The Submarine Pitch Read online

  Copyright

  Copyright © 1976, 1992 by Matt Christopher Royalties, Inc.

  All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

  Little, Brown and Company

  Hachette Book Group

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  New York, NY 10017

  Visit our website at www.HachetteBookGroup.com

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  The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  Matt Christopher® is a registered trademark of Matt Christopher Royalties, Inc.

  First eBook Edition: December 2009

  ISBN: 978-0-316-09604-1

  Contents

  Copyright

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  The #1 Sports Series for KIDS MATT CHRISTOPHER®

  Matt Christopher®

  1

  There was no way in the world that Bernie Shantz would have connected a lady’s vanity with baseball. A vanity was a piece of furniture with drawers into which women put their personal things, such as cosmetics. Baseball was — well, everybody knew what baseball was.

  Actually, what brought about the connection was the newspaper clipping that Ann-Marie found in the bottom drawer of the vanity. How it got there, whose it was, and why it was there were the questions that immediately bothered Bernie, AnnMarie, his fifteen-year-old sister, who had bought it from a friend, and Frankie, the youngest of the Shantz clan.

  “Hey, read this,” said Frankie, who was only eight and longed to be old enough to play ball on his brother’s team.

  “It’s about a guy who used to pitch for a team called the Keystones,” said AnnMarie, who looked up at Bernie with her enormous blue eyes.

  “He threw a submarine pitch,” Frankie added. “Ever hear of a submarine pitch? Weird-sounding, isn’t it?”

  Bernie frowned as he looked at his sister and brother. “Submarine pitch? Never heard of it.”

  “It must’ve been some pitch,” said Frankie, looking at his brother anxiously. “It says here that he had the strikeout record in the league for three years.”

  Bernie knew why Frankie had that anxious look on his face. Bernie was a pitcher himself. Was — until last week, that is. Since then he had given it up, closed it out of his life forever. No more pitching. In fact, no more baseball at all for him, except watching it on TV, maybe. He just wasn’t cut out for it, no matter how much he loved it. He knew his decision bothered Frankie, who couldn’t understand why his older brother didn’t want to play ball anymore. Well, Frankie was just a kid. He wouldn’t.

  “Dusty Fowler,” Bernie began to read out loud, “pitching his fourth straight victory of the season against Rockville in the City Twilight League, says of his pitching form, ‘I throw that way because it’s the easiest for me. I can throw all day if I have to and not get tired. The thing is, I can’t throw overhand if I try. I hurt my shoulder one day while baling hay, and I’ve been throwing underhand ever since.’”

  There was more, but Bernie didn’t care to read any further.

  “You’d better give this back to the people you bought the vanity from,” he said to Ann-Marie. “They might not have known it was there and would want it back.”

  “But their name isn’t Fowler,” Frankie intervened. “It’s Hudson. Why would they want it back?”

  Bernie looked at him. “Dusty Fowler could’ve been a friend,” he replied. “Anyway,” he turned to AnnMarie, “I think you should call the Hudsons and tell them about it.”

  “But,” said Frankie, not one to yield so easily, “there’s more about that submarine pitch that I think you should know.”

  “I don’t care.” Bernie’s eyes flashed as he looked at his younger brother. “I know what you’re thinking, Frankie, and you might as well get it out of your head. I’m through with baseball. Through… finished… out. Okay?”

  Frankie looked at him with large eyes. Bernie paused. No kid on the block read as much about baseball players and teams as Frankie did. When it came to records, Frankie was a walking encyclopedia. And Bernie — although he wouldn’t say so — admired him for it.

  “Okay,” said Frankie. “I just thought…” He turned and went out of the room abruptly without finishing what he was going to say.

  AnnMarie took the clipping from Bernie. “Too bad he’s too young to play,” she said icily. “I think he’s really more nuts about baseball than you are.”

  “Yeah, I know,” said Bernie sullenly.

