For a moment Carson felt that he was going to blow up like a firecracker, but, somehow, he managed to control himself in a measure. “Yes, I sent for you,” he said. “I want to hear what you have to say for yourself.” “I’m not going to say anything.” “Oh, you’re not! You’re not going to say anything after handing the Specters that game on a platter? You’re not going to say a word after an exhibition that would make a jackass weep?” “I don’t see any tears in your eyes.” Then Carson did go up. “You infernal, insolent, swell-headed cub!” he shouted. “You think you can talk to me that fashion just because you happen to have a pull with――” Barely in time he bit the sentence short. His breast heaving, his nostrils distended, he announced: “I’ll show you! I’ll teach you that you can’t deliberately throw a game!” “Any man who says I ever deliberately threw a game is a liar!” Rarely in his baseball career had a player talked to Carson like that. The manager could scarcely believe the evidence of his ears, and for a moment he choked, his face purple, in an effort to articulate. “I oughter beat your head off!” he finally ground forth. “Try it!” invited Locke. The manager knew better than to try it. That tall, compact, finely built man looked like a thorough athlete, and just now the expression on his face seemed to betoken that he would gladly welcome a hand-to-hand scrap with anyone. “I won’t maul you,” panted Carson. “I’m sorry,” regretted the southpaw. “But I’ll teach you something, just the same. You’re fined twenty-five and suspended.” For a moment or two Lefty was silent. “Perhaps you think you can make that penalty stick,” he said presently. “Perhaps you think, simply because I lost a game――I’m not denying I lost it――you can call me into a private room and browbeat me, and fine me when I fail to cower and eat humble pie.” “I’m fining you for your rotten work on the field. I’d fined you then and there if I’d got hold of you before you loped off.” “You’re fining me from pure malicious revenge, nothing else. As a manager you play your favorites, and I don’t happen to be one of them.” “Shut up!” roared Carson. “Shut up, or I’ll double it!” “Double and be――hanged! I don’t have to play baseball for a living. You can suspend me as long as you please. I’m getting tired of the game, anyway, and thinking about quitting.”