A guard seldom has an opportunity to pose in the limelight, and so you are not to hear that Don pulled off any brilliant feats that afternoon. What he did do was to very thoroughly vindicate Mr. Robey's selection of him for Gafferty's position by giving an excellent impersonation of a concrete block on defence and by doing rather better than he had ever done before when his side had the ball. Don had actually speeded up considerably, much as Tim had assured him he could, and while he was still by no means the snappiest man in the line, nor was ever likely to be, he was seldom far behind his fellows. For that matter the whole line of forwards was still much slower than Mr. Robey wanted them at that time of year, and Don showed up not badly in comparison. After all, what is needed in a guard is, first and foremost, fighting spirit, and Don had that. If he was a bit slower to sense a play, a little later in getting into it, at least when he did start he started hard and tackled hard and always played it safe. In the old days when a guard had only his small territory between centre and tackle to cover, Don would have been an ideal player for the position, but now, when a guard's duties are to free-lance, so to speak, from one end of the line to the other and to get into the play no matter where it comes, Don's qualifications were more limited. A guard in these amazing times is "soldier and sailor too," and Don, who liked to deal with one idea at a time, found it a bit confusing to have to grapple with a half-dozen!

Brimfield returned to the battle at the beginning of the second half highly resolved to take no more fooling from her opponent. Fortune ordered it that the south goal should fall to her portion and that a faint but dependable breeze should spring up between the halves. That breeze changed Coach Robey's plans, and the team went on with instructions to kick its way to within scoring distance and then batter through the line at any cost. And so the spectators were treated to a very pretty punting exhibition by both teams, for, wisely or unwisely, Southby accepted the challenge and punted almost as often as her adversary. That third period supplied many thrills but no scoring, for although Brimfield did manage to get the ball on Southby's twenty-five-yard line when a back fumbled, the advantage ended there. Two rushes failed, a forward pass grounded and when St. Clair tried to skirt his own left end he was pulled down just short of his distance and Southby soon punted out of danger.

When time was called both teams made several substitutions. Don yielded his place to Harry Walton, Crewe went in at right tackle and McPhee took Carmine's position at quarter. With the advantage of the wind no longer hers, Brimfield abandoned the kicking game and used her backfield for all it was worth. From the middle of the field to Southby's thirty yards she went without much difficulty, St. Clair, Martin and Tim Otis carrying the ball for short but consistent gains. But at the thirty Southby braced and captured the pigskin on downs by a matter of inches. It was then that Elliston repeated. Following two attempts at Pryme's position, which yielded a scant four yards, Elliston got away around Steve Edwards's end and, with some good interference for the first ten or twelve yards, passed the whole field except McPhee and was only brought down by that player after he had run to Brimfield's twenty-six yards.

Southby's adherents cheered wildly and demanded a touchdown, and it looked for awhile as though their team was to give them what they asked for. Southby twice poked a back through the centre of the maroon-and-grey line and then tore off ten yards around Clint Thayer, Steve Edwards being put wholly out of the play. Then, however, Brimfield dug her cleats and held the enemy, giving a very heartening exhibition of stubborn defence, and again Southby decided that half a loaf was better than none and tried a field-goal. She ought never to have got it, for the left side of her line was torn to ribbons by the desperate defenders. But she did, nevertheless, the ball in some miraculous manner slipping through the upstretched hands and leaping bodies and just topping the bar.

Those three added points seemed to spell defeat for Brimfield, and many of her supporters in the stand conceded the victory to Southby then and there. But the team refused to view the matter in that light and came back fighting hard. With only some seven minutes of the twelve left, McPhee opened the line when Southby had finally been forced to punt from her twelve yards and St. Clair had caught on his forty-five, and started a series of direct-pass plays that, coming as they did on the heels of an afternoon of close-formation plays, confused the enemy until the ball had been planted near her thirty-five yards. Brimfield fought desperately then, closing her line again and sending Edwards off on an end-around run that took the pigskin eight yards nearer the last white mark.

It was then that St. Clair really showed what was in him. Four times he took the ball and four times he plunged, squirming, fighting, through the Southby centre and, with the Brimfield shouts cheering him on, put the leather down at last on Southby's eighteen. Otis got three off left tackle and McPhee tried the same end for no gain. Martin went back and, faking a kick, threw forward to Edwards, who romped to the nine yards before he was smothered. It was fourth down then, with less than a yard to go, and St. Clair was called on. A delayed-pass did the business and Southby was digging her toes into her seven yards. Martin slid off right tackle for two, bringing the ball nearly in front of goal, and the defenders again fell back.

Carmine was sent in again for McPhee and Lawton took Pryme's place. Carmine evidently brought instructions, for Captain Edwards fell back to kicking position after the conference, and the ball was passed to him. But with only five to go and three downs to do it in a drop-kick was not likely, especially as three points would still leave Brimfield beaten, and so Southby disregarded the bluff. But if a kick was out of the question a forward pass was not, and it was a forward pass that Southby set herself for. And so, with her ends drawn out and her backs spread, the touchdown came easily. For Steve faked a throw to the right, where Holt apparently waited, and then dashed straight ahead, the ball against his ribs, his head down and his feet flying, struck the hastily-formed massing of Southby's centre like a battering ram and literally tore his way through until, when he was at last pulled down, he was five yards over the line!

Since Brimfield needed that goal badly, Rollins, in spite of bandages, was sent in for Martin, and, when Carmine had canted the ball to his liking, very calmly put it squarely between the uprights above the bar.

The remaining minute and a half of play brought no results and Brimfield trotted off victor by the narrow margin of one point, while her adherents flowed across the field cheering and flaunting their banners in triumph.



CHAPTER XIV

WALTON WRITES A NOTE

THE Southby game was played on the sixth of November, a fortnight before the final contest with Claflin School, and practically marked the end of the preparatory season. Brimfield would meet her blue-legged rival with what plays she had already learned and the time for instruction was passed. The remaining two weeks, which held but ten playing days, would be devoted to perfecting plays already known, to polishing off the rough angles of attack and defence and to learning a new set of signals as a matter of precaution. Those ten days were expected to work a big improvement in the team. Whether they would or not remained to be seen.

On the whole, Brimfield had passed through a successful season. She had played seven games, of which she had lost one, won five and tied one. Next week's adversary, Chambers, would in all likelihood supply a sixth victory, in which case the Maroon-and-Grey would face Claflin with a nearly clean slate. Claflin, on her part, had hung up a rather peculiar record that Fall. She had played one more game than Brimfield, had won four, lost one and tied three. She had started out strongly, had had a slump in mid-season and was now, from all evidence at hand, recovering finely. On comparative scores there was little to choose between the rivals. If any perceptible advantage belonged to Brimfield it was only because she had maintained a steadier pace.

There was a lay-off for most of the first-string players on Monday, a fact which gave Harry Walton a chance to conduct himself very capably at left guard during the four ten-minute periods of scrimmage with the second. Don didn't go near the field that afternoon and so was saved any of the uneasiness which the sight of Walton's performance might have caused him. Rollins got back for a short workout and showed few signs of his injury. The second team, profiting by some scouting done by Coach Boutelle and Joe Gafferty on Saturday, tried out the Claflin formation and such Claflin plays as had been fathomed against the first team and made some good gains thereby until the second-string players solved them. On Tuesday Harry Walton disgruntledly found himself again relegated to the bench during most of the practice game and saw Don open holes in the second team's line in a style that more than once brought commendation from Coach Robey. Walton glowered from the bench until Cotter disgustedly asked if he felt sick. Whereupon Walton grinned and Cotter, with a sigh, begged him to scowl again!

The first team presented its full strength that afternoon, and Mr. Boutelle's Claflin plays made little headway. With Rollins back in place, the first team scored almost at will during three periods, and even after an entirely new backfield was put in it continued to smash the second up very effectually. Mr. Boutelle scolded and raved and threatened, but all to scant purpose. The first got its plays off very smoothly, played low and hard and, for once, played together. The final score that day was the biggest ever piled up in a practice contest, 30 to 3. Had Mr. Robey allowed Rollins to try goals from touchdowns it would have been several points larger.

Tom Hall had so far carefully avoided the field, but today he appeared there and sat in the stand with Roy Draper and tried his best to be cheerful. But his best wasn't very good. Already the feeling against him had largely subsided, and the school, realising, perhaps, that Tom's loss to the team did not necessarily spell defeat for it, was inclined to be sorry for him. But Tom didn't realise that, since he still kept to himself and was suspicious of advances. He hadn't quarrelled with the school's verdict, but it had hurt him and, as he didn't like being hurt any more than most of us, he avoided the chance of it. In those days he stuck pretty close to his room, partly because the office required it and partly because he had no heart for mingling with his fellows. Roy Draper had to plead long and earnestly that afternoon to get him to the gridiron. As badly as he felt about losing his place on the team, however, Tom didn't begrudge Pryme his good fortune, and he was honestly pleased to see that the latter, in spite of his deficiencies, would doubtless fill the right guard position very capably in the Claflin game. He studied Pryme's work attentively that afternoon, criticised it and praised it and showed no trace of animosity.

"He will do all right," he confided to Roy. "Crewe will help him a lot, and so will Thursby. If he could use his hands a bit better he'd be fine. He holds himself nicely, doesn't he? On his toes all the time. I hate to see a lineman play flat-footed. That's one trouble with Don Gilbert. Don's doing a heap better than he did last year, though. I guess he's every bit as good as Joe Gafferty. He's a regular whale on defence, isn't he? He's a queer chap, Don, but a mighty nice one."

"Don," replied Roy in his somewhat didactic manner, "is the sort of fellow I'd pick out to be cast away on a desert island with. He isn't so scintillant, you know, but he'd wear forever."

"That's him to a T." Tom chuckled. "They tell me Harry Walton is as mad as a hatter because Don butted in and grabbed that position away from him. Can't say I altogether blame him, either. That is, there's no use getting mad about it, but it is tough luck. Harry isn't a half-bad guard, either."

"If he can play good football," answered Roy, "I'm glad to know it. I've always wondered what Walton was for."

Tom laughed. "Oh, he isn't so bad, I guess. His manner's against him."

