“He thought his friends were game,” explained the colonel; “and, in spite of his long and sucessful business experience, he over-looked the difference between a promise and a promissory note.  He nailed his stock subscribers down with hasty conversation only, and then rushed off and grabbed the six collected parcels of that block, for fear it might get away before he had his company legally organized.”

“And now he can’t unspike it,” guessed Johnny smilingly.  “Watch out, Colonel!”

There was a lively scramble in the two boxes as the first foul tip of the season whizzed directly at them.  Gamble, who had captained his village nine, had that ball out of the air and was bowing jovially to the applause before Gresham had quite succeeded in squeezing himself down behind the door of the box.

Naturally it was Polly who led the applause; and Constance shocked the precise Gresham by joining in heartily.

She was looking up at Johnny with sparkling eyes and flushed cheeks when Gresham came out of his cyclone cellar—­and, if he had disliked Gamble before, now he hated him.

It is a strange feature of the American national game that the more perfectly it is played the duller it is.  This was a pitchers’ battle; and the game droned along, through inning after inning, with seldom more than three men to bat in each half, while the score board presented a most appropriate double procession of naughts.  Spectators, warmly praising that smoothly oiled mechanical process of one, two, three and out, and telling each other that this was a great game, nevertheless yawned and dropped their score cards, and put away their pencils, and looked about the grandstand in search of faces they knew.

In such a moment Colonel Bouncer, who had come into this box because of a huge admiration for Polly and an almost extravagant respect for Constance, and who had heartily wished himself out of it during the last two or three innings, now happily discovered a familiar face only a few rows back of him.  “By George, Johnny, there’s Courtney now!” he announced.

Gamble looked with keen interest.

“Do you mean that gentleman with the ruddy face and the white beard?” he inquired.

“That’s the old pirate,” asserted the colonel.

“Why, that’s the man you wanted to introduce me to at the race-track in Baltimore Saturday.”

“Bless my heart, so I did!” he remembered.  “I thought it might relieve him to tell his troubles to you.  It isn’t too late yet.  Come on up and I’ll introduce you—­that is, unless you want to watch this game.”

“I’m pleased to pass up this game till somebody makes an error,” Johnny willingly decided.  “If they’ll hand out a base on balls and a safe bunt and hit a batter, so as to get three men on bases with two out, and then muft a high fly out against the fence, and boot the ball all over the field while four of the Reds gallop home—­I’ll stay and help lynch the umpire; otherwise not.  Show me to your friend Courtney.”  He turned to take courteous leave of the others and his eyes met the friendly glance of Constance.