CHAPTER IV

A PLACE OF GREAT MAGIC

“Hello Johnny!” Doug Danby exclaimed, as Johnny came racing into the Danby’s back yard. “Where you been? Gee! You look queer! As if you’d been stealin’ chickens or something.” Doug laughed.

“Oh forget it!” Johnny exploded. “Here! Give me your catcher’s mask. I’ll use it to hide my face.”

“Don’t need it,” Doug replied. “All self-respecting secrets carefully guarded—that’s our motto.

“But say!” Doug exploded. “The Colonel wants to see us! Guess it’s about that pitcher of his. Bet he’ll be with us next Saturday. And if he is,—say! Boy! We’ll lick ’em!”

Doug was a fine boy. Johnny liked him a heap. Tall, slightly angular, like the boy Abe Lincoln, he was honest, hard-working and full of droll fun—just the sort of boy that should come from a little city like Hillcrest.

Together the boys walked rapidly down the street. They soon caught up with a slow ambling figure that greeted them with a squawky but none the less hearty, “Why, hello Doug! Hello Johnny!”

This was Professor George, the little city’s favorite old man. He was eighty years old, was Professor George. The younger men of the city could remember when he was a popular teacher in the high school. Now, for years, he had been Professor George, friend of every boy in town.

The professor had a hooked nose and there were huge brown freckles all over his dry face, but his kindly smile was worth earning, and many a boy owed his success to Professor George’s kindly, steadying hand.

“Sorry you lost the game Saturday,” he said as he tried hard to keep in step. “You’ll have better luck next time. I’m sure of it.” Professor George had not missed a ball game in twenty years.

“Yes,” Doug exclaimed enthusiastically, “we’re going to have a grand pitcher, regular big league stuff! We—”

His words were broken in upon by a booming voice. It was Big Bill Tyson speaking. He had suddenly appeared from somewhere. “Just the fellows I want to see!” he roared. “The very ones. Wanted to tell you about the ball grounds.”

“Ye—es. What about it?” The words caught in Doug’s throat. He had been dreading this for some time, in fact ever since Big Bill’s father died. Bill’s father had owned the ball park. He had owned a lot more of the town besides. Now it all belonged to Big Bill. Once the ball park had been the grounds of a canning factory. Bill’s father had been rich and generous, a good citizen and a great friend of Professor George. So, when the antiquated canning factory failed to pay, he had allowed Professor George and his boys to tear it down and to use the lumber for a fence and bleachers of a ball park.

But now the good old man was dead and Big Bill reigned, in his stead. Big Bill was a different sort. He cared little for boys, in fact he thought very little about the welfare of anyone but Big Bill. So now Doug, Johnny and Professor George stood, inwardly quaking, awaiting his next word.

“It’s like this—” he tried to be brisk and business-like, but succeeded only in appearing, in the boys’ eyes at least, as a big bully. “Like this—” he began again. “Fellow came into my office last week. He’s interested in organizing a professional baseball league. Hired players and all that from out of town. Play the games on Sunday. Big thing for the city. Bring lots of folks here. Fill up the soft-drink places, pool halls an’ all that. Fine big thing!” Thrusting his fingers in his belt, he swelled out like a turkey gobbler.

“But the boys could play their games on Saturday just the same,” Professor George put in hopefully.

“No. No, they couldn’t. That’s what I wanted to tell you.” Big Bill scowled. “Boys would be in the way. Professionals need practice and all that. So—it’s out you go, just like that!” He snapped a pudgy finger. “Unless—”

“Unless what?” Doug breathed.

“Unless you can get me a thousand dollars.”

“Rent?” Professor George gasped. “We—”

“Rent nothing!” Big Bill roared. “First payment on a contract to purchase the grounds.”

“For—for how much?” Doug was staring.

“Ten thousand dollars on contract.”

“Ten thousand!” Johnny whistled through his teeth.

“We—ll,” Professor George said slowly, “that’s a fair price, William. But you’ll have to give us time to think where we can get it.”

