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Yes, Tom and I have been in plenty of bad scrapes, and pulled out just because we set our teeth and refused to admit we were down and out. So I'm going to try the same dodge in this case, and not acknowledge defeat until the ninth inning is through, and the last man down."
Knowing something must be done at once or the game would doubtless be lost in that inning, Eliot threw the ball to Barker, so that Berlin might hold the man on third, and, calling Phil, stepped forward and met him in front of the pan. "Play ball! play ball!" yelled Sanger. "Don't delay the game!" And, "Play ball! play ball!" howled the Barville spectators.
In case of a tie at the end of the game the play continues until at the completion of a full inning one team is ahead. That ends the game and the team ahead is the winner. In arranging games with visiting teams it is customary to make some arrangement as to expenses, share of gate receipts or other guarantee.
Don smiled mechanically. It was his turn to go to bat; and after he was thrown out he came to the bench and fought stubbornly to keep his thoughts on the game and away from Tim. Grimly he stuck to his task. When it came time to start the seventh inning, he was almost master of himself. He found his drop ball working again. "Yah!" cried Ted. "Here's where we get in the game again."
Come on in, the water is fine," and Pa laughed as though he was in swimming and wanted the rest of the gang to come in. The crowd thought they had given the distinguished stranger his inning, and so they all rushed in with clubs and began to kill rabbits and drive them away from pa.
Although the head of Frank's batting order came up in the sixth and Hodge reached third, no scores were secured. In the seventh Gallup crossed the pan with a run. Neither side could secure a tally in the eighth, and the ninth inning opened with Merriwell's team three runs behind the youngsters. "Oh, we've got you!" laughed Sparkfair.
The grand stand, slower to understand and approve, arrived later; but it got there about the seventh, and ladies' gloves and men's hats were sacrificed. In the eighth the Quakers reluctantly yielded their meed of praise, showing it by a cessation of their savage wordy attacks on the Rube. It was a kind of sullen respect, wrung from the bosom of great foes. Then the ninth inning was at hand.
As Daddy's team became more tense and excited Bo Stranathan's players grew steadier and more arrogantly confident. Daddy saw it with distress, and he could not realize just where Natchez had license for such confidence. Daddy watched the game with the eyes of a hawk. As the Natchez players trooped in for their sixth inning at bat, Daddy observed a marked change in their demeanor.
Old Put congratulated Frank as soon as the bench was reached. "That was great work, Merriwell. Keep it up! Keep it up!" "That kind of work will not win the game as the score stands," returned Frank. "Some batting must be done, and there must be some score getting." "You are right, and you are the second man up this inning. See what you can do."
He vaulted over the railing and turned. "I'll come back here right after the game," he said; "there's only one more inning." "We'll come back right after the game," repeated Mr. Duncan. Bob shot one look at him, of which Mr. Duncan seemed blissfully unconscious, and stalked off abruptly to second base.
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