It was Lefty Locke's turn to laugh, but his merriment held more than a touch of irony. "Jack Kennedy has won pennants or kept in the first division, at least, with teams that would have been fighting for the subcellar under any other manager. When meddlers have not interfered he's always been able to get the last ounce of baseball out of every man under him. While he has handled it the club has always been a big paying proposition. What he has done has been nothing short of miraculous considering the niggardly policy forced upon him by those in power. It's the lowest-salaried team in the league. We have men getting twenty-five hundred or three thousand who should be drawing down twice as much, and would be with any other winning Big League club. Only a man with Kennedy's magnetism and tact could have kept them going at high pressure, could have kept them from being dissatisfied and lying down. What they've accomplished has been done for him, not for the owners. And now you tell me he's to be canned. There's gratitude!" "My dear man," chirruped Weegman, "baseball is business, and gratitude never goes far in business. Granting what you say may have been true in the past, it's plain enough that the old man's beginning to lose his grip. He fell down last season, and now that the Feds are butting in and making trouble, he's showing himself even more incompetent. Talk about gratitude; it didn't hold Grist or Orth, and now it's reported that Dillon is negotiating with the outlaws. You know what that means; our pitching staff is all shot to pieces. If the players were so true to Kennedy, why didn't they wait for their contracts?" "How could Jack send them contracts when he hasn't one himself? If he had the authority now, perhaps he could save Dillon for us even yet. Billy Orth is hot-headed and impulsive, and he thought he wasn't given a square deal. As for Grist, old Pete's days are numbered, and he knows it. He was wise to the talk about asking waivers on him. It was a ten-to-one shot he'd have been sent to the minors this coming season. With the Federals offering him a three-year contract at nearly twice as much as he ever received, he'd have been a fool to turn it down. All the same, he had a talk with Kennedy before he signed. Jack couldn't guarantee him anything, so he jumped." "That's it!" exclaimed Weegman triumphantly. "There's a sample of Kennedy's incompetence right there. He should have baited Grist along, and kept him away from the Feds until the season was well under way, when they would have had their teams made up, and probably wouldn't have wanted Pete. Then, if he didn't come up to form, he could be let out to the minors." Lefty's face being in the shadow, the other man did not see the expression of contempt that passed over it. For a few minutes the southpaw was too indignant to reply. When he did, however, his voice was level and calm, though a trifle hard.