  There was a sound from the other room, and then a cheery greeting, as a boy with rust-colored hair and a thin smattering of freckles on his high-cheekboned face came in.

  “Hi, AnnMarie. Hi, Bernie. What’s new?”

  “Hi, Dave,” AnnMarie greeted him. “Heard you were in New York?”

  Dave Grant smiled. “I was. But that was just over Sunday to see the Mets game. Dad had to be back to work today.” He looked at the clipping in AnnMarie s hand. “Hey, that looks like something out of an old newspaper. Anything important?”

  “It’s a clipping I found in a drawer of a vanity I just bought,” AnnMarie explained. “I was about to call up the woman I bought it from and ask her if she wants it back. Maybe it dropped out of a scrapbook or something. Excuse me.”

  As she started out of the room Bernie saw Dave open his mouth as if he were going to call to her, but then he closed it and looked at Bernie. A sheepish grin came over his face.

  “Hey, man,” he said. “That was quite a game I saw. I hope you can come with us sometime.”

  Dave’s acting kind of peculiar. Does he have a secret with AnnMarie? thought Bernie.

  “I might, sometime,” he answered, frowning. Ever since the major league baseball season had opened, Dave and his father had gone to New York City to see games. They had gone to Syracuse to see International League games, too. Apparently Mr. Grant enjoyed baseball as much as his son did, although he seldom talked about it in Bernie s presence.

  Bernie studied Dave’s face; his friend’s warm blue eyes looked restless. Something seemed to be bothering Dave, that was sure.

  Dave lived four blocks away and he was Bernie’s best friend. They were in the same grade at Lake Center School and shared similar interests: fossil collecting, weird comic books, and horror movies.

  “You in trouble?” Bernie asked. After being friends for two years, you can tell when something’s bothering a guy.

  Dave shook his head. “Trouble? No. Why?” His phony smile made Bernie even more suspicious.

  Bernie shrugged. “I don’t know. You kind of look as if something’s bothering you.”

  Dave forced a chuckle. Bernie was pretty sure now that he was right — something was bothering Dave. Well, maybe it was something personal. Something Dave didn’t want to tell him about.

  In a minute AnnMarie came back into the room, Frankie close behind her.

  “Know what?” she said casually. “Mrs. Hudson doesn’t know a thing about this clipping.”

  Bernie looked at her. If Mrs. Hudson didn’t know a thing about the clipping, how could it have gotten into the vanity?

  “Well,” AnnMarie said, “I won’t have to return it, so that saves a trip over to Douglas Street.”

&n
bsp; Hardly were the words out of her mouth when she turned toward Dave. Her blue eyes fastened on him.

  “Dave, you must know the Hudsons,” she said. “They’re your neighbors.”

  He blushed and then nodded. “Yeah, that’s right,” he said. “They live four doors from us.”

  Bernie suddenly got an idea about the clipping’s origin. He poked a finger gently into Dave’s ribs. “Buddy boy,” he said, “is there an itty-bitty chance that you know how that clipping got into Mrs. Hudson’s vanity?”

  The smile flickered on Dave’s face. “I guess it’s no use for me to keep my mouth shut any longer, is it?”

  Bernie shook his head. “No, it isn’t. I thought you were acting kind of funny. I read that clipping, Dave. A part of it, anyway. It won’t work. Frankie’s been trying to get me back into pitching, too. I won’t do it. I’m through.”

  “But you didn’t read the whole clipping, Bernie,” said Frankie from the doorway. “You didn’t come to the most important part.”

  Bernie looked at him. “Most important part? What was that?”

  “About the pitch,” replied Frankie, stepping forward as if he were glad for the chance to participate in the conversation. “There’s something about that submarine pitch that’s really weird.”

  “Oh?” Bernie’s eyebrows went up a notch. “What do you mean? How can a pitch be weird?”

  AnnMarie handed him back the clipping. “Here,” she said. “Maybe you’ll learn more about it by reading the whole thing this time.”

