“Good Lord!” Billy muttered to himself. “I never saw him so shifty. First he’s careless and wild as a hawk, then, just when he seems going up for fair, he tightens like a drumhead. He’s got Carson squirming.” True, the manager of the Blue Stockings was squirming. Even when Locke fanned dangerous hitters in the pinches Carson, though showing some relief, did not look wholly happy. At no time was the angry frown wiped clean from his face. For through it all he was troubled by a nagging conviction that the man on the mound was playing on his feelings as well as toying with the opposing batters. It really seemed that Lefty invited and sought threatening situations――in any of which the slightest slip would give the Specters what they desired――in order that he might make a display of his skill by balking the enemy when they were almost grasping the coveted prize. A pitcher who could “monkey” in such a manner, with the result of a single game meaning so much, was not worthy of trust under any circumstances. Had Carson felt absolutely assured that Locke was doing this, he would have braved the wrath of the owner by benching the man in one of those tense, threatening moments. But Carson was not sure. Much as he disliked Lefty for certain reasons, he could not bring himself to believe that a youngster with Locke’s promise in the Big League would, through malice or spite, toy inanely with his future prospects. Nevertheless, even when Lefty succeeded in pulling himself out of the holes, and came to the bench amid the approving uproar of the great crowd, the manager could not bring himself to give the grim and sullen man a word of encouragement and approval. True it was that Locke did not invite anything of the sort, and actually seemed, by his cold and distant manner, to repel the advances of his own friends and intimates on the team. In every way he was thoroughly unlike the open, jovial, likable youngster he had seemed to be earlier in the season. Even Laughing Larry, than whom no one had been more intimate with the young southpaw, wore an expression of troubled anxiety each time he came to the bench following those pinches. Billy Orth saw this, and signaled for the perspiring, disturbed Dalton to sit beside him in the pit. “What’s the matter with Lefty, Dalt?” asked Orth guardedly. “Do you think――” “Dunno what to think,” muttered Larry, in a perplexed way; “but I don’t believe he’s right. The whole team feels it, too; and, with our slim margin of one run, it wouldn’t take only the smallest break to put the bunch off their feet.” “Of course you’ve noticed how queer he’s been acting the last few days?” “Huh! Couldn’t help noticing it. A blind man or a fool could see that. He seems to be sore with himself and the whole world generally. That quarrel with Carson didn’t improve his condition any. He’s in bad there.” “But he stands well with the skirt, and she seems to be the real power behind the machine.”