neymoon trip! Just think!"

"If the worst comes to the worst, Cap, I don't care for anything but
the games. If we get in the lead and stay there I'll stand for
anything.... Couldn't the gang be coaxed or bought off to let the
Rube and Nan alone?"

"Not on your life! There ain't enough love or money on earth to stop
them. It'll be awful. Mind, I'm not responsible. Don't you go holdin'
me responsible. In all my years of baseball I never went on a trip
with a bride in the game. That's new on me, an' I never heard of it.
I'd be bad enough if he wasn't a rube an' if she wasn't a crazy
girl-fan an' a flirt to boot, an' with half the boys in love with her,
but as it is----"

Spears gave up and, gravely shaking his head, he left me. I spent a
little while in sober reflection, and finally came to the conclusion
that, in my desperate ambition to win the pennant, I would have taken
half a dozen rube pitchers and their baseball-made brides on the trip,
if by so doing I could increase the percentage of games won.
Nevertheless, I wanted to postpone the Rube's wedding if it was
possible, and I went out to see Milly and asked her to help us. But
for once in her life Milly turned traitor.

"Connie, you don't want to postpone it. Why, how perfectly lovely! ...
Mrs. Stringer will go on that trip and Mrs. Bogart.... Connie,
I'm going too!"

She actually jumped up and down in glee. That was the woman in her.
It takes a wedding to get a woman. I remonstrated and pleaded and
commanded, all to no purpose. Milly intended to go on that trip to see
the games, and the fun, and the honeymoon.

She coaxed so hard that I yielded. Thereupon she called up Mrs.
Stringer on the telephone, and of course found that young woman just as
eager as she was. For my part, I threw anxiety and care to the four
winds, and decided to be as happy as any of them. The pennant was
mine! Something kept ringing that in my ears. With the Rube working
his iron arm for the edification of his proud Nancy Brown, there was
extreme likelihood of divers shut-outs and humiliating defeats for some
Eastern League teams.

How well I calculated became a matter of baseball history during that
last week of June. We won six straight games, three of which fell to
the Rube's credit. His opponents scored four runs in the three games,
against the nineteen we made. Upon July 1, Radbourne beat Providence
and Cairns won the second game. We now had a string of eight