"I've noticed it," said Roy drily. "Also his looks and his remarks and a number of other things. Larry Jones says he comes from the best sort of family."

"A fellow's family doesn't prove anything, I guess."

"Evidently not. There's the whistle. Let's go back." Presently Roy added, as they headed for Torrence: "I can quite understand why Walton's family sent him to school."

"Why they sent him to school?" repeated Tom questioningly.

"Yes, it was to get rid of him."

"You've certainly got your little hammer with you," said Tom, with a smile. "What's Harry done to you?"

"Not a thing. I wouldn't advise him to, either. I just don't like him, Tom. Can't stand being in the same room with him. Well, see you later, old chap. And, say, think over what I said about—you know."

"Oh, that's all right," replied Tom, with a shrug of his broad shoulders. "Fellows can think what they like about me. I don't blame them. But you can't expect me to like it!"

"I know, Tom, but they don't feel that way now. It was just for a day or two. I've heard a lot of fellows say lately that it's nonsense blaming you, Tom. So come out of your shell, like a sensible chap, and show that you don't feel any—any ill-will."

"Well, I don't, I suppose. As for coming out of my shell, I'll be crawling out pretty soon. Don't bother about me, Roy. I'm feeling fine. So long."

Perhaps what Tom really meant was that he was feeling a whole lot better than he had a few days before, for he certainly had not become quite reconciled to the loss of his position with the team. He was getting used to the idea, but he wasn't happy over it. When he squarely faced the fact that when Claflin came trotting onto the field on the twentieth he would be sitting in the grand stand instead of being out there in togs, his heart sank miserably and he hardly knew whether he wanted to kick something or get off in a corner and cry. At such moments the question of whether his school fellows liked him or detested him bothered little. If he could only play against Claflin, he assured himself, the school might hate him to its heart's content!

Going on to Billings and his room, he considered what Roy had told him of the altered sentiment toward him, but somehow he didn't seem to care so much today. Watching practice had brought back the smart, and being liked or disliked seemed a little thing beside the bigger trouble. Still, he thought, if Roy was right perhaps he had better meet fellows half-way. There was no use in being a grouch. As a starter and in order to test the accuracy of Roy's statement, he decided that he would drop in on Carl Bennett, who roomed in Number 3. Bennett was a chap he rather respected and, while they had never been very close friends, Tom had seen a good deal of the other during the Fall. But Bennett was not in and Tom was making his way back to the stairs when the door of Number 6 opened and Harry Walton came out. Perhaps it was Roy's dressing-down of that youth that prompted Tom to be more decent to him than usual. At all events, Tom stopped and hailed him and they conversed together on their way up the stairs. It wasn't until later that Tom, recalling Harry's grudge against Don, wondered what had taken him to the latter's room. Then he concluded that Harry had probably been calling on Tim, and thought no more of it. Just now he asked Harry how he was getting on with the team and was a little puzzled when Harry replied: "All right, I guess. Of course, Gilbert's got the call right now, but I'm going to beat him out before the big game. Did you see practice today?"

"Yes. You fellows put up a great game, Harry."

"I didn't get into it for more than ten minutes. Robey's playing Don Gilbert for all he knows." Harry laughed disagreeably. "Robey's a bit of a fox."

"How's that!" Tom inquired.

"Oh, he's sort of keeping me guessing, you see. Thinks I'll get worried and dig harder."

"Huh. I see. You seem mighty certain of that place, Harry."

"Sure, I'm certain. You just wait and see, old top." Harry nodded and entered his room across the hall, leaving Tom a trifle more sympathetic toward Roy's estimation of him. Walton certainly did have a disagreeable manner, he reflected.

As a matter of fact, Harry hadn't been calling on anyone in Number 6 for the simple reason that he had found no one at home. Moreover, he had expected to find no one, for he had left Tim at the gymnasium and seen Don and Harry Westcott sitting in the window of the latter's room in Torrence as he passed. What he had done was leave a hastily scrawled note for Don on the table in there, a note which Don discovered an hour later and which at once puzzled and disturbed him.

"Come up and see me after supper will you," the note read, with a superb disdain of punctuation, "I want to see you. Important. H. Walton."

"What's he want to see you about?" asked Tim when Don tossed the note to him to read.

"I don't know." Don frowned thoughtfully.

"I hope he isn't going to make trouble about that old business."

"What old business?" asked Tim carelessly, more interested in a set of bruised knuckles than anything else just then.

"Why, you know Harry saw us climbing in the window that night."

"Saw us climb—Well, what of it? That was years ago. Why should he want to make trouble about that? And how could he do it? I'd like to see him start anything with me."

"Oh, well, I just happened to think of that."

"More likely he's going to ask you to break a leg or something so he can get your place," chuckled Tim. "Don't you do it, Don, if he does. It doesn't pay to be too obliging. Ready for eats?"

"In a minute." Don dropped the note and began his toilet, but he didn't speak again until they were on their way down the stairs. Then: "If it should be that," he remarked, "I wouldn't know whether to punch his head or laugh at him."

"Don't take any chances," advised Tim grimly. "Punch his head. Better still, bring the glad tidings to me and let me do it. Why, if that idiot threatened to open his face about us I'd give him such a walloping that his own folks wouldn't recognise the remnants! Gee, but I'm hungry tonight! Toddle along faster and let's get there before Rollins and Holt and the rest swipe all the grub."



CHAPTER XV

A PROPOSITION

DON sought Harry Walton's room soon after supper was over and found neither Harry nor his room-mate, Jim Rose, at home. He lighted the droplight, found a magazine several months old and sat down to wait. He had, however, scarcely got into a story before Harry appeared.

"Hello," greeted the latter. "Sorry I was late. Had to stop at the library for a book." In proof of it he tossed a volume to the table. "I asked you to come up here, Gilbert, because I have a proposition to make and I thought you wouldn't want anyone around." Harry seated himself, took one knee into his clasped hands and smiled at the visitor. It was a peculiarly unattractive smile, Don decided.

"Proposition?" Don frowned perplexedly. "What sort of a proposition, Walton?"

"Well, I'll tell you. It's like this, Gilbert. You see, old man, you and I are fighting like the mischief for the left guard position and so far it's about nip-and-tuck, isn't it?"

Don viewed the speaker with some surprise. "Is it?" he asked. "I thought I had rather the best of it, Walton."

Harry smiled and shrugged. "That's only Robey's foxiness. I'm not saying he might not pick you for the place in the end, of course, but I stand just as good a show. Robey doesn't like to show his hand. He likes to keep you guessing. I'm willing to bet that if nothing happened he'd drop you next week and stick me in there. Of course you might get in for awhile in the Claflin game, if I got hurt, but I wouldn't advise you to bank much on that because I'm rather lucky about not getting hurt. Honestly, Gilbert, I don't really think you've got much of a chance of final selection."

Don observed his host's countenance with some bewilderment. "Well," he said at last, "that may be so or not. What is it you want me to do?"

"I'll tell you." Harry tried hard to look ingenuous, but only succeeded in grinning like a catfish. "It's this way. My folks are coming up for the Claflin game; father and mother and kid brother, you know. Well, naturally, I'd like to have them see me play. They think I'm going to, of course, because I've mentioned it once or twice in my letters. I'd feel pretty cheap if they came up here and watched me sitting on the bench all through the game. See what I mean, old man?"

Don nodded and waited.

"Well, so I thought that as your chance is pretty slim anyway maybe you wouldn't mind dropping out. I wouldn't ask you to if I really thought you had much chance, you know, Gilbert."

"Oh! That's it? Well, I'm sorry if you're folks are going to be disappointed, Walton, but I don't feel quite like playing the goat on that account. You might just write them and sort of prepare them for the shock, mightn't you? Tell them there's a bare chance that you won't get into the fracas, you know. I would. It would soften the blow for them, Walton."

Walton scowled. "Don't be funny," he said shortly. "I've given you the chance to drop out gracefully, Gilbert, and you're a fool not to take it."

"But why should I drop out! Don't you suppose I want to play in the Claflin game just as much as you do?"

"Perhaps you do, but you won't play in it any way you figure it. If you don't quit willingly you'll quit the other way. I'm giving you a fair chance, that's all. You've only got to make believe you're sick or play sort of rottenly a couple of times. That will do the trick for you and there won't be any other trouble."

"Say, what are you hinting at?" demanded Don quietly. "What have you got up your sleeve?"

"Plenty, Gilbert. I've got enough up my sleeve to get you fired from school."

There was a moment of silence. Then Don nodded thoughtfully. "So that's it, is it?" he murmured.

"That's it, old man." Harry grinned. "Think it over now."

"What do you think you've got on me?" asked Don.

"I don't think. I know that you and three other fellows helped put out that fire that night and that you didn't get back to hall until long after ten-thirty." Harry dropped his knee, thrust his hands into his pockets, leaned back in his chair and viewed Don triumphantly. "I don't want to go to faculty with it, Gilbert, although it's really my duty and I certainly shall if you force me."

"Hm," mused Don. "But wouldn't faculty wonder why you'd been so long about it?"

"Probably. I'd have to tell the truth and——"

"I guess that would hurt," interpolated the other drily.

"And explain that I'd tried to shield you fellows, but that my conscience had finally prevailed." And Harry grinned broadly. "Josh wouldn't like it, but he wouldn't do anything to me. What he'd do to you, though, would be a plenty, Gilbert. It would be expulsion, and you know that as well as I do."

"Yes, I do." Don dropped his gaze to his hands and was silent a moment. Then: "Of course you've thought of what it would mean to you, Walton? I wouldn't be likely to keep you out of it, you know."

Harry shrugged. "Fellows might talk some, but I'd only be doing my duty. As long as my conscience was clear——"

"You're a dirty pup, Walton," said Don, "and if I wasn't afraid of getting the mange I'd give you the beating you deserve."

"Calling names won't get you anything, Gilbert. I'm not afraid of anything you could do to me, anyway. I may be a pup, but I'm where I can make you sit up and beg, and I'm going to do it."

"You think you are," said Don contemptuously. "Let me tell you now that I'd rather be fired a dozen times than make any bargains with a common skunk like you!"

"That means you want me to go ahead and tell Josh, does it?"