  Curious, Bernie took the clipping from her and started to read it again from the beginning. By the time he was finished with it, his skin was prickling.

  2

  The pitch comes up like a submarine coming up out of the water, which is how it got its name,” Bernie read. “It sails in a straight path toward the plate, rising until it reaches the batter. Then, at the last instant, the ball curves sharply — away from a right-handed batter, toward a left-handed batter.

  “Some batters have accused Dusty of putting some kind of substance on the ball, such as saliva, to make it act the way it does. But no evidence has been found that such is the case. He just throws the ball naturally, and it comes up to the batter, curves, and then flies by into the catcher’s mitt. The batter either watches it go by or swings at it, usually missing it by a foot. If Dusty Fowler keeps his pitch under control, no one will be the least surprised to hear that some major league ball club has signed him up.”

  Bernie waited for his pulse to slow down a bit. He had read about pitchers throwing the illegal spitball in the big leagues, but never had he heard of anyone throwing a submarine pitch.

  “Does this clipping belong to you or your father?” Bernie asked.

  “It’s my father’s,” admitted Dave. “I got it out of his scrapbook of interesting sports stories. When I saw the guys loading the piece of furniture on the truck and they said that they were bringing it over here to your house, I got it and stuck it into the bottom drawer. I suppose it was a stupid thing to do.”

  “Not stupid, just silly,” said Bernie. “Did Dusty Fowler ever make it to the big leagues?”

  “No. He only got as far as the International. But that wasn’t bad.”

  “Why don’t you try it, Bernie?” Frankie broke in with an eager voice that grabbed Bernie’s attention.

  “Try what?” said Bernie.

  “Learn to throw that submarine pitch,” Frankie answered. “You said yourself that your overhand pitches are like fat balloons to the batters. Maybe if you learn this submarine pitch you won’t have to give up baseball.”

  Frankie made it sound so simple. Ann-Marie had said that he probably loved baseball more than Bernie did. Well, that wasn’t true. No one could love it more than Bernie did. He was just too darned proud, that was his trouble. He wanted to be really good at it, and he just couldn’t be.

  Last year he had tried pitching because he had a fair throwing arm. He had no curve, but his overhand delivery could cut the plate in two most of the time. His problem was not being able to get the ball past the hitters. Players on the other teams always hoped Bernie would be pitching to them. They boosted their batting averages every time he pitched for the Rangers.

  In the infield or outfield he was no worse than any other fielder; his troubles all centered around the plate. Because when he was up, pitchers were as happy to see him bat as batters were to see him pitch. He couldn’t hit, and whoever heard of a nonhitting fielder?

  Why should he make a fool of himself again this year?

  “I’ve brought a ball and mitt,” said Dave. “Get your glove and let’s throw a few. Maybe you can develop into another Dusty Fowler.”

  “Yeah, Bernie! Let’s!” cried Frankie. His eyes flashed as if it were he about whom all the fuss was being made.

  Bernie glanced at AnnMarie, not saying anything, but asking her with his eyes if what Dave was asking him to do made sense.

  As if she read his thoughts she said, “You know how nuts you are about baseball, Bernie. I was just kidding you when I said that Frankie loves it more than you do. If you don’t play, you’ll mope around here all summer and bug both Mom and me. I think you ought to listen to Dave.”

  “Come on!” Dave insisted, and started out of the house. “You’re not doing anything else right now, anyway.”

  Reluctantly, Bernie got his glove and ball and went out to the backyard with Dave. If it were anyone else but Dave who tried to coax him, he would definitely refuse. But he’d do it for Dave — mainly to satisfy Dave, not himself.

  He threw his first pitch, not concentrating on whether it was overhand or underhand.

  “Underhand,” reminded Dave. “Throw it underhand. Like this.”

  Thinking that no one he knew threw underhand, Dave threw the ball back to him, bringing it up from the side of his body, near his knees. The ball streaked up to Bernie and then, just as it got near him, curved inward, toward Bernie’s right side.

