"Got hurt, you mean?" asked Dick quickly.

"Not quite," went on Darrin, making a face. "When Fred was going into the house last night he tripped slightly—-against a rope that had been stretched across the garden path between two stakes."

"But Fred wasn't hurt?"

"No; he says he tripped, but he recovered himself."

"I'm afraid you don't believe that, Dave?"

"I ought to, anyway," retorted Darrin dryly. "Fred is showing the rope."

"A piece of rope is easy enough to get," mused Dick.

"Yep; and a lie is easy enough for some fellows to tell. But some of the fellows are inclined to believe Rip, so they've started a yarn that Gardiner High School is up to tricks, and that some fellows have been sent over in advance to cripple our box men for to-day."

"That's vile!" flushed Prescott indignantly, as he got up to make the circuit of the room. "The Gardiner fellows have always been good, fair sportsmen. They wouldn't be back of any tricks of that sort."

"Well, Fred has managed to cover himself, anyway," returned Dave rather disgustedly. "He called his father and mother out to see the rope before he cut it away from the stakes. Oh, I guess a good many fellows will believe Ripley's yarn!"

"I'm afraid you don't, Dave;"

"Oh, yes; I'm easy," grinned Darrin.

"Can you see two young ladies, Richard?" asked Mrs. Prescott, looking into the room.

"Certainly, mother, if I get a chance. My vision is not impaired in the least," laughed Dick.

Mrs. Prescott stood aside to admit Laura and Belle, then followed them into the room.

"We came to make sure that Gridley is not to lose its great pitcher to-day," announced Laura.

"Then your father must have told you that I'd do," cried Dick, eagerly.

"Father?" pouted Miss Bentley. "You don't know him then. One can never get a word out of father about any of his patients. But he said we might call."

The visit of the girls brightened up twenty minutes of the morning.

"Of course," said Laura, as they rose to go, "you mustn't attempt to pitch if you really can't do it, or if it would hurt you for future games."

"I'm afraid the coach won't let me pitch, unless your father says I can," murmured Dick, with a wry face.

Few in Gridley who knew the state of affairs had any idea that Dick Prescott would be able to stand in the box against Gardiner. But the young pitcher boarded a trolley car, accompanied by Dave Darrin, and both reached the Athletic Field before two o'clock. Dr. Bentley was there soon after. In the Gridley dressing room, Dick's left leg was bared, while Coach Luce drew off his coat and rolled up his shirt sleeves. Under the physician's direction the coach administered a very thorough massage, following this with an alcohol rubbing.

When it was all over Dick rose to exhibit the motions of that leg before the eyes of the doubtful physician.



CHAPTER XVII

WHEN THE HOME FANS QUIVERED

"Is Prescott going to toss!"

"They say not."

"It's a shame."

"And there's a suspicion," whispered one of the High School speakers, "that the other name of the shame is Fred Ripley."

"He ought to be lynched!"

"But he claims that an attempt was made against him, also."

"Ripley never was strong on the truth."

Though the gossip about Fred Ripley was not general, the anxiety over Pitcher Prescott was heard on all sides.

"It'll be a sure hoodoo if Prescott can't pitch the season's first game," declared a man who seldom missed a High School game on the home diamond.

Before three o'clock the grand stand was comfortably filled. The cheaper seats beyond held about as many spectators as they were built to hold.

The attendance, that day, was nearly three thousand. Gardiner had sent a delegation of nearly one-tenth of this number.

Before three o'clock the band began to play. Whenever the musicians launched into a popular baseball ditty the crowd joined with the words.

"Prescott is going to pitch!"

"No, he isn't."

"The word has just been passed around. Besides, his name's down on the score card."

"The score cards were printed yesterday."

Finally, curiosity could stand it no longer. A committee left the grand stand to go toward the dressing rooms building. But a policeman waved them back.

"None but players and officials allowed in there," declared the officer.

"We want to find out whether Prescott is going to pitch," urged the spokesman.

"I heard something about that," admitted the policeman.

"What was it? Quick!"

"Let me see. Oh! Prescott wants to pitch; the coach is half willing, but the doctor ain't certain."

This was the best they could do, so the committee returned to their seats. But nothing was settled.