"It means that you can do anything you want to, Walton." Don stood up. "But if you do go to faculty with the story you'll get the worst licking you ever had or heard of, and fellows will make it so unpleasant here for you that you won't stay much longer than I do. Now you think it over!"

"What fellows say or think won't hurt me a mite, thank you, and I'm not afraid of you or any of your friends, Gilbert. Wait a minute now. We're not through yet."

"I am, thanks," replied Don, moving toward the door.

"Oh, no you're not. You may feel heroic and all that and too mad to give in just now, but you're not considering what it will mean if you make me squeal to faculty. Why, we wouldn't have a ghost of a show with Claflin!"

"I thought you considered yourself quite as good a guard as me, Walton," answered Don.

"I do, old man. But I don't think I'm able to take the places of all the other fellows who would be missing from the team."

Don turned, with his hand on the door-knob, and stared startledly. "What do you mean by that?" he asked.

"I thought that would fetch you," chuckled Harry. "I mean that you're not the only one who would quit the dear old school, Gilbert. You haven't forgotten, I suppose, that there were three other fellows mixed up in the business?"

"No, but faculty would have to know more than I'd tell them before they'd find out who the others were."

"Oh, you wouldn't have to tell them, old man."

"Meaning you would? You don't know, Walton."

"Don't I, though? You bet I do! I know every last one of them!"

"You told me——"

"Oh, I let you think I didn't, Gilbert. No use telling everything you know."

"I don't believe it!" But, in spite of the statement, Don did believe it and was trying to realise what it meant. .

"Don't be a fool! Why wouldn't I know? If I could see you why couldn't I see Clint Thayer and Tim Otis and Tom Hall? You were all as plain as daylight. Of course, Tom's out of it, anyway, but I guess losing a left tackle and a right half-back a week before the game would put rather a dent in our chances, what? And that's just what will happen if you make me go to Josh with the story!"

"You wouldn't!" challenged Don, but there was scant conviction in his tone. Harry shrugged his shoulders.

"Oh, I'd rather not. I don't want to play on a losing team, and that's what I'd be doing, but you see I've sort of set my heart on playing right guard a week from Saturday, Gilbert, and I hate to be disappointed. Hate to disappoint my folks, too."

"They must be proud of you!"

"They are, take it from me." Harry's smile vanished and he looked ugly as he went on. "Don't be a fool, Gilbert! You'd do the same thing yourself if you had the chance. You're playing the hypocrite, and you know it. I've got you dead to rights and I mean to make the most of it. If you don't get off the team inside of two days I'll go to Josh and tell him everything I know. It isn't pretty, maybe, but it's playing your hand for what there is in it, and that's my way! Now you sit down again and just think it all over, Gilbert. Take all the time you want. And remember this, too. If I keep my mouth shut you've got to keep yours shut. No blabbing to Tim Otis or Clint Thayer or anyone else. This is just between you and me, old man. Now what do you say?"

"The thing's as crazy as it is rotten, Walton! How am I to get off the team without having it look funny?"

"And how much do I care whether it looks funny or not? That's up to you. You can play sick or you can get out there and mix your signals a few times or you can bite Robey in the leg. I don't give a hang what you do so long as you do it, and do it between now and Saturday. That's right, sit down and look at it sensibly. Mull it over awhile. There's no hurry."



CHAPTER XVI

DON VISITS THE DOCTOR

"WHAT did Walton want of you?" asked Tim a half-hour later, when the occupants of Number 6 were settled at opposite sides of the table for study.

"Walton?" repeated Don vaguely. "Oh, nothing especial."

"Nothing especial? Then why the mysterious summons? Did he make any crack about that little escapade of ours?"

"He mentioned it. Shut up and let me get to work, Tim."

"Mentioned it how? What did he say? Any chance of beating him up? I've always had a longing, away down deep inside me, Donald, to place my fist violently against some portion of Walton's—er—facial contour. Say, that's good, isn't it? Facial contour's decidedly good, Don."

"Fine," responded the other listlessly.

Tim peered across at him under the droplight. "Say, you look as if you'd lost a dozen dear friends. Anything wrong? Look here, has Walton been acting nasty?"

"Don't be a chump, Tim. I'm all right. Or, anyway, I'm only sort of—sort of tired. Dry up and let me stuff."

"Oh, very well, but you needn't be so haughty about it. I don't want to share your secrets with dear Harry. Everyone to his taste, as the old lady said when she kissed the cow."

Tim's sarcasm, however, brought no response, and presently, after growling a little while he pawed his books over and dropped the subject, to Don's relief, and silence fell. Don made a fine pretence of studying, but most of the time he couldn't have told what book lay before him. When the hour was up Tim, who had by then returned to his usual condition of cheerful good nature, tried to induce Don to go over to Hensey to call on Larry Jones, who, it seemed, had perfected a most novel and marvellous trick with a ruler and two glasses of water. But Don refused to be enticed and Tim went off alone, gravely cautioning his room-mate against melancholia.

"Try to keep your mind off your troubles, Donald. Think of bright and happy things, like me or the pretty birds. Remember that nothing is ever quite as bad as we think it is, that every line has a silver clouding and that—that it's always dawnest before the dark. Farewell, you old grouch!"

Don didn't have to pretend very hard the next day that he was feeling ill, for an almost sleepless night, spent in trying to find some way out of his difficulties, had left him hollow-eyed and pale. Breakfast had been a farce and dinner a mere empty pretence, and between the two meals he had fared illy in classes. It was scarcely more than an exaggeration to tell Coach Robey that he didn't feel well enough to play, and the coach readily believed him and gave him over to the mercies of Danny Moore.

The trainer tried hard to get Don to enumerate some tangible symptoms, but Don could only repeat that he was dreadfully tired and out of sorts. "Eat anything that didn't agree with you?" asked Danny.

"No, I didn't eat much of anything. I didn't have any appetite."

"Sure, that was sensible, anyway. I'll be after giving you a tonic, me boy. Take it like I tell you, do ye mind, keep off your feet and get a good sleep. After breakfast come to me in the gym and I'll have a look at you."

Don took the tonic—when he thought of it—ate a fair supper and went early to bed, not so much in the hope of curing his ailment as because he couldn't keep his eyes open any longer. He slept pretty well, but was dimly conscious of waking frequently during the night, and when morning came felt fully as tired as when he had retired. Breakfast was beyond him, although Mr. Robey, his attention drawn to Don by Harry Walton's innocent "You're looking pretty bum, Gilbert," counselled soft boiled eggs and hot milk. Don dallied with the eggs and drank part of the milk and was glad to escape as soon as he could.

Danny gave him a very thorough inspection in the rubbing room after breakfast, but could find nothing wrong. "Sure, you're as sound as Colin Meagher's fiddle, me boy. Where is it it hurts ye?"

"It doesn't hurt anywhere, Danny," responded Don. "I'm all right, I suppose, only I don't feel—don't feel very fit."

"A bit fine, you are, and I'm thinking you'd better lay off the work for today. Be outdoors as much as you can, but don't be tiring yourself out. Have you taken the tonic like I told ye?"

"I've taken enough of the beastly stuff," answered Don listlessly.

Danny laughed. "Sure, it's the fine-tasting medicine, lad. Keep at it. And listen to me, now. If you want to play agin Claflin, Donny, you do as I'm tellin' you and don't be thinkin' you know more about it than I do. Sure, Robey won't look at ye at all, come a week from tomorrow, if you don't brace up."

"Oh, I'm all right, Danny, thanks. Maybe if I rest off today I'll be fine tomorrow."

"That's what I'm tellin' you. See that ye do it."

That afternoon he watched practice from the bench without getting into togs and saw Harry Walton play at left guard. He would much rather have remained away from the field, but to have done so might, he thought, have looked queer. Coach Robey was solicitous about him, but apparently did not take his indisposition very seriously. "'Take it easy, Gilbert," he said, "and don't worry. You'll be all right for tomorrow, I guess. You've been working pretty hard, my boy. Better pull a blanket over your shoulders. This breeze is rather biting. Can't have you laid up for long, you know."

Harry Walton performed well that afternoon, playing with a vim and dash that was something of a revelation to his team-mates. Tim was evidently troubled when he walked back to hall with Don after practice. "For the love of mud, Don," he pleaded, "get over it and come back! Did you see the way Walton played today? If he gets in tomorrow and plays like that against Chambers Robey'll be handing him the place! What the dickens is wrong with you, anyway?"

"I'm just tired," responded Don.

"Tired!" Tim was puzzled. "What for? You haven't worked since day before yesterday. What you've got is malaria or something. Tell you what we'll do, Don; we'll beat it over to the doctor's after supper, eh?"

But Don shook his head. "Danny's tonic is all I need," he said. "I dare say I'll be feeling great in the morning."

"You dare say you will! Don't you feel sure you will? Because I've got to tell you, Donald, that this is a plaguy bad time to get laid off, son. If you're not a regular little Bright Eyes by Monday Robey'll can you as sure as shooting!"

"I wouldn't much care if he did," muttered Don.

"You wouldn't much—— Say, are you crazy?" Tim stopped short on the walk and viewed his chum in amazement. "Is it your brain that's gone back on you? Don't you want to play against Claflin?"

"I suppose so. Yes, of course I do, but——"

"Then don't talk like a piece of cheese! You'll come with me to the doctor after supper if I have to drag you there by one heel!"

And so go he did, and the doctor looked at his tongue and felt his pulse and "pawed him over," as Don put it, and ended by patting him on the back and accepting a nice bright half-dollar—half-price to Academy students—in exchange for a prescription.

"You're a little nervous," said the doctor. "Thinking too much about that football game, I guess. Don't do it. Put it out of your mind. Take that medicine every two hours according to directions on the bottle and you'll be all right, my boy."

Don thanked him, slipped the prescription in a pocket and headed for school. But Tim grabbed him and faced him about. "You don't swallow the prescription, Donald," he said. "You take it to a druggist and he gives you something in a bottle. That's what you swallow, the stuff in the bottle. I'm not saying that it mightn't do you just as much good to eat the paper, but we'd better play by the rules. So come on, you lunk-head."

"Oh, I forgot," murmured Don.

"Of course you did," agreed the other sarcastically. "And, look here, if anyone asks you your name, it's Donald Croft Gilbert. Think you can remember that? Donald Croft——"

"Oh, dry up," said Don. "How much will this fool medicine cost me?"

"How much have you got?"

"About eighty cents, I think."

"It'll cost you eighty cents, then. Ask me something easier. I don't pretend to know how druggists do it, but they can always look right through your clothes and count your money. Never knew it to fail!"

But it failed this time, or else the druggist counted wrong, for the prescription was a dollar and Tim had to make up the balance. He insisted on Don taking the first dose then and there, so that he could get in another before bedtime, and Don meekly obeyed. After he had swallowed it he begged a glass of soda water from the druggist to take the taste out of his mouth, and the druggist, doubtless realising the demands of the occasion, stood treat to them both. On the way back Tim figured it that if they had only insisted on having ice-cream sodas they would have reduced the price of the medicine to its rightful cost. Don, though, firmly insisted that it was worth every cent of what he had paid for it.

"No one," he said convincedly, "could get that much nastiness into a small bottle for less than a dollar!"



CHAPTER XVII

DROPPED FROM THE TEAM

WHETHER owing to Danny Moore's tonic, the doctor's prescription or a good night's rest, Don awoke the next morning feeling perfectly well physically, and his first waking moments were cheered by the knowledge. Then, however, recollection of the fact that physical well-being was exactly what wasn't required under the circumstances brought quick reaction, and he jumped out of bed to look at himself in the mirror above his dresser in the hope of finding pale cheeks and hollow eyes and similar evidences of impending dissolution. But Fate had played a sorry trick on him! His cheeks were not in the least pale, nor were his eyes sunken. In short, he looked particularly healthy, and if other evidence of the fact was needed it was supplied by Tim. Tim, when Don turned regretfully away from the glass, was sitting up and observing him with pleased relief.

"Ata boy!" exclaimed Tim. "Feeling fine and dandy, aren't you? I guess that medicine was cheap at the price, after all! You look about a hundred per cent better than you did yesterday, Donald."

Don started to smile, caught himself in time and drew a long sigh. "You can't always tell by a fellow's looks how he's really feeling," he replied darkly.

"Oh, run away and play! What's the matter with you? You've got colour in your face and look great."

"Too much colour, I'm afraid," said Don, shaking his head pessimistically. "I guess—I guess I've got a little fever."

Tim stared at him puzzledly. "Fever? What for? I mean—— Say, are you fooling?"

"No. My face is sort of hot, honest, Tim." And so it was, possibly the consciousness of fibbing and the difficulty of doing it successfully was responsible for the flush. Tim pushed his legs out of bed and viewed his friend disgustedly.

"Don, you're getting to be one of those kleptomaniacs—no, that isn't it! What's the word? Hydrochondriacs, isn't it? Anyway, whatever it is, you're it! You've got so you imagine you're sick when you aren't. Forget it, Donald, and cheer up!"

"Oh, I'll be all right, thanks," responded the other dolefully. "I guess I'm lots better than I was."

"Of course you are! Why, hang it, man, you've simply got to be O. K. today! If you're not Robey'll can you as sure as shooting! Smile for the gentleman, Don, and then get a move on and come to breakfast."

"I don't think I want any breakfast, thanks."

"You will when you smell it. Want me to start the water for you?"

"If I was a hydrochondriac I wouldn't want any water, would I?"

"Hypochondriac's what I meant, I guess. Hurry up before the mob gets there."

Tim struggled into his bath-robe and pattered off down the corridor, leaving Don to follow at his leisure. But, instead of following, Don seated himself on the edge of his bed and viewed life gloomily. If Tim refused to believe in his illness, how was he to convince Coach Robey of it? He might, he reflected, rub talcum on his face, but he was afraid that wouldn't deceive anyone, the coach least of all. And, according to his bargain with Harry Walton, he must sever his connection with the team today. If he didn't Walton would go to the principal and tell what he had witnessed from his window that Saturday night, and not only he, but Tim and Clint as well, would suffer. And, still worse, the team would be beaten by Claflin as surely as—as Tim was shouting to him from the bathroom! He got up and donned his bath-robe and set off down the corridor with lagging feet, so wretched in mind by this time that it required no great effort of imagination to believe himself ailing in body.

To his surprise—and rather to his disgust—he found himself intensely hungry at breakfast and it was all he could do to refuse the steak and baked potato set before him. Under the appraising eye of Mr. Robey, he drank a glass of milk and nibbled at a piece of toast, his very soul longing for that steak and a couple of soft eggs! Afterward, when he reported to Danny, the trainer produced fresh discouragement in him.

"Fine, me boy!" declared the trainer. "You're as good as ever, aren't you? Keep in the air all you can and go light with the dinner."

"I—I don't feel very fit," muttered Don.

"Get along with you! You're the picture of health! Don't be saying anything like that to Mr. Robey, or he might believe it and bench you. Run along now and mind what I tell you. Game's at two-fifteen today."

It was fortunate that Don had but two recitations that morning, for he was in no condition for such unimportant things. His mind was too full of what was before him. At dinner it was easy enough to obey Danny's command and eat lightly, for he was far too worried to want food. The noon meal was eaten early in order that the players might have an hour for digestion before they went to the field. Chambers came swinging up to the school at half-past one, in all the carriages to be found at the station, while her supporters trailed after on foot. The stands filled early and, by the time the Chambers warriors trotted on to the gridiron for their practice, looked gay and colourful with waving pennants.

Don kept close to Tim from the time dinner was over until they reached the locker-room in the gymnasium. Tim was puzzled and disgusted over his chum's behaviour and secretly began to think that perhaps, after all, he was not in the condition his appearance told him to be. Don listlessly dragged his playing togs on and was dressed by the time Coach Robey came in. He hoped that the coach would give him his opportunity then to declare his unfitness for work, but Mr. Robey paid no attention to him. He said the usual few words of admonition to the players, conferred with Manager Morton and the trainer and disappeared again. Captain Edwards led the way out of the building at a few minutes before two and they jogged down to the field and, heralded by a long cheer from the stand, took their places on the benches. It was a fine day for football, bright and windless and with a true November nip in the air.

Chambers yielded half the gridiron and Coach Robey approached the bench. "All right, first and second squads," he said cheerfully. "Try your signals out, but take it easy. Rollins, you'd better try a half-dozen goals. Martin, too. How about you, Gilbert? You feeling all right?"

Don felt the colour seeping out of his cheeks as the coach turned toward him, and there was an instant of silence before he replied with lowered eyes.

"N-no, sir, I'm not feeling very—very fit. I'm sorry."

"You're not?" Mr. Robey's voice had an edge. "Danny says you're perfectly fit. What's wrong?"

"I—I don't know, sir. I don't feel—well."

A number of the players still within hearing turned to listen. Mr. Robey viewed Don with a puzzled frown. Then he shrugged impatiently.

"You know best, of course," he said shortly, "but if you don't work today, Gilbert, you're plumb out of it. I can't keep your place open for you forever, you know. What do you say? Want to try it?"

Don wished that the earth under his feet would open up and swallow him. He tried to return the coach's gaze, but his eyes wandered. The first time he tried to speak he made no sound, and when he did find his voice it was so low that the coach impatiently bade him speak up.

"I don't think it would be any good, sir," replied Don huskily. "I—I'm not feeling very well."

There was a long silence. Then Mr. Robey's voice came to him as cold as ice. "Very well, Gilbert, clean your locker out and hand in your things to the trainer. Walton!"

"Yes, sir?"

"Go in at left guard on the first squad." Mr. Robey turned again to Don. "Gilbert," he said very quietly, "I don't understand you. You are perfectly able to play, and you know it. The only explanation that occurs to me is that you're in a funk. If that's so it is a fortunate thing for all of us that we've discovered it now instead of later. There's no place on this team, my boy, for a quitter."

Coach and players turned away, leaving Don standing alone there before the bench. Miserably he groped his way to it and sat down with hanging head. His eyes were wet and he was horribly afraid that someone would see it. A hand fell on his shoulder and he glanced up into Tim's troubled face.

"I heard, Don," said Tim. "I'm frightfully sorry, old man. Are you sure you can't do it!"

Don shook his head silently. Tim sighed.

"Gee, it's rotten, ain't it? Maybe he didn't mean what he said, though. Maybe, if you're all right Monday, he'll give you another chance. I'm—I'm beastly sorry, Don!"

The hand on his shoulder pressed reassuringly and drew away and Tim hurried out to his place. Presently Don took a deep breath, got to his feet and, trying his hardest to look unconcerned but making sorry work of it, skirted the stand and retraced his steps to the gymnasium. His one desire was to get out of sight before any of the fellows found him, and so he pulled off his togs as quickly as he might, got into his other clothes, made a bundle of his suit and stockings and shoes and left them in the rubbing-room where Danny could not fail to find them and then hurried out of the building and through the deserted yard to Billings and the sunlit silence and emptiness of his room.

There was very little consolation in the knowledge that he had done only what was right. Martyrdom has its drawbacks. He had lost his position with the team and had been publicly branded a quitter. The fact that his conscience was not only clear but even approving didn't help much. Being thought a quitter, a coward, hurt badly. If he could have got at Harry Walton any time during the ensuing half-hour it would have gone hard with that youth. After a time, though, he got command of his feelings again and, since there was nothing better to do, he seated himself at the window and watched as much of the football game as was visible from there. Once or twice he was able to forget his trouble for a brief moment.

Chambers put up a good game that day and it was all the home team could do to finally win out by the score of 3 to 0. For two periods Chambers had Brimfield virtually on the run, and only a fine fighting spirit that flashed into evidence under the shadow of her goal saved the latter from defeat. As it was, luck took a hand in matters when a poor pass from centre killed Chambers's chance of scoring by a field-goal in the second quarter.

Brimfield showed better work in the second half and twice got the ball inside the visitor's twenty-yard line, once in the third period and again shortly before the final whistle blew. The first opportunity to score was lost when Carmine called for line-plunges to get the pigskin across and Howard, who was playing in St. Clair's position because of a slight injury to the regular left half, fumbled for a four-yard loss. Chambers rallied and took the ball away a minute later. In the fourth period dazzling runs outside of tackles by Tim Otis and hard line-plugging by Rollins and Howard took the ball from Brimfield's thirty-five to the enemy's twenty-five. There a forward pass grounded—Chambers had a remarkable defence against that play—and, on third down, Rollins slid off left tackle for enough to reach the twenty. But with only one down remaining and time nearly up, a try-at-goal was the only course left, and Rollins, standing squarely on the thirty-yard line, drop-kicked a scanty victory.

In some ways that contest was disappointing, in others encouraging. Team-play was more in evidence than in any previous game and the maroon-and-grey backfield had performed prodigiously. And the plays had, as a general thing, gone off like clock-work. But there were weak places in the line still. Pryme, at right guard, had proved an easy victim for the enemy and the same was true, in a lesser degree, of Harry Walton, on the other side of centre. And Crewe, at right tackle, had allowed himself to be boxed time after time. It might be said for Crewe, however, that today he was playing opposite an opponent who was more than clever. But the way in which Chambers had torn holes in Brimfield's first defence promised poorly for next Saturday and the spectators went away from the field feeling a bit less sanguine than a week before. "No team that is weak at both guard positions can hope to win," was the general verdict, and it was fully realised that Claflin's backs were better than Chambers's. For a day or two there was much talk of a petition to the faculty asking for the reinstatement of Tom Hall, but it progressed no further than talk. Josh, it was known, was not the kind to reverse his decision for any reason they could present.

And yet, although the weekly faculty conference on Monday night had no written petition to consider, the subject of Tom's reinstatement did come before it and in a totally unprecedented manner.



CHAPTER XVIII

"GOOD-BYE, TIMMY!"

TIM found a dejected and most unsatisfactory chum when he got back to the room after the Chambers game that Saturday afternoon. All of Tim's demands for an explanation of the whole puzzling affair met only with evasion. Don was not only uncommunicative, but a trifle short-tempered, a condition quite unusual for him. All Tim could get from him was that he "felt perfectly punk" and wasn't going to try to change Mr. Robey's decision.

"I'm through," he said. "I don't blame Robey a bit. I'm no use on the team as I am. He'd be foolish to bother with me."

"Well, all I can say," returned Tim, with a sigh of exasperation, "is that the whole thing is mighty funny. I guess there's more to it than you're telling. You look like thirty cents, all right enough, but I'll wager anything you like that you could go out there and play just as good a game as ever on Monday if Robey would let you and you cared to try. Now couldn't you!"

"I don't know. What does it matter, anyhow? I tell you I'm all through, and so there's no use chewing it over."

"Oh, all right. Nuff said." Tim walked to the window, his hands thrust deep in his pockets, and, after a minute's contemplation of the darkening prospect without, observed haltingly: "Look here, Don. If you hear things you don't like, don't get up on your ear, eh?"

"What sort of things?" demanded the other.

Tim hesitated a long moment before he took the plunge. Then: "Well, some of the fellows don't understand, Don. You can't altogether blame them, I suppose. I shut two or three of them up, but there's bound to be some talk, you know. Some fellows always manage to think of the meanest things possible. But what fellows like that say isn't worth bothering about. So just you sit snug, old man. They've already found that they can't say that sort of thing when I'm around."

"Thanks," said Don quietly. "What sort of things do you mean?"

"Oh, anything."

"You mean that they're calling me a quitter?"

"Well, some of them heard Robey get that off and they're repeating it like a lot of silly parrots. I called Holt down good and hard. Told him I'd punch his ugly face if he talked that way again."

"Don't bother," said Don listlessly. "I guess I do look like a quitter, all right."

"Piffle! And, hang it all, Robey had no business saying that, Don! He couldn't really believe it."

"Why couldn't he? On the face of it, Tim, I'd say that I looked a whole lot like a quitter."

"But that's nonsense! Why would you or any fellow want to quit just before the Claflin game? Why, all the hard work's done with, man! Only a little signal practice to go through with now. Why would you want to quit? It's poppycock!"

"Well, some fellows do get cold feet just before the big game. We've both known cases of it. Look at——"

"Yes, I know what you're going to say, but that was different. He never had any spunk, anyway. Nobody believed in him but Robey, and Robey was wrong, just as he is about you. Anyway, all I'm trying to say is that there's no use getting waxy if some idiot shoots off his mouth. The fellows who really count don't believe you a—a quitter. And the whole business will blow over in a couple of days. Look how they talked about Tom at first!"

"They didn't call him a quitter, though. They were just mad because he'd done a fool thing and lost the team. I wouldn't blame anyone for thinking me a—a coward, and I can't resent it if they say it."

"Can't, eh? Well, I can!"

Don smile wanly. "Thought you were telling me not to, Tim."

Tim muttered. There was silence for a minute in the twilit room. Then Tim switched on the lights and rolled up his sleeves preparatory to washing. "The whole thing's perfectly rotten," he growled, "but we'll just have to make the best of it. Ten years from now——"

"Yes, but it isn't ten years from now that troubles me," interrupted Don thoughtfully. "It—it's right this minute. And tomorrow and the next day. And the day after that. I've a good mind to——"

"To what?" demanded Tim from behind his sponge.

"Nothing. I was just—thinking."

"Well, stop it, then. You weren't intended to think. You always do something silly when you get to thinking. Wash up and come on to supper."

"I'm not going over tonight," answered Don. "I'm not hungry. And, anyway, I don't feel quite like facing it yet."

"Now, look here," began Tim severely, "if you're going to take it like that——"

"I'm not, I guess. Only I'd rather not go to supper tonight. I am through at the training-table and I funk going back to the other table just now. Besides, I'm not the least bit hungry. You run along."

Tim observed him frowningly. "Well, all right. Only if it was me I'd take the bull by the horns and see it through. Fellows will talk more if you let them see that you give a hang."

"They'll talk enough anyway, I dare say. A little more won't matter."

"I just hope Holt gets gay again," said Tim venomously, shying the towel in the general direction of the rack and missing it by a foot. "Want me to bring something over to you?"

"No, thanks. I don't want a thing."

"We-ell, I guess I'll beat it then." Tim loitered uncertainly at the door. "I say, Donald, old scout, buck up, eh?"

"Oh, yes, I'll be all right, Timmy. Don't you worry about me. And—and thanks, you know, for—for calling Holt down."

"Oh, that!" Tim chuckled. "Holt wasn't the only one I called down either." Then, realising that he had not helped the situation any by the remark, he tried to squirm out of it. "Of course, Holt was the one, you know. The others didn't really say anything, or—or mean anything——"

Don laughed. "That'll do, Tim. Beat it!"

And Tim, red-faced and confused, "beat it."

For the next five minutes doors in the corridor opened and shut and footfalls sounded as the fellows hurried off to Wendell. But I doubt if Don heard the sounds, for he was sunk very low in the chair and his eyes were fixed intently on space. Presently he drew in his legs, sat up and pulled his watch from his pocket. A moment of speculation followed. Then he jumped from the chair as one whose mind is at last made up and went to his closet. From the recesses he dragged forth his bag and laid it open on his bed. From the closet hooks he took down a few garments and tossed them beside the bag and then crossed to his dresser and pulled open the drawers. Don had decided to accept Coach Robey's title. He was going to quit!

There was a train at six-thirty-four and another at seven-one for New York. With luck, he could get the first. If he missed that he was certain of the second. The dormitory was empty, it was quite dark outside by now and there was scarcely a chance of anyone's seeing him. If he hurried he could be at the station before Tim could return from supper. Or, even if he didn't get away until the seven-one train, he would be clear of the hall before Tim could discover his absence and surmise the reason for it. To elude Tim was the all-important thing, for Tim would never approve and would put all sorts of obstacles in his way. In fact, it would be a lot like Tim to hold him back by main force! Don's heart sank for a moment. It was going to be frightfully hard to leave old Timmy. Perhaps they might meet again at college in a couple of years, but they would not be likely to see each other before that time, and even that depended on so many things that it couldn't be confidently counted on.

Don paused in his hurried selection of articles from the dresser drawers and dropped into a chair at the table. But, with the pad before him and pen in hand, he shook his head. A note would put Tim wise to what was happening and perhaps allow him to get to the station in time to make a fuss. No, it would be better to write to him later; perhaps from New York tonight, for Don was pretty sure that he wouldn't be able to get a through train before morning. So, with another glance at his watch, he began to pack again, throwing things in every which-way in his feverish desire to complete the task and leave the building before Tim got back. He came across a scarf that Tim had admired and laid it back in the top drawer. It had never been worn and Tim should have it. And as he hurried back and forth he thought of other things he would like Tim to have. There was his tennis racket, the one Tim always borrowed when Don wasn't using it, and a scarf-pin made of a queer, rough nugget of opal matrix. He would tell Tim he was to have those and not to pack them with the other things. The thought of making the gifts almost cheered him for awhile, and, together with the excitement of running away, caused him to hum a little tune under his breath as he jammed the last articles in the bag and snapped it shut.

It was sixteen minutes past now. He would, he acknowledged, never be able to make the six-thirty-four, with that burden to carry. But the seven-one would do quite as well, and he wouldn't have to hurry so. In that case, then, why not leave just a few words of good-bye for Tim? He could put the note somewhere where Tim wouldn't find it until later; tuck it, for instance, under the bed-clothes so that he would find it when he pulled them down. He hesitated a moment and then set his bag down by the door, dropped his overcoat and umbrella on the bed and seated himself again at the table. Tim was never known to take less than a half-hour for supper and he still had a good ten minutes' leeway:

"Dear Timmy [he wrote hurriedly], I'm off. It's no use sticking around any longer. Fellows aren't going to forget as soon as you said and I can't stay on here and be thought a quitter. So I'm taking the seven-one to New York and will be home day after tomorrow. I wish you would pack my things up for me when you get time. There isn't any great hurry. I've got enough for awhile. You're to keep the racket and the blue and white tie and the opal matrix pin and anything else you like to remember me by. Please do this, Tim. I'll write from home and tell you about sending the trunk. I'm awfully sorry, Tim, and I'm going to miss you like anything, but I shan't ever come back here. Maybe we will get together again at college. I hope so. You try, will you? Good-bye, Tim, old pal. We've had some dandy times together, haven't we? And you've been an A1 chum to me and I wish I wasn't going off without saying good-bye to you decently. But I've got to. So good-bye, Timmy, old man. Think of me now and then like I will of you. Good-bye.

"Your friend always, "DON."

That note took longer to write than he had counted on, and when he got up from the table and looked at his watch he was alarmed to find that it was almost half-past six. He folded the paper and tucked it just under the clothes at the head of Tim's bed, took a last glance about the room, picked up coat and umbrella and turned out the light. Then he strode toward the door, groping for his bag.



CHAPTER XIX

FRIENDS FALL OUT

TIM didn't enjoy supper very much that evening. The game had left him pretty weary of body and mind, and on top of that was Don and his trouble, and try as he might he couldn't get them out of his thoughts. Mr. Robey was not at table; someone said he had gone to New York for over Sunday; and so Tim didn't have to make a pretence of eating more than he wanted. And he wanted very little. A slice of cold roast beef, rather too rare to please him, about an eighth of one of the inevitable baked potatoes, a few sips of milk and a corner of a slice of toast as hard as a shingle, and Tim was more than satisfied. Tonight he was not especially interested in the talk, which, as usual after a game, was all football, and didn't see any good reason for sitting there after he had finished and listening to it. All during his brief meal he was on the alert for any mention of Don's name, and more than once he glared, almost encouragingly, at Holt. But Holt had already learned his lesson and was doing very little talking, and none at all about Don. Nor was the absent player's name mentioned by anyone at that table, although what might be being said of him at the other Tim had no way of knowing. He stayed on a few minutes after he had finished, eyeing the apple-sauce and graham crackers coldly, and then asked Steve Edwards to excuse him.

"Off his feed," remarked Carmine as Tim passed down the dining hall on his way out. "First time I ever saw old Tim have nerves."

"It's Don Gilbert, probably," said Clint Thayer. "They're great pals. Tim's worried about him, I guess."

"What do you make of it, Steve?" asked Crewe, helping himself to a third slice of meat.

"What is there to make of it?" asked Steve carelessly. "The chap's all out of shape, I suppose. I don't know what his trouble is, but I guess he's a goner for this year."

"It's awfully funny, isn't it?" asked Rollins. "Gilbert always struck me as an awfully plucky player."

"Has anyone said he isn't?" inquired Clint quietly.

"N-no, no, of course not!" Rollins flushed. "I didn't mean anything like that, Clint. Only I don't see——"

"He hasn't been looking very fit lately," offered Harry Walton. "I noticed it two or three days ago. Too bad!"

"Yes, you're feeling perfectly wretched about it, I guess," said big Thursby drily, causing a smile around the table. Walton shrugged and rewarded the speaker with one of his smiles that were always unfortunately like leers.

"Oh, I can feel sorry for him," said Walton, "even if I do get his place. Gilbert gave me an awfully good fight for it."

"Oh, was there a fight?" asked Thursby innocently. "I didn't notice any."

Thursby got a real laugh this time and Harry Walton joined in to save his face, but with no very good grace.

"If anyone has an idea that Don Gilbert is scared and quit for that reason," observed St. Clair, "he'd better keep it to himself. Or, anyhow, he'd better not air it when Tim is about. He nearly bit my head off in the gym because I said that Don was a chump to give up like this a week before the Claflin game. Tim flared up like—like a gasoline torch and wanted to fight! I didn't mean a thing by my innocent remark, but I had the dickens of a time trying to prove it to Tim! And he almost jumped into you, too, didn't he, Holt?"

"Yes, he did, the touchy beggar! You all heard what Robey said, and——"

"I didn't hear," interrupted Steve, "and——"

"Why, he said——"

"And, as I was about to remark, Holt, I don't want to. And it will be just as decent for those who did hear to forget. Robey says lots of things he doesn't mean or believe. Perhaps that was one of them. I'm for Don. If he says he's sick, he is sick. You've all seen him play for two years and you ought to know that there isn't a bit of yellow anywhere in his make-up."

"That's so," agreed several, and others nodded, Holt amongst them.

"I didn't say he was a quitter, Steve. I was only repeating what Robey said, and Tim happened to hear me. Gee, I like Don as well as any of you. Gee, didn't I play a whole year with him on the second?"

"Gee, you did indeed!" replied Crewe, and, laughing, the fellows pushed back their chairs and left the table.

Tim didn't hurry on his way along the walk to Billings, for he was earnestly trying to think of some scheme that would take Don's mind off his trouble that evening. Perhaps he could get Don to take a good, long walk. Walking always worked wonders in his own case when, as very infrequently happened, he had a fit of the blues. Yes, he would propose a walk, he told himself. And then he groaned at the thought of it, for he was very tired and he ached in a large number of places!

Only a few windows were lighted in Billings as he approached it, for most of the fellows were still in dining hall and the rule requiring the turning out of lights during absence from rooms was strictly enforced. Only the masters were exempted, and Tim noticed as he passed Mr. Daley's study that the droplight was turned low by one of those cunning dimming attachments which Tim had always envied the instructor the possession of. Tim would have had one of those long ago could he have put it to any practical use. He passed through the doorway and down the dimly lighted corridor, the rubber-soled shoes which he affected in all seasons making little sound. He was surprised to see that no light showed through the transom of Number 6, and he paused outside the door a moment. Perhaps Don was asleep. In that case, it would be just as well to not disturb him. But, on the other hand, he might be just sitting there in the dark being miserable. Tim turned the knob and pushed the door open.

The light from the corridor and the fact that Don had stopped startledly at the sound of the turning knob prevented an actual collision between them. Tim, pushing the door slowly shut behind him, viewed Don questioningly. "Hello," he said, "where are you going?"

"For a walk," replied Don.

"Why the coat and umbrella? And—oh, I see!" Tim's glance took in the bag and comprehension dawned. "So that's it, eh?"

There was an instant of silence during which Tim closed the door and leaned against it, hands in pockets and a thoughtful scowl on his face. Finally:

"Yes, that's it," said Don defiantly. "I'm off for home."

"What's the big idea?"

"You know well enough, Tim. I—I'm not going to stay here and be—be pointed out as a quitter. I'm——"

"Wait a sec! What are you doing now but quitting, you several sorts of a blind mule? Think you're helping things any by—by running away? Don't be a chump, Donald."

"That's all well enough for you. It isn't your funeral. I don't care what they say about me if I don't have to hear it. I'm sorry, Tim, but—but I've just got to do it. I—there's a note for you in your bed. I didn't expect you'd be back before I left."

"I'll bet you didn't, son!" said Tim grimly. "Now let me tell you something, Don. You're acting like a baby, that's what you're doing! It's all fine enough to say that you don't care what fellows say as long as you don't hear it, but you don't mean it, Don. You would care. And so would I. If you don't want them to think you a quitter, for the love of mud don't run away like—like one!"

"I've thought of all that, Tim, but it's the only thing to do."

"The only thing to do, your grandmother! The thing to do is to stick around and show folks that you're not a quitter. Don't you see that getting out is the one thing that'll make them believe Robey was right?"

"Oh, I dare say, but I've made up my mind, Tim. I'm going to get that seven-one train, old man, and I'll have to beat it. If you want to walk along to the station with me——"

"And carry your bag?" asked Tim sweetly. He turned the key in the lock and then dropped it in his pocket. Don took a stride forward, but was met by Tim's challenging frown. "There's no seven-one train for you tonight, Donald," said Tim quietly, "nor any other night. Put your bag down, old dear, and hang your overcoat back in the closet."



"Don't act like a silly ass," begged Don. "Put that key back and let me out, Tim!"

"Yes, I will—like fun! The only way you'll get that key will be by taking it out of my pocket, and by the time you do that the seven-one train will be half-way to the city."

"Please, Tim! You're not acting like a good chum! Just you think——"

"That's just what I am acting like," returned Tim, stepping past the other and switching on the lights. "And you'll acknowledge it tomorrow. Just now you're sort of crazy in the head. I'll humour you as much as possible, Donald, but not to the extent of letting you make a perfect chump of yourself. Sit down and behave."

"Tim, I want that key," said Don sternly.

Tim shrugged. "Can't have it, Don, unless you fight for it. And I'm not sure you'd get it then. Now look here——"

"You've no right to keep me here!"

"I don't give a hang whether I've got the right or not. You're going to stay here."

"There are other trains," said Don coldly. "You can't keep that door locked forever."

"I don't intend to try, but it'll stay locked until the last train tonight has whistled for the crossing back there. Make up your mind to that, son!"

Don looked irresolutely from Tim to the door and back again. He didn't want to fight Tim the least bit in the world. He wasn't so sure now that he wanted to get that train, either. But, having stated his purpose, he felt it encumbent on him to carry it out. Then his gaze fell on the windows and he darted toward them.

But Tim had already thought of that way of escape and before Don had traversed half the distance from door to windows Tim had planted himself resolutely in the way. "No you don't, Donald," he said calmly. "You'll have to lick me first, boy, and I'm feeling quite some scrappy!"

"I don't want to lick you," said Don irritably, "but I mean to get that train. You'd better either give up that key or stand out of my way, Tim."

"Neither, thanks. And, look here, if we get to scrapping Horace will hear us and then you won't get away in any case. Be sensible, Don, and give it up. It can't be done, old man."

"Will you unlock that door?" demanded Don angrily.

"No, confound you, I won't!"

"Then I'm going out by the window!"

"And I say you're not." Tim swiftly peeled off his coat. "Anyway, not in time to get that train."

Don dropped his bag to the floor and tossed overcoat and umbrella on his bed. "I've given you fair warning, Tim," he said in a low voice. "I don't want to hurt you, but you'd better stand aside."

"I don't want to get hurt, Don," replied the other quietly, "but if you insist, all right. I'm doing what I'd want you to do, Don, if I went crazy in the head. You may not like it now, but some day you'll tell me I did right."

"You're acting like a fool," answered Don hotly. "It's no business of yours if I want to get out of here. Now you let me pass, or it'll be the worse for you!"

"Don, will you listen to reason? Sit down calmly for five minutes and let's talk this thing over. Will you do that?"

"No! And I won't be dictated to by you, Tim Otis! Now get out of the way!"

"You'll have to put me out," answered Tim with set jaw. "And you're going to find that hard work, Donald. We're both going to get horribly mussed up, and——"

But Tim didn't finish his remark, for at that instant Don rushed him. Tim met the onslaught squarely and in a second they were struggling silently. No blows were struck. Don was bent only on getting the other out of the way and making his escape through the open window there, while Tim was equally resolved that he should do nothing of the sort. In spite of Don's superior weight, the two boys were fairly equally matched, and for a minute or two they strained and tussled without advantage to either. Then Tim, his arms wrapped around Don's body like iron bands, forced the latter back a step and against a chair which went crashing to the floor. Don tore at the encircling arms, panting.

"I don't—want to—hurt you," he muttered, "but—I will—if you don't—let go!"

There was no answer from Tim, but the grip didn't relax. Don worked a hand under the other's chin and tried to force his head back. Tim gave a little and they collided with the window-seat, stumbled and slid together to the floor, Don on top. For a moment they writhed and thrashed and then Don worked his right arm loose, slowly tore Tim's left hand away and held it down to the floor.

"Let go or I'll punch you, Tim," he panted.

"Punch—ahead!"

Don strained until he felt Tim's other hand giving, and then, with a sudden fling of his body, rolled clear and jumped to his feet. But Tim was only an instant behind him and, panting and dishevelled, the two boys confronted each other, silent.

"I'm going out there," said Don after a moment.

Tim only shook his head and smiled crookedly.

"I am, Tim, and—and you mustn't try to stop me this time!"

"I've—got to, Don!"

"I'm giving you fair warning!"

"I know."

Don took a deeper breath and stepped forward. "Don't touch me!" he warned. But Tim was once more in his path, hands stretched to clutch and hold. "Out of my way, Tim! Fair warning!" Don's face was white and his eyes blazing.

"No!" whispered Tim, and crouched.

Then Don went on again. Tim threw himself in the way, a fist shot out and Tim, with a grunt, went back against the pillows and slipped heavily to the floor.

Don's hands fell to his sides and he stared bewilderedly. Then, with a groan, he dropped to his knees and raised Tim's head from the floor. "Gee, but I'm sorry, Timmy!" he stammered. "I didn't mean to do it, honest! I was crazy, I guess! Timmy, are you all right!"

Tim's eyes, half-closed, fluttered, he drew a deep breath and his head rolled over against Don's arm.

"Timmy!" cried Don anxiously. "Timmy! Don't you hear me! I didn't hit you awfully hard, Timmy!"

Tim sighed. "What—time is it?" he murmured.

"Time? Never mind the time. Are you all right, Tim?"

Tim opened his eyes and grinned weakly. "Hear the birdies sing, Don! It was a lovely punch! Help me up, will you?"

Don lifted him to the window-seat. "I'm horribly sorry, Tim," he said abjectedly. "I—I didn't know what I was doing, chum! I wish—I wish you'd hand me one, Tim! Go on, will you?"

Tim laughed weakly. "It's all right, Donald. Just give me a minute to get my breath. Gee, things certainly spun around there for a second!"

"Where'd I hit you?"

"Right on the point of the jaw." Tim felt of the place gingerly. "No harm done, though. It just sort of—jarred me a bit. What time is it?"

Don glanced at the tin alarm clock on his dresser. "Ten of seven," he answered. "What's that got to do with it?"

"Well, you can't make the seven-one now, Donald, unless you fly all the way, can you?"

"Oh!" said Don, rather blankly. "I—I'd forgotten!"

"Good thing," muttered Tim. "Wish you'd forgotten before! If anyone ever tells you you're a nice good-natured, even-tempered chap, Don, don't you believe him. You send 'em to me!"

"I didn't know I could lose my temper like that," replied the other shamefacedly. "Timmy, I'm most awfully sorry about it. You believe that, don't you?"

"Sure!" Tim laughed. "But I'll bet you're not half as sorry as you would have been tomorrow if I'd let you go! Don, you're an awful ass, now aren't you?"

Don nodded. "I guess I am, Timmy. And you're a—a brick, old man!"

"Huh! Any more trains to New York tonight?"

"There's one at twelve-something," answered Don, with a grin.

"Thinking of catching it?"

"Not a bit!"

"All right then." Tim dug in his pocket and then tossed the door-key beside him on the cushion. "Better unpack your bag, you silly ass. Then we'll go out and get some air. I sort of need it!"

Some three hours later Tim, tossing back his bed-clothes, exclaimed: "Hello! What have we here?"

"That's just a note I wrote you," said Don hurriedly. "Hand it here, Tim."

"I should say not! I'm going to read it!"

"No, please, Tim! It's just about two or three things I was going to leave you! Hand it over, like a good chap!"

"Something you were going to leave me?" said Tim as he let Don wrest the sheet of paper from him. "Oh, I see. Well,"—he felt carefully of the lump on his chin—"I guess you left me enough as it is, dearie!"



CHAPTER XX

AMY APPEARS FOR THE DEFENCE

PRACTICE on Monday was a wretched affair. To be sure, many of the fellows who had played in the Chambers game had been excused, but that didn't account for the fact that those who did take part went at their work as if half asleep. Both McPhee and Cotter failed to get any life into the first, and the second, while it, too, seemed to have taken part in the general slump, managed to score twice while the first was with difficulty wresting three touchdowns from its opponent. Mr. Robey shouted himself red in the face, Steve Edwards, who followed practice, pleaded and exhorted, and a stocky, broad-shouldered, bearded individual who made his appearance that afternoon for the first time frowned and shook his head, and all to small purpose. The players accepted scoldings and insults as a donkey accepts blows, untroubledly, apathetically, and jogged on at their own pace, guilty of all the sins of commission and omission in the football decalogue.

There was much curiosity about the newcomer and many opinions as to his identity were hazarded on the bench that afternoon. It was quite evident that he was a football authority, for Coach Robey consulted him at times all during practice. And it was equally evident that they were close friends, since the stranger was on one occasion seen to smite the head coach most familiarly between the shoulders! But who he was and what he was doing there remained a secret until after supper. Then it became known that his name was Proctor, Doctor George G. Proctor, that he was a practising physician some place in the Middle West and that he was visiting Coach Robey. But that was unsatisfactory data and some enterprising youth hunted back in the football records and, lo, the mystery was explained. Eight years before "Gus" Proctor had played tackle on the Princeton eleven and in his junior and senior years had been honoured with a position on the All-American Team. Subsequently he had coached at a college in Ohio and had put said college on the map. Now, having stolen away from home to see Princeton and Yale play next Saturday, he was staying for a day or two with Mr. Robey. After that became generally known Doctor Proctor was gazed at with a new respect whenever he appeared on field or campus.

Don and Tim went up to Number 12 that night after supper to call on Tom Hall. Tim was having hard work making Don face the music. If Don could have had his way he would have kept to himself, but Tim insisted on dragging him around. "Just keep a firm upper lip, Donald," he counselled, "and show the fellows that there's nothing in it. That's the only way to do. If you keep skulking off by yourself they'll think you're ashamed."

"So I am," muttered Don.

"You're not, either! You've done nothing to be ashamed of! Keep that in mind, you silly It. Now come along and we'll go up and jolly Tom a bit."

Steve Edwards was not at home, but Amy Byrd was enthroned on the window-seat when they entered in response to Tom's invitation, and Amy had evidently been holding forth very seriously on some subject.

"Don't mind us," said Tim. "Go ahead, Amy, and get it off your chest."

"Hello," said Amy. "Hello, Don, old man. Haven't seen you for an age. Make yourselves at home. Never mind Tom, he's only the host. How did you like the practice today, Tim?"

"I didn't see it, but I heard enough about it. It must have been fierce!"

"It was perfectly punk," growled Tom. "I should think Robey would want to throw up his hands and quit!"

"Did you see it, Don?" asked Amy.

"No, I didn't go over. What was the trouble?"

"Well, I'm no expert," replied Amy, taking his knees into his arms and rocking gently back and forth on the seat, "but I'd say in my ignorant way that someone had unkindly put sleeping-potions in the milk at training-table! The only fellow who seemed to have his eyes more than half open was McPhee. Mac showed signs of life at long intervals. The rest sort of stumbled around in their sleep. I think Peters actually snored."

"Oh, we're going to get a fine old drubbing next Saturday," said Tom pessimistically. "And what a fine exhibition for that chap Proctor! I'll bet Robey could have kicked the whole team all the way back to the gym. He looked as though it would have done him a world of good to have a try at it!"

"Oh, well, these things happen," said Tim cheerfully. "It's only a slump. We'll get over it."

"Slump be blowed!" said Tom. "This is a fine time to slump, five days before the game!"

"I know that, too, but there's no use howling about it. What we need, Tom, is to have you get back there at right guard, old man."

"That's what I've been saying," exclaimed Amy earnestly. "I want Tom to go to Josh and ask him to let him play, but he won't. Says it wouldn't be any good. You don't know whether it would or not, Tom, until you try it. Look here, Josh doesn't want us to get beaten Saturday any more than we want it ourselves, and if you sort of put it up to him like that——"

"I'd look well, wouldn't I?" laughed Tom. "Telling Josh that unless he let me off pro the team would get licked! Gee, that's some modest, isn't it?"

"You don't have to put it like that," replied Amy impatiently. "Be—be diplomatic. Tell him——"

"What we ought to do," interrupted Tim, "is get up a petition and have everyone sign it."

"I thought of that, too," said Amy, "but this dunder-headed Turk won't stand for even that."

"Why not, Tom?" asked Don.

"Because."

"And after that?" asked Amy sweetly.

"Well, look here, you chaps." Tom scowled intently for a moment. "Look here. It's this way. Josh put a bunch of us on pro, didn't he? Well, what right have I to go and ask to be let off just because I happen to be a football man? You don't suppose those other fellows like it any better than I do, do you?"

"Oh, forget that! I'm one of them, and I'm having the time of my life. It's been the making of me, Tom. I'm getting so blamed full of learning that I'll be able to loaf all the rest of the year; live on my income, so to say." And Amy beamed proudly.

"That's all right," answered Tom doggedly, "but I don't intend to cry-baby. I'm just as much in it as any of you. If Josh wants to let us all off, all right, but I'm not going to ask for a—a special dispensation!"

"You don't need to," said Tim. "Let the fellows do it. That has nothing to do with you. What's to keep us from going ahead and getting up a petition?"

"Because I ask you not to," replied Tom simply. "It's only fair that we should all be punished alike."

"But you're not," said Don.

"We're not? Why aren't we?" asked Tom in surprise.

"Because you're getting it harder than Amy and Harry Westcott and the others," answered Don quietly. "They aren't barred from any sport, and you are."

"By Jove, that's a fact!" exclaimed Amy.

"But—but we all got the same sentence," protested Tom.

"I know you did, but"—Don smiled—"put it like this. I hate parsnips; can't bear them. Suppose you and I were punished for something we'd done by being made to eat parsnips three times a day for—for a month! You like them, don't you? Well, who'd get the worst of that? The sentence would be the same, but the—the punishment would be a heap worse for me, wouldn't it?"

"'Father was right'!" said Tim.

"Oh, father never spoke a truer word!" cried Amy, jumping up from the window-seat. "That settles it, Tom! Get some paper, Tim, and we'll write that petition this minute and I'll guarantee to get fifty signatures before ten o'clock!"

"You'll do nothing of the sort," said Tom stubbornly. "Don talks like a lawyer, all right, but he's all wrong. And, anyway, I'm out of football and I'm going to stay out for this year. I've quit training and I probably couldn't play if Josh said I might. So that——"

"Oh, piffle," said Amy. "Quit training! Everyone knows you never quit training, Tom. You could go out there tomorrow and play as good a game as you ever did. Don't talk like a sick duck!"

"There's no reason why I should play, though. Pryme's putting up a bully game——"

"Pryme is doing the best he knows how," said Tim, "but Pryme can't play guard as you can, Tom, and he never will, and you know it! Now have a grain of sense, won't you? Just sit tight and let us put this thing through. There isn't a fellow in school who won't be tickled to death to sign that petition, and I'll bet you anything you like that Josh will be just as tickled to say yes to it. Whatever you say about Josh Fernald, you've got to hand it to him for being fair and square, Tom."

"Josh is all right, sure. I haven't said anything against him, have I? But I won't stand for any petition, fellows, so you might as well get that out of your heads. Besides, my being on the team or off it isn't going to make a half of one per cent's difference next Saturday."

There was silence in the room for a moment. Then Amy went dejectedly back to the window-seat and threw himself on it at full length. "I think you might, Tom," he said finally, "if only on my account!"

"Why on your account?" laughed Tom.

"Because I'm the guy that got you all into the mess, that's why. And I've felt good and mean about it ever since. And now, when we think up a perfectly good way to—to undo the mischief I made, you act like a mule. Think what a relief it would be to my conscience, Tom, if you got off pro and went back and played against Claflin!"

"I don't care a continental about your conscience, Amy. In fact I never knew before that you had one!"

"I've got a very nice one, thanks. It's well-trained, too. It——" Amy's voice trailed off into silence and for the next five minutes or so he took no part in the conversation, but just laid on the cushions and stared intently at the ceiling. Then, suddenly, he thumped his feet to the floor and reached for his cap.

"What time is it?" he demanded.

"Most eight," said Tim. "We'd better beat it."

"What time——" began Amy. Then he stopped, pulled his cap on his head and literally hurled himself across the room and through the door, leaving the others to gaze at each other amazedly.

"Well, what's wrong with him?" gasped Tim.

"He's got something in that crazy head of his," answered Tom uneasily. "Don't let him start that petition business, Tim, will you? I don't want to seem mean or anything, you know, but I'd rather let things be as they are. Come up again, fellows. And maybe today's showing doesn't mean anything, Tim, just as you said. We'll hope so, eh?"

Faculty conferences took place on Monday evenings at half-past seven in the faculty meeting room in Main Hall. At such times, with the principal, Mr. Fernald, presiding at the end of the long table and all members of the faculty able to attend ranged on either side, all and sundry matters pertaining to the government of the school came up for discussion. The business portion of the conference was followed by an informal half-hour of talk, during which many of the students were subjected to a dissection that would have surprised them vastly had they known of it. Tonight, however, the executive session was still going on and Mr. Brooke, the secretary, was still making notes at the foot of the table, when there came a rap at the door.

Mr. Fernald nodded to Mr. Brooke. "See who it is, please," he said.

The secretary laid down his pen very carefully on the clean square of blue blotting-paper before him, pushed back his chair and opened the door a few inches. When he turned around his countenance expressed a sort of pained disapprobation. "It's Byrd, sir," announced Mr. Brooke in a low, shocked voice. "He says he'd like to speak to you."

"Byrd? Well, tell him I'm busy," replied the principal. "If he wants to wait I'll see him after the conference. Although"—Mr. Fernald glanced at the clock—"it's only four minutes to eight and he'd better get back to his room. Tell him I'll see him at the Cottage at nine, Mr. Brooke. As I was saying," and Mr. Fernald faced the company again, "I think it would be well to arrange for a longer course this Winter. Last year, as you'll recall—— Eh? What is it?"

"He says, sir, that it's a faculty matter," announced Mr. Brooke deprecatingly, "and asks to be allowed to come in for a minute."

"A faculty matter? Well, in that case——All right, Mr. Brooke, tell him to come in."

As Amy entered eight pairs of eyes regarded him curiously; nine, in fact, for Mr. Brooke, closing the door softly behind the visitor, gazed at him in questioning disapproval.

"Well, Byrd, what can we do for you?" Mr. Fernald smiled, doubtless with the wish to dispel embarrassment. But he needn't have troubled about that, for Amy didn't look or act in the least embarrassed. "I'm afraid," continued the principal, "that I can't offer you a chair, for we're rather busy just now. What was it you wanted to speak of?"

"I guess it looks pretty cheeky, sir, for me to butt in here," replied Amy, with a smile, "but it's rather important, sir, and—and if anything's to be done about it it'll have to be done tonight."

"Really? Well, it does sound important. Suppose you tell us about it, Byrd."

"Thank you, sir." Amy paused, gathering his words in order. "It's this, Mr. Fernald: when we fellows were put on pro—probation, I mean, it was intended that we should all get the same punishment, wasn't it, sir?"

"Let me see, that was the affair of—— Ah, yes, I recall it. Why, yes, Byrd, naturally it was meant to treat you all alike. What complaint have you?"

"It isn't exactly a complaint, sir. But it's this way. There were nine of us altogether. It was my fault in the first place because I put them up to it. They'd never thought of it if I hadn't." Amy glanced at Mr. Moller. "It was a pretty silly piece of business, sir, and we got what we deserved. But—but none of us meant to—to hurt anyone's feelings, sir. It was just a lark. We didn't think that——"

"We'll allow that, Byrd. Please get down to the purpose of this unusual visit," said Mr. Fernald drily.

"Yes, sir. Well, eight of us it doesn't matter so much about. We aren't football men and being on probation doesn't cut so much—I mean it doesn't matter so much. But Tom Hall's a football man, sir, and it's different for him. This is his last year here and losing his place on the team was hard lines. That's what I'm trying to get at, sir. You meant that we were all to be punished the same, but we weren't. It's just about twice as hard on Tom as it is on the rest of us. You see that, sir, don't you?"

There was a moment of silence and then Mr. Simkins coughed. Or did he chuckle? Amy couldn't tell. But the principal dropped his eyes and tapped his blotter with the tip of the pencil he held. At last:

"That's a novel point of view, Byrd," he said. "There may be something in it. But I must remind you that the Law—and the faculty stands for the Law here—takes no cognisance of conditions existing—hem!" Mr. Fernald glanced doubtfully down the table. "Perhaps it should, though. We'll pass that question for the moment. What is it you suggest, Byrd?"

"Well, sir, the team's in punk shape. It was awful today. It needs Tom, sir; needs him awfully. I don't say that we'll beat Claflin if he should play, Mr. Fernald, but I'm mighty sure we won't if he doesn't. And it seemed to me that maybe you and the other faculty members hadn't thought of how much harder you were giving it to Tom than to the rest of us, and that if you did know, realise it, sir, you'd maybe consider that he'd had about enough and let him off so he might play Saturday. The rest of us haven't any kick coming, sir. It's just Tom. And he doesn't know that I'm here, either. We tried to get him to let us petition faculty, but he wouldn't. He said he was going to take the same punishment as the rest of us."

"Then he doesn't agree with your contention, Byrd?"

"Oh, he sees I'm right, Mr. Fernald, but he—he's obstinate!"

Mr. Fernald smiled, as did most of the others.

"Byrd, I think you ought to take a law course," said the principal. "I might answer you as I started to by pointing out that it is no business of ours whether a punishment is going to hit one fellow harder than another; that just because it might should make that one fellow more careful not to transgress. But you've taken the wind out of my sails by getting me to testify that we intended the punishment to be the same for all. You've put us in a difficult place, Byrd. If we should lift probation in Hall's case it would seem that we had different laws for team members than for boys unconnected with athletics. You've made a very eloquent plea, but I don't just see——" Mr. Fernald hesitated. Then: "Possibly someone has some suggestion," he added, and it seemed to Amy that his gaze rested on Mr. Moller for an instant.

At all events it was the new member of the faculty who spoke. "If I might, sir," he said hesitatingly, "I'd like to make the suggestion that probation be lifted from all. It seems to me that that would—would simplify things, Mr. Fernald."

"Hm. Yes. Possibly. As the target of the extremely vulgar proceeding, Mr. Moller, the suggestion coming from you bears weight. Byrd, you'd better get to your studies. You'll learn our decision in the morning. Your action is commendable, my boy, and we'll take that into consideration also. Good-night."

"Good-night, sir. Good-night, sirs. Thank you."

Amy retired unhurriedly, unembarrassedly, and with dignity, as befitted one who had opened the eyes of Authority to the error of its ways!

The next morning Mr. Fernald announced in chapel that at the request of Mr. Moller, and in consideration of good behaviour, the faculty had voted to lift probation from the following students: Hall——

But just there the applause began and the other eight names were not heard.



CHAPTER XXI

THE DOCTOR TELLS A STORY