  “Hey, did you see that?” Bernie exclaimed. “It hooked!”

  “That’s what it’s supposed to do,” said Dave, proudly. “It comes naturally if you throw it right.”

  “Maybe you should pitch for the Rangers,” suggested Bernie.

  “I wish I could,” replied Dave.

  Bernie felt slightly embarrassed because he remembered that Dave had said recently that he might never be able to play baseball again. He used to, but last spring he had gotten sick and hadn’t played since. His participation now was limited to easy games of pitch and catch.

  Bernie started to throw the ball underhand, bringing it up from his knees as Dave had done. At first the pitch was slightly wild, forcing Dave to leap out after it. But each successive throw got better, and before long, Bernie had the pitch fairly well under control.

  “Hey, man!” Dave cried. “You’re doing fine!”

  Bernie grinned. “You make a lousy liar, you know that?”

  Frankie sprawled on his stomach, watching them play. “Look who’s here,” he said a few minutes later.

  Bernie paused and looked toward the street. Two guys who played with the Sharks were coming up to the fence separating the sidewalk from the yard. The taller of them, the light-haired one wearing a white T-shirt, was Vincent Steele, the Sharks’ cleanup hitter. The other was Mick Devlan, the Sharks’ catcher.

  “Hold it,” said Dave, and looked at his wristwatch. “It’s almost five. I’ve got to run.”

  He went up to Bernie, catching a soft throw and squeezing the mitt around it. “Don’t breathe a word about the submarine pitch to those guys or to anybody else,” he said under his breath. “Let’s keep it between us. Okay?”

  He was breathing unusually hard, as if they’d been playing for hours.

  “Okay. Are you all right, Dave?”

  “Yes, I’m okay. Just a little tired. See you.”

  Dave left, waving to the two newcomers as he walked out of the yard and across the street. Bernie watched him. Maybe someday he’ll te
ll me what is really bugging him, he thought.

  “Heard that you’re not going to pitch for the Rangers this year, Bernie,” said Vincent. “What’s the story?”

  “I’m holding out for more money,” said Bernie.

  Both Vincent and Mick laughed. “What did your coach do? Promise to pay you for not playing?” said Vincent.

  “Just wait’ll the season opens,” Frankie piped up. “We’ll see who’ll be laughing then.”

  “Is that so?” said Mick. “’Well, well, well! How about that, Vince? Did you hear the kid?”

  “I heard some noise,” replied Vince, looking around and then back at Bernie, a pretended look of puzzlement on his face.

  Bernie stared coldly at Frankie. He didn’t say a word, but he didn’t have to. Frankie had learned a long time ago what the looks that his older brother gave him under varying circumstances meant.

  “If you guys don’t mind, we’ve got to go in,” said Bernie. “See you around.”

  “Sure,” said Vincent, and he and Mick took off down the sidewalk.

  Frankie rose to his feet and came trotting up beside Bernie. “I’m sorry, Bernie,” he said, his eyes wide and apologetic. “I shouldn’t have said what I did, should I?”

  “No, you shouldn’t,” said Bernie, still smoldering. “For a little kid you’ve got a big mouth, you know that?”

  Frankie’s jaw slacked. He turned away, his eyes blinking.

  “I’m sorry,” said Bernie, reaching out toward his brother. “You were sticking up for me and didn’t think what you were saying, but Dave did ask us not to talk about the pitch.”

  He put his arm around Frankie’s shoulders and squeezed him gently as they walked to the house. As long as he could remember, Frankie had always looked up to him as an older, wiser brother. Quite often Frankie had gone to him for advice about something — such as fixing his bike chain when a link had broken — instead of going to Dad. He liked the feeling. Frankie was more than a brother. He was a pal.

  And now his brother and his best friend wanted him to learn this new “wonder” pitch. He felt a creepy sensation shooting through him as he remembered Dave’s pitches to him. Each one had hooked as it came over the plate.