Haley, still first-choice box-artist, had pitched a no-hit game against Locust Valley and of late had gone well-nigh unpunished.
The Templeton game had been somewhat of a jolt, to use Captain Jones' inelegant but expressive phrase, inasmuch as Templeton had been looked on as an easy adversary, and Joe Browne, in process of being turned into a third-choice pitcher, had started in the box against them. Joe had been literally slaughtered in exactly two-thirds of one inning and had thereupon gone back to right field, yielding the ball to Nostrand. But Nostrand, while faring better, had been by no means invulnerable. Even if he had held the enemy safe, however, Clearfield would still have been defeated, for her hitting that day was so poor that she was unable to overcome the four runs which Templeton had piled up in that luckless first inning. The First Team had to stand a deal of ragging from the Second Team fellows when they got back, for the Second had gone down to Lesterville and won handily from a hard-hitting team of mill operatives who had claimed the county championship for several years. To be sure, the Second Team fellows had returned rather the worse for wear, Terry Carson having a black
eye, Howard Breen a badly spiked instep and
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