Therefore they were very miserable, and they told themselves that “things would be different if Frank Merriwell was here.” And they wondered and speculated at the absence of both Frank and King Jimmy from the ball-field.
Hodge had been compelled to give up the search for Frank and go into the game. He was satisfied that Ditson’s trick was simply to keep Merry out of the way till U. V. could win, and he firmly believed that the fellow would take good care that no real harm befell the captain of the Yale team.
Then Bart resolved to defeat Ditson’s purpose by encouraging the men to win, even though Frank was not there to pitch. But Virgil Paragon, the Virginia pitcher, proved to be the great stumbling-block. They could not seem to get safe hits off him when hits were needed.
Ditson, who had obtained odds when he bet on Virginia earlier in the day, was now offering odds, and with no takers.
Had Frank Merriwell been there, he would have found plenty who were ready to cover his money; but without Frank Merriwell the Yale men seemed to lack heart and confidence.
“Just hear that blower!” growled one of the disgusted subjects of King Jimmy. “If Frank Merriwell was here, I’d shut him up! But I reckon it ain’t any use as long as he ain’t here.”
In the sixth Morgan had again seemed on the point of going to pieces, and Hodge feared the third time this should happen; therefore he resolved to put in Starbright.
So Dick was again set to “warming up,” and Morgan knew he was to be taken out. If he felt angry over this, he held his temper. He had learned that pitchers might be changed any time during the game on a trip like this, and no pitcher was liable to win the satisfaction of claiming truthfully that he had carried off a game without assistance.
In the first of the seventh the Yale men were at the bat, but Paragon toyed with them as before, not permitting a man to reach second.
Deep was the gloom of the men from the North when they moved out onto the field beneath that smiling blue Virginian sky.
The crowd was delighted, as it had a right to be, for it was an honor to defeat Yale.
Morgan sat on the bench and saw Starbright go into the box.
“Ha! ha!” laughed Ditson. “Our boys will make short work of that big duffer! Why, he can’t pitch!”