“All right.” Big Bill suddenly put on a business-like air. “Two weeks. Time enough for anybody.” At that he strode away.

“Might as well make it two years,” Doug grumbled gloomily, “for all we’ll ever make it!”

“Now, now Doug!” Professor George admonished. “It’s a worthy cause, a very worthy cause. Nothing better for the boys than good, clean baseball. God loves boys, I’m positive of that. So, just like as not He’ll show us the way.” Professor George was religious but he was not what you call pious. His religion, like the blood that coursed through his veins, was a real part of him. Every boy who came to know him respected him the more because of his religion.

“Well, boys,” the good old professor said as he left them at his own door, “don’t let William trouble you too much. We’ll get round him somehow. Used to trouble us in school, William did, but we always got round him, somehow.” He gave forth a cackling laugh. “Always got round him somehow.”

“Bill went to school when Professor George taught,” Doug explained as he and Johnny went on down the street. “Dad says Bill cheated something terrible, but Professor George always caught on to him. That’s why he don’t like Professor George, even now.

“He’s been cheating ever since,” he added gloomily. “He’ll cheat us out of our ball park if we don’t watch out.

“A thousand dollars,” he murmured thoughtfully. “We’ve got half that much in the bank—been saving it for new bleachers. Took two years to save it. Fine chance to gather up that much more in two weeks!”

“Got to advertise,” said Johnny. “This mysterious new pitcher now. He ought to draw a crowd if we only had him advertised.”

Like a flash a bright idea occurred to Johnny. “I’ll think up some good publicity,” he told himself. “Think it up just right. Then I’ll shoot that thought-camera at myself and turn out some swell copy. Old C. K. Lovell will put it in the _Sentinel_, I know he will.” But of this he said never a word to Doug. The thought-camera was a deep, dark secret.

“He is mysterious!” Doug exclaimed quite suddenly.

“Huh! What? Who’s mysterious?” Johnny dragged himself back to earth with a start. “Oh! Yes! That pitcher. Sure he is. Terribly mysterious.”

“The Colonel says he’s been working in the laboratories for three months,” Doug broke in. “Three months! I’ve been round the lab nearly every day, and I never once saw him, except that evening when he pitched a few over for us.”

As the boys approached the long, low building known as the laboratories, Johnny felt a thrill course up his spine. He was to see that strange pitcher. With his olive skin and bright gleaming blue eyes, this pitcher’s very movements seemed to say, “Here I am. A mystery. Solve me.”

The laboratories too held a special charm for Johnny. Here all manner of strange chemical secrets were sought out and often found. Already these laboratories were famous. Here a new drug had been discovered that had proved a great boon to those suffering from asthma. With characteristic generosity, the Colonel had given this discovery to the world, asking no profit to himself.

It was rumored that here a poison had been discovered, so powerful that it would make war impossible. One drop of it on any part of the body would mean instant death. This was only a rumor. Better founded was the statement that “heavy water”—a water in which no animal life, however small, could live—had been produced. However these things might be, both Johnny and Doug approached the place with a feeling akin to awe, for this to their growing minds was a place of great magic.

In the office of the laboratories they found awaiting them not only the Colonel, but a short, round-shouldered boy who wore heavy horn-rimmed glasses with thick lenses.

“Hello, Goggles!” Doug greeted the bespectacled boy with a hearty grin. “What you doing here? Been discovering some new element or something?”

“Johnny—” he turned to his friend. “Meet Goggles Short, the boy wizard, both chemical and electrical, of our fair city.”

“Aw now!” Goggles was embarrassed.

“Fame,” said the Colonel with a cordial smile, “is a terribly embarrassing thing, Goggles. However, since you have attained it, you’ll have to bear up under it.”

“I suppose you think—” the Colonel’s tone changed as he wheeled about to face the other boys, “I suppose you think that I sent for you to talk about our new pitcher. I did not. He is not here.”

