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He thought, This is my chance. This is the way it always happens. But there seemed to be no way to regain precision, to regain control over leaden muscles.

Perspective was crazy. The batter was too close, the plate too small. The crowd noises had the sound of delirium, reminding him of a childhood operation, of the roar as he went under the anaesthetic.

He made the next batter a present of a medium ball down the alley, right in the groove. He had tried to put stuff on it, but his arm wouldn’t behave. The batter swung hard and the ball, on a vicious slant, went like an arrow between the shortstop and the second baseman. The fielder gathered it in on the second bounce and made a nice throw to second, holding the hitter at first. But two runs scored and there was a runner on first and third with none out.

There was no chance to lick it. It was too late to lick it. They would yank him out. Strange that they didn’t gather ’round and try to stiffen him up.

The next pitch was a ball, and the next was a fat one. The crack of the bat was like a pistol shot. The ball went by Johnny, six feet over his head. The fielder came in fast, misjudged the ball. He tried to reverse and back up, but the ball went over his head. It was a clean triple, scoring two more runs.

Johnny wanted to be taken out. He didn’t want the nightmare of standing out there so desperately alone, while the crowd made mock of him, while the batters hit him at will. He had allowed four runs and still there was none out and a man on third.

He felt as though his right arm was made of brittle sticks. His fingers felt weak and pulpy on the ball. His teeth were clamped so tightly that his jaw ached. Why didn’t they take him out? No one came near him.

He walked the next batter, and the next. The bases were filled. The crowd had begun to chant and stomp their feet.

Johnny felt as though he would faint. He looked through mist toward the dug-out, tried to tell the manager by an awkward gesture that he wanted to be taken out. There was no response.

He beckoned to Shorty. Shorty came slowly out onto the mound.

“I’m... I’m all through, Shorty. I can’t pitch.”

“Brother, you can say that again. But you don’t come out.”

“What!”

“Like I said, you don’t come out. Charlie give everybody the word. Don’t ask me why. Maybe he’s gone nuts. But that’s the way it is. He says you pitch the whole game even if we got a score of a thousand to one. It ain’t baseball, kid. I don’t know what it is. But you stay right there and sweat it out. Maybe the game gets called on account of darkness before this inning is over.”

Johnny couldn’t comprehend. He had the crazy idea that this was one of the nightmares he had about pitching. Yet this was reality.

“They can’t leave me in here. I can’t pitch!”

“Brother, you’re in and according to Charlie, you stay in.”

Shorty Gordon turned and walked back to the plate.

Johnny wondered what would happen if he walked off the field. But be couldn’t do that. He had to be sent out of the game.

The next pitch hit the ground in front of the plate. He managed to get one pitch over the plate before he walked the batter, forcing the run. Somebody hurled an empty pint bottle out of the stands. It hit and slid across the grass toward him. The umpire walked over, picked it up and put it in his coat pocket.

Five runs had scored and still there were none out. He felt as though he were standing in water over his head, trying to throw the ball. He lobbed it in over the plate and the ball was going so slowly that the batter knocked it almost straight up in the air. Shorty caught it for the out.

The next pitch hit the batter on the thigh, forcing the sixth run in. The crowd stomped and whistled. The next batter hit a line drive that smacked into the shortstop’s glove. Two down. Johnny walked the next batter, forcing the seventh run. The next batter reached for one, smashed it far out into right field along the foul line. As it faded foul, the fielder gathered it in for the third out.

Johnny Lace walked in wooden desperation to the manager and said, “Why didn’t you take me out?”

The manager looked at him coldly. “I don’t have to give reasons for what I do.”

“I can’t go back in. You’ll have to send somebody else in.”

“Nobody tells me what to do, Lace. You’ll go back in and you’ll pitch the rest of the game.” His voice was loud enough for the others to hear it. They looked sulky and baffled. It was beyond their experience, seeming to them to be some grotesque way of punishing all of them.

Affected by lethargy, by the sense of having already lost the game to an impossible situation, they quickly accumulated three outs.

Johnny Lace walked back to the mound. He was greeted with a roar of disapproval from the stands.

It was the top of the fourth, the score 7–1. He felt weak and dizzy and afraid. His pitch was an awkward travesty. The batter slammed it for a clean base hit, yelling, “Thanks, pal,” as he took his lead of first.

It was a nightmare. The ball was enormously heavy and the distance to the plate was infinite. He walked two more batters to fill the bases. The tiny bits of control he had retained in the third inning were gone. In desperation he threw with all his strength. The ball whistled down the middle and the batter lofted it into the right-field bleachers to make the score eleven to one, with none out.

Johnny stood in apathy. The ball, thrown out by Shorty, hit him a painful blow on the chest and dropped into the dust at his feet. Two wild pitches and two that hit the ground in front of the plate walked the next batter. The stands had begun to quiet down, realizing that this sort of thing was rare in organized ball.

He walked two more men, filling the bases again. The runners started at the crack of the bat. The ball took a flat bounce, plumped into the shortstop’s glove. He had moved over toward second to take the hit. With the ball he tagged the runner who had started for third, took two quick steps to second base to put out the runner coming in from first and then hurled the ball to first, beating the runner by a stride.

The stands exploded. The shortstop had put himself in the record books with that play. The runner who had crossed home plate from third couldn’t believe that the three outs had been accomplished before he could score.

Johnny Lace walked in from the mound, his spikes scuffing on the grass.

The triple play had done one of those inexplicable things to the spirit of the team. The batters came up to the plate, tense and eager. The first pitch was nailed for a double. The next man up slammed the ball out of the park. The opposition pitcher, momentarily rattled, walked the next man. The Sailors were so far behind that sacrifice hits were out of order. They scored four runs before the Roamers sent in the relief pitcher who retired the side. The score was eleven to five and the Sailors were almost back in the ball game.

Johnny came out to the mound for the top of the fifth. He walked the first two batters and the stands began to rock with the rhythmic stomp of feet.

Johnny knew that he was going to have to stay right there for the rest of the game. He finally realized that the manager meant what he said.

He stood and looked around at the infield, at the dead, unfriendly faces.

And Johnny Lace began to laugh! It started as a chuckle deep in his throat, bubbling up into a series of yelps of laughter that bent him double, that started the tears running down bronzed cheeks.

Shorty came running out. He said, “Pally, if you’re going nuts, maybe you better walk off.”

Gasping, Johnny Lace stood up. He looked down at the batter who stood outside the box knocking the dirt out of his cleats. The batter was normal size. The plate looked big. Johnny Lace tensed his arm, then swung it loosely.