natural bent, until at last he came to the conclusion that he ought to adopt professional baseball as his vocation.

His mother was, naturally, much disappointed, as she had had great hopes of seeing her only son in the pulpit. Moreover, she had the vague feeling that there was something almost disreputable in making baseball a profession. But Joe at last convinced her that whatever might have been true in the early days of the game did not apply now, when so many high-class men were turning toward it, and she yielded, though reluctantly.

Joe’s chance to break into the professional ranks was not long in coming. That last great game with Princeton had been noted by Jimmie Mack, manager of the Pittston team in the Central League. He made Joe an offer which the latter accepted, and the story of his first experience on the professional diamond is told in the fourth volume of the series entitled: “Baseball Joe in the Central League; Or, Making Good as a Professional Pitcher.”

But this was only the first step in his career. He was too ambitious to be content with the Central League except as a stepping stone to something higher. His delight can be imagined, therefore, when he learned that he had been drafted into the St. Louis Club of the National League. He was no longer a “busher” but the “real thing.” He had to work hard and had many stirring adventures. How he succeeded in helping his team into the first division is told in the fifth volume of the series, entitled: “Baseball Joe in the Big League; Or, A Young Pitcher’s Hardest Struggles.”

But these hard struggles were at the same time victorious ones and attracted the attention of the baseball public, who are always on the lookout for a new star. Among others, McRae, the famous manager of the New York Giants, thought he saw in Joe a great chance to bolster up his pitching staff. Joe could hardly believe his eyes when he learned that he had been bought by New York. It brought a bigger reputation, a larger salary and a capital chance to get into the World Series. He worked like a Trojan all through the season, and, as we have already seen, came through with flying colors, winning from the Chicagos the final game that made the Giants the champions of the National League and put them in line for the championship of the world. The details of the stirring fight are told in the sixth volume of the series, entitled: “Baseball Joe on the Giants; Or, Making Good as a Ball Twirler in the Metropolis.”

“I say, old top,” remarked Reggie, breaking in on Joe’s rather resentful musings, “you’re going to stay and have dinner with us to-night, you know.”

Joe looked at Mabel for confirmation.

“You certainly must, Joe,” she said enthusiastically. “We won’t take no for an answer.”

As there was nothing else on earth that Joe wanted so much as to be with Mabel, he did not require much urging.

“And I’ll tell you what we’ll do,” suggested Mabel. “In fact, it’s the only thing we can do. We’ll have the dinner served right in here for the three of us. If you should go down in the public dining-room of the hotel to-night, Joe, you’d have a crowd around the table ten lines deep.”

“By Jove, you’re right,” chimed in Reggie. “They’d have to send out a call for reserves. I’ll go down and have a little talk with the head waiter, and I’ll have him send up a dinner fit for a king.”

“Fit for a queen,” corrected Joe, as he glanced at Mabel.