At three-twenty, just as the band ceased playing, the compact bunch of Gardiner fans sent up the yell:

"Here they come! Our fellows! The only ones!"

Using their privilege as visiting team, the Gardiner players were now filing on to the field for a little warming-up practice.

"Throw him down, McCluskey!" tooted the band, derisively. But the cheers from the wild Gardiner fans nearly drowned out the instrumental racket. Quickly the visitors had a practice ball in motion. Now the home fans waited breathlessly.

At last the band played again. "See the Conquering Hero Comes!"

Gridley High School, natty and clean looking in their gray and black uniforms, with black stockings, caps and belts, came out on the field. Instantly there was craning of necks to see if Prescott were among the players.

"There he is!" yelled one of the High School fans. "There's our Dick! Wow!"

Cheering went up from every Gridley seat. The bleachers contributed a bedlam of noise. "For He's a Jolly Good Fellow!" blared forth the band. Girls and women stood up, waving fans, handkerchiefs, banners. Another round of cheering started. Dick walked quietly, looking neither to right nor left. Yet the boy was wondering, in astonishment, if kings usually got such a welcome.

By the time the cheering had ceased, Fred Ripley, also in uniform, strolled out and walked toward the sub bench.

A hiss greeted Ripley. It was not loud, nor insistent, and presently died out. But Fred went as white as a sheet, then, with eyes cast downward, he dropped to his seat at the end of the sub bench. His chest heaved, for the greeting had unnerved him.

"I wonder why I usually get that sort of thing, while that fellow Prescott has a band to play him in," muttered Fred.

The bulk of the audience was now quiet, while the three hundred visiting fans roared out one of their school yells.

Then followed a noisy whooping of the Gridley High School yell.

Coach Luce had walked over to a post behind the sub bench.

Umpire Foley, his mask dangling from his left hand, now summoned Purcell and the Gardiner captain. A coin spun up in the air. Gardiner's diamond chieftain won the toss, and chose first chance at the bat. Purcell's men scattered to their fielding posts, while the young captain of the home team fastened on his catcher's mask.

The umpire took a ball from its package, inspected it, then tossed it to Dick Prescott, who stood in the box awaiting it. There was a moment's tense expectation, followed by the command that set all the real fans wild:

"Play ball!"

Gardiner High School had put up a husky young giant who stood beside the plate, a confident grin on his face as he swung the bat.

Dick moistened his fingers. The batsman saw that, and guessed what was coming. He didn't guess quite low enough, however, for, though he stooped and swung the stick lower, the ball went under it by three inches.

"Strike one!" called Mr. Foley, judicially.

An imperceptible signal told Purcell what was coming next. Then it came—-a jump ball. This time Gardiner's batsman aimed low enough but it proved to be a jump ball.

"Strike two!"

A howl of glee went up from all quarters, save from the Gardiner visitors.

Again Dick signaled. His third was altogether different—-a bewildering out-curve. Gardiner's batsman didn't offer, but Purcell caught the leather neatly.

"Strike three, and out! One out!" announced the umpire.

"Whoop!" The joy from the home fans was let loose. With a disgusted look, Gardiner's man slouched back to the players' bench.



CHAPTER XVIII

THE GRIT OF THE GRAND OLD GAME

In that half of the inning it was one, two, three—-down and out!

Even Fred Ripley found himself gasping with admiration of Prescott's wonderfully true pitching.

Yet the joy of the home fans was somewhat curbed when Gridley went to bat and her third man struck out after two of the nine had reached bases.

So the first inning closed without score. Gardiner had found that Gridley was "good," and the latter realized that even young Prescott's pitching could not do it all.

The first five innings went off quickly, neither side scoring.

"It'll be a tie at dark," sighed some of the fans.

"Oh, well, a tie doesn't score against Gridley," others added, consolingly.

In the five innings Dick Prescott had to run twice. The first time he was left at first base. The second time he had reached second, and was cautiously stealing third, when Gridley's batsman, Captain Purcell, struck his side out on a foul hit.

"How's your wrist holding up?" asked Purcell, in a low tone, as Dick came in.

"It feels strong.

"Do you think Darrin had better have the rest of the game?"

"Not on account of my wrist."

"But can you run the bases to the end?"

"If it doesn't call for any more running than we've had," smiled Dick.

