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"Strike two!" A howl of glee went up from all quarters, save from the Gardiner visitors. Again Dick signaled. His third was altogether different -a bewildering out-curve. Gardiner's batsman didn't offer, but Purcell caught the leather neatly. "Strike three, and out! One out!" announced the umpire. "Whoop!" The joy from the home fans was let loose.
"He isn't," retorted Dave Darrin. "He's just on the job, steady as iron, cool as a cucumber and confident as an American." Gardiner's pitcher measured his man critically, then signaled the next ball. It came, just as Dick, closely watching the pitcher, expected it to come, a swift, graceful out-curve. Bang! At least it sounded like a gunshot. Dick Prescott struck the ball with all his might.
The suit of black diagonal, wrinkled in impossible places; the bright blue four-in-hand, factory tied; the low, turned-down collar, pattern of the days of Seymour and Blair, white glazed as the letters on the window of the open-day-and-night-except-Sunday restaurants; the out-curve at the knees from the saddle grip; the peculiar spread of the half-closed right thumb and fingers from the stiff hold upon the circling lasso; the deeply absorbed weather tan that the hottest sun of Cape May can never equal; the seldom-winking blue eyes that unconsciously divided the rushing crowds into fours, as though they were being counted out of a corral; the segregated loneliness and solemnity of expression, as of an Emperor or of one whose horizons have not intruded upon him nearer than a day's ride these brands of the West were set upon Greenbrier Nye.
The catcher was almost as cool as Ted, and to show his calmness, he began to toss the ball into the air as he caught it and then catch it again in his bare hand as it came down. As soon as his arm felt right, Don tried out his curves. His drop, his best ball, worked nicely, but his in-curve and his out-curve were only fair.
He will have ample time to move after the pitcher has begun his delivery and when the batter's attention is wholly occupied with that. If an out-curve is coming, he should be ready to move out, or if an in-curve, or fast, straight ball, he should be ready to step in.
An out-curve should be pitched just out of his reach; being so near where he wants it, it will draw him out and he will make every movement, except the swing of the bat, as in hitting. This movement should be carefully noted. If, in stepping forward to hit, he also steps away from the plate toward the third base, it is at once a point in the pitcher's favor.
But the ball travelled with much greater speed than the batter expected from such motion. McCord let the first two balls go by, and Arthurs called them both strikes. Then Ken pitched an out-curve which McCord fanned at helplessly. Arthurs sent Trace up next. Ken saw that the coach was sending up the weaker hitters first. Trace could not even make a foul.
I will signal for an out-curve, and you'll stand in the box and tie yourself in a bow-knot, and throw at me something about Columbus discovering America in 1776; or you'll reel off some problem about plastering the inside of a room, leaving room for four doors and six windows."
For the in-curve a swinging sidearm motion is used, the ball being released over the tips of the first two fingers with a snap to set it spinning. It may also be produced by releasing the ball over all four fingers. The grip of the ball for the drop is very similar to the out-curve, but in delivery the hand is brought almost directly over the shoulder.
The hundreds on the seats were standing up now. Then, to rest his arm, Dick, who was wholly collected, and as cool as a veteran under fire, served the spectators with a glimpse of an out-curve that was not quite like any that they had ever seen before. This out-curve had a suspicion of the jump-ball about it. Dick was pitching easily, now.
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