Rambletown Field buzzed with activity when I arrived. A fire engine flashed in the parking lot. The school marching band warmed up on the infield, trumpets tooting, tubas burping. Baton twirlers pranced in the on-deck area.
The place looked spectacular, not a single blade of grass out of place. Overnight, the wind had remained steady, keeping the grasshoppers pinned in their clump of trees out beyond the outfield wall. Red, white, and blue bunting flapped in the breeze along the grandstand rail. Hundreds of fans already filled the seats, many waving homemade banners hand-lettered with the names of their teams—the Lumleyville Lumberjacks, the Bixburg Blue Bottles, the Windsor Gaskets, the Pikerton Scrooges, and lots more. One whole cheering section shook cowbells.
Unfortunately, not even the Haymaker rooters drowned out the grasshoppers. They hummed louder than ever. I hoped they weren’t getting ready to make a break for it.
I tried to put the bugs out of my mind as I hurried onto the diamond to meet the other All-Stars. The first person I looked for was Stump.
I found him on the top step of the home dugout, surrounded by the rest of the Rounders as he limbered up.
“How are you feeling?” I asked, full of hope.
“Pretty good,” he said, flashing a smile. But a certain stiffness in the way he moved told me that all was far from well.
We didn’t have time to talk about it before Skip Lou rounded us up for the opening parade. To cries of “Good luck!” from our teammates, Stump, Ducks, and I fell into line with the other East All-Stars. Mr. Bones came with us. That dog loves parades.
The fire engine rolled onto the field, two firefighters perched on the bumper flinging candy to kids in the stands. The marching band and majorettes massed behind the truck, followed by the players from both teams. Then the truck led us down the first-base line and into right field.
The crowd roared, fans screaming the names of their favorite players: “Mudfish!” “Choo-Choo!” “Slats!” “Flicker!”
We circled the outfield and finished by marching straight down the third baseline. As we neared home, a familiar voice rang out from the crowd.
“Yoo-hoo! Yoo-hoo!”
I looked up and saw the lady from Hog City waving from behind the backstop. Her glittery jewelry sparkled brighter than ever as she stalked on high heels to intercept me at home plate, her pink-bowed Afghan mincing by her side. Leading with his tongue, Mr. Bones rushed to meet them. The woman bent down to pet him and he slapped a wet one on her perfectly made-up face.
“I’ve been looking for you,” the woman sputtered, rising. “Princess Pinky Muffin and I googled “royal Oxford sniffing spaniel” on the internet, and we didn’t find a thing, did we, looovy wooovy? Not a thing!”
Uh-oh, I thought.
Suddenly Gasser emerged from the crowd, where he’d been watching.
“Of course you didn’t!” he said, elbowing forward. “The breed is way too exclusive for the internet. Plaster the breed all over the Net, suddenly everybody and his brother wants a royal Oxford sniffing spaniel. The association would never stand for it. They prefer to keep ownership by personal invitation only. Keep away the riffraff that way.”
“Of course,” whispered the woman as I bit my lip to keep from laughing. “The association. Hush-hush. Invitation only. Well, if you ever decide to breed this adorable creature, please let me know.” She slipped me a card. “I can furnish references. Call me.”
I waited until she was gone to look at the card. When I did, my jaw nearly hit the ground.
“No way!” I exclaimed.
“What’s it say, Walloper?” Ducks demanded.
A yelp of surprise escaped his lips as he read the name spelled out in fancy pink letters on the small rectangle of cardboard:
Mrs. Priscilla Pringle
Sure enough, when I looked up again, I spotted her on the pitcher’s mound, posing for a snapshot with her son, the biggest, meanest Haymaker of them all.
Then the umpire cleared the field.
“PLAY BALL!” he barked.
To the roar of the crowd and the grasshoppers, I ran onto the field with the East All-Stars.
Leading off for the West, Grant Vesper of the St. Joe Jungle Cats dug in at the plate.
Flicker Pringle glowered down at him from the hill, rolling his trademark toothpick from side to side in his mouth. For the first time in my life, I didn’t mind seeing him do that. He kicked and delivered a sizzling fastball.
Whoosh went the pitch.
“Yowch!” yelled catcher Charlie “Slats” Connolly of the Bixburg Blue Bottles, who wasn’t used to Flicker’s heat.
“STEE-RIKE ONE!” bleated the ump.
Strike two came hot on its heels, followed by number three. Out in the bleachers, Haymakers fans superglued a red K onto our freshly painted wall.
“Way to go, Flicker,” I called from third, the words sounding strange even as I spoke them.
I glanced over at press row, where all the reporters sat, and saw Gabby glaring at me. She really had a thing about Flicker.
The big, mean fireballer proceeded to whiff the next two All-Stars in order, both on wicked heaters.
If Flicker kept pitching like that, it wouldn’t matter whether Stump’s yips had been cured or not. He wouldn’t need to make any plays. As it was, our shortstop looked relieved to dash off the field as the top half of the first came to a close.
Hitting for the East in the bottom of the inning, Choo-Choo Choo of the Bixburg Blue Bottles smashed the first pitch he saw up the middle for a base hit. Stump batted next and lashed a single to right. The yips sure didn’t affect his hitting any.
Then it was my turn.
As I strode up to the plate, the home crowd stood and cheered. “Give it a ride, Walloper!” someone shouted.
I sure meant to try.
Grant Vesper stared in for a sign. He kicked and delivered. I swung with all my might and hit the ball on the nose. It soared toward center field like it had wings. It might have cleared the wall, too, if only a sudden shift in the breeze hadn’t knocked it down. “Lousy low pressure,” I muttered, remembering Slingshot’s lecture from the night before. The ball bounced on the warning track, and I raced around to third, driving home the first two runs of the game.
When I looked up, I saw Pepper McGraw leaning over the third baseline, clapping like mad. He wore a Rounders cap on his head and a big smile on his face. I was glad he’d seen my triple. I wished my parents had, too. But it was only the first inning, so of course they were killing time in the parking lot.
After my hit, Grant seemed to flip a switch. He started pitching like the All-Star he was and retired the next three batters in a row, ending the inning before we could inflict any more damage.
Neither team managed any base runners in the second. The score held at 2–0. Just as important, the locusts stayed in their trees.
In the third the wind picked up, and the hitting did too. Balls began to fly out of the park. Cheese Grabini and Chick Hernanski homered for the West. Neither player struck the ball particularly well. Cheese seemed downright surprised to catch a piece of Flicker’s fastball. But the wind grabbed both flares and deposited them in the cheap seats. Hoot Fewster answered for us in the bottom half, keeping us ahead by a run, 3–2.
Flicker came out for the fourth on a mission. Still peeved at the freak taters, he blazed one smoking heater after another. Slats yelped a little louder with each pitch as the West went down in order.
The game was more than half over and Stump still hadn’t needed to make a throw.
The fifth inning belonged to Ducks. He dived into the left field seats to steal a dinger from Stinkeye Boyle, hitting for the West. Then he clocked one of his own with a runner aboard when it was his turn to bat.
We moved to the sixth and final inning leading 5–2 and feeling pretty good about our chances. For the first time all game, I allowed myself to think we were out of the woods. Neither the yips nor the locusts would mess things up for us.
Shows you how much I know.