“Not here!” Doug’s face dropped. “Gone for—”

“No, not for good,” the Colonel broke in. “Just for a day or two. He’ll be back for Saturday’s game. I’m ready to guarantee that. And you boys are going to need him—for—” his voice dropped, “for more reasons than one.”

“You know Big Bill’s plans.” Doug’s face took on a hopeful look. “You’ll help us.”

“Yes.” The Colonel spoke slowly. “Only moral and mental support, however. Cash is all tied up.

“But you’ll lick Big Bill, I’m sure of it!” the Colonel’s tone carried conviction. “Goggles here has an idea. Sit down.” He motioned them to chairs. “Goggles, tell them about it.”

“Well I—you know—” Goggles pulled at his sleeve nervously. “It’s sort of like this. Maybe it won’t help a bit. But this is it. Dave Saunders over at the electric shop has been experimenting with a thing. I’ve been helping him. Thing’s got eyes, better’n human eyes because they’re quicker.”

“Electric eyes,” Johnny put in.

“Sure! How’d you know?” Goggles’ eyes bulged behind his thick lenses.

“Know a lot about them,” Johnny chuckled. “Sometime I’ll tell you about how a fellow talked to me down a beam of light. Electric eyes helped him to do that, and a lot of exciting things happened. But go on. What you using electric eyes for?”

“Umpire,” Goggles said with a broad grin. “Baseball umpire. Got forty eyes. Some see up and down and some sideways. We’ve tried it out. Works swell. Calls balls and strikes perfectly. Never a miss.

“Thing is—” Goggles hurried on. “A week from Wednesday we play Fairfield. That team’s always beefing about the umpire. Holler their heads off. So I thought—” he took a long breath, “thought you might like to try our old electric umpire. He’ll umpire fairly. Never a mistake.”

“That—” Doug sprang to his feet, “that would be swell! And man! Oh, man! We’ll draw a crowd! Think of it! Something absolutely new. Electric umpire! What do you think of it, Johnny?”

“Wha—think of what?” Johnny started. “Electric eye. Oh! Yes, it’s interesting.”

“No! More than that!” Doug exploded. “Electric umpire!”

Truth was, strange as it may seem, Johnny’s mind had gone off the track. It had suddenly been deflected by the thought-camera, the most extraordinary thing he had ever seen. “I dreamed it,” he had been telling himself. “Thing never happened. That Chinaman never recorded my thoughts. But if he did, if the thing’s in my closet when I get home, I’ll try it—like to try it now.” This was what he had been thinking when Doug Danby brought him back to his present surroundings.

“Swell idea!” he enthused, once the electric umpire had been explained to him. “Work all right, I’m sure of it.”

“And draw a crowd,” put in Doug.

“That’s what I was thinking,” Colonel Chamberlain agreed. “Paying crowds are what you need right now. You’ll get that extra five hundred dollars in plenty of time. All you need is advertising.”

“Leave that to me.” Johnny was on his feet, ready for a dash home. With the aid of the thought-camera, he would dish up plenty of fancy advertising.

“All right,” Doug agreed, “you look after that. I’ll get in touch with the Fairfield bunch. See if they’ll stand for this electric umpire.”

“They’ll stand for it right enough,” the Colonel said with a smile. “They get a percentage of the gate receipts. Just talk publicity to them and they’ll agree readily enough.

“Well—” his tone became brisk. “Council of war is over. I’ll have my pitcher on hand for Saturday’s major attraction. And you, Goggles, you’ll take care of Wednesday. Meeting’s adjourned.”

With a “Thank you, thank you a lot!” the three boys filed out of the office.

“Well,” Doug sighed, “we didn’t see him after all.”

“See who?” Johnny was once more lost in his contemplation of the immediate future.

“The pitcher, of course,” Doug grumbled. “Fellow’d think he was just an ordinary person.”

“Well, perhaps he is,” Johnny chuckled.

“And perhaps he is not,” Doug replied as they lost themselves in the gathering darkness.