"It is looking your way to bid you good-by," chuckled Harry, not in the least disturbed or anxious.
Merriwell had a way of snapping his left foot out of the box for a throw to first, and it kept the runner hugging the bag all the time.
Frank also had another trick of holding the ball in his hand and appearing to give his trousers a hitch, upon which he would deliver the ball when neither runner nor batter was expecting him to do so, and yet his delivery was perfectly proper.
He struck the next man out, and the batter to follow hit a weak one to third, who stopped the runner at second.
Two men were out, and still there was a man on first. Now it looked dark for Harvard that inning, and not a safe hit had been made off Merriwell thus far.
The Harvard crowd was getting anxious. Was it possible that Merriwell would hold them down so they could not score, and Yale would yet pull out by good work at the bat?
The captain said a few words to the next batter before the man went up to the plate, and Frank felt sure the fellow had been advised to take his time.
Having made up his mind to this, Frank sent a swift straight one directly over, and, as he had expected, the batter let it pass, which caused the umpire to call a strike.
Still keeping the runner hugging first, Frank seemed to start another ball in exactly the same manner. It was not a straight one, but it was a very slow drop, as the batter discovered after he had commenced to swing. Finding he could not recover, the fellow went after the ball with a scooping movement, and then did not come within several inches of it, greatly to the delight of the Yale crowd.
"Oh, Merry has every blooming one of them on a string!" cried Rattleton. "He thon't do a wing to 'em--I mean he won't do a thing to 'em."
The Yale men were singing songs of victory already, and the Harvard crowd was doing its best to keep up the courage of its team by rooting hard.
"The hottest game I ever saw played by freshmen," commented Collingwood.
"It is a corker," confessed Pierson. "We weren't looking for anything of the sort a short time ago."
"I should say not. Up to the time Merriwell went in it looked as if Harvard had a walkover."
"Gordon feels bad enough about it, that is plain. He is trying to appear cheerful on the bench, but--"