This was easier said than done. Emerging from the booth, Lefty was waylaid by Spider Grant, captain of the team, who wasted a good half hour in desultory discussion of their chances for winning the third game of the series from the Specters that afternoon. It might have continued for an hour and a half had not Locke departed unceremoniously in the very midst of one of Spider’s most elaborate arguments. “If hot air would win the game, we wouldn’t need to go out to the park,” he muttered grumpily as he leaped aboard an open car. Of course there was a block; equally of course, Lefty fretted and fumed and wasted his good energy and invention in uncomplimentary remarks about the road and its operators. He was compelled to walk the last twelve blocks. When he at last arrived at the apartment house his mental condition was far from enviable. “Not at home,” said the maid, with cool brevity. As she started to close the door Lefty placed one foot over the sill, with apparent carelessness. His earnestness of purpose was dimming the brightness of his manners. “Are you sure?” he asked suspiciously. “I only want to see Miss Harting for a minute.” “Indeed!” sniffed the girl. “Well, you’ll have to wait some time before you get the chance. She and Mrs. Manning are leaving on the night train for the Adirondacks.” “The Adirondacks!” gasped Lefty. “To-night!” He stood staring at the maid for a moment in utter dismay. “But I _must_ see them before they go. Haven’t you any idea where they are now?” “No more’n a fly,” returned the girl, evidently softened a little by his distress. “They went right after the trunks was took――shoppin’, I s’pose. Anyhow, Mrs. Manning said they wouldn’t be back.” How Lefty went through the rest of the morning he did not know. What had been started by a trivial trick of chance seemed to be growing more serious every moment. Evidently Janet believed the worst of him. It was equally evident that she was determined to give him no opportunity to explain the mix-up. Her behavior hurt Lefty desperately. It seemed unfair and unjust that she should have so little faith in him, in spite of appearances. For several hours he wandered about the shopping district, in the vague hope that somehow he might run across the girl. Failing in that, he lunched in gloomy solitude, then made his way to the ball park. For six innings he sat on the bench in grim silence while “Slick” Lumley held down the Specters to a shut-out score. Slick was one of those pitchers who are unsurpassed when they are good, but who seldom last through an entire game. Evidently Carson did not propose to run any chances of his blowing up this time, for at the beginning of the seventh, with Lumley showing sudden wildness, he took him off the mound and substituted Billy Orth.