Then he caught the ball, held it an instant, signaled, and let drive. It was the same Gardiner batsman whom Prescott had struck out at the opening of the game. This time the young giant got the range of the ball by sheer good guessing.

Crack! It soared. Right field ran backward after the ball. Now the Gardiner fans were up and yelling like Comanches.

"Leg it, Prendergast!"

The runner touched first bag, then darted on for second. Right field was still after the ball.

"Whoop! He's pulverized the second bag!"

"Just look at third, old man, and come steaming home over the plate!"

That runner had been well trained. He was close upon third base and going with unabated speed.

He kicked the bag—-then a warning cry told him that right field had the ball.

A swift look over his shoulder, and Prendergast fell back upon third just before the ball dropped into the third baseman's hands.

"Safe on third!" came the umpire's announcement. The ball arched over to Dick Prescott. Purcell signaled him to let the ball come in over the plate.

Now the air was all a-tingle. The visitors had a run in sight. Dick felt the thrill, but steeled himself against any impulsiveness or loss of nerve. He signaled the drive, then let go. Three strikes and out, the ball all the while so closely under control that Prendergast fidgeted but did not dare steal far from third.

Then came Dowdy to the bat. He was far and away the best batsman from Gardiner. Prendergast began to edge in.

"Strike one!" from the umpire.

Crack! The leather hung low, a little to the left of shortstop, who raced after it. Prendergast was going in at a tremendous clip. As shortstop reached the ball, he swooped down on it, stopped its rolling, and rising quickly, hurled it in across the plate.

Purcell was waiting, and made a good catch. It looked close. Everyone eyed Umpire Foley.

"Runner safe home," he decided.

There was a gasp of disappointment, but the decision was fair. Prendergast had made good by a fraction of a second—-and there was a man on first.

"Oh, Dick! Oh, Prescott!" wailed the home fans. "We look to you."

Dick's answer was to strike the next man out, with never a chance for the man on first to steal away from Dalzell and make second. Then a short fly filled first and second. Dick struck out a second man—-then a third.

But this was getting on Gridley's nerves. Despite Prescott's fine pitching, it began to look as though Gardiner High School was fitted for getting the only one or two runs that the game would witness.

In the eighth, Gardiner got a second run, but that inning closed with Gridley as much "stumped" as ever.

"Why play the ninth?" yelled one of the visitor fans. "Let's go and drink tea. Gridley boys are nice little fellows, but——-"

"How's that wrist?" asked Captain Purcell, anxiously, as the players changed places to begin the ninth. Coach Luce had stepped close, too, and looked anxious.

"Just a bit lame, of course," Dick admitted. "But I'm going to pull through."

"You're sure about it?" Purcell asked.

"Sure enough!"

The first Gardiner man to bat went out on the third ball sent past him. Then a second. Now came Prendergast to the bat, blood in his eye. He glared grimly at young Prescott, as though to say:

"Now, I'll take it out of you for making a comedian of me the first time I held the stick!"

Dick felt, somehow, that Prendergast would make good.

The first ball that Prescott put over the plate was a called strike. At the second serve—-

Crack! and Prendergast was running.

Dan Dalzell gauged the flight of that ball better than anyone else on the diamond. He side-stepped like a flash, falling back a couple of paces. Then pulling the leather down out of the air, he leaped back to first. He was holding the ball in his left hand when Prendergast, breathing fast, hopped at the bag.

"Runner out!" called Umpire Foley. Prendergast stamped back, with a look of huge disgust. And now Gridley came in at the bat.

"It's no use! We're whipped!" That was the comment everywhere as Gridley came in from the field prepared for a last effort.

Gridley's first and second men went bad—-the first struck out, and the second knocked a foul bit that was caught.

"Greg, you've got to go to bat next," whispered Dick to Holmes, just a moment before. "Oh, don't you strike out. Hit something drive it somewhere. Remember Gridley can't and won't lose! Get the Gridley spirit soaked into you instanter. Chase that leather somewhere!"

Gardiner's pitcher, his face beaming, faced Holmes, whom he did not regard as one of the team's heavyweights in batting skill. Visiting fans were rising, preparing to leave the stand.

"Strike one!"

"There he goes!"

"Strike two!"

"It's all over."

Crack! Greg was off like a colt. Running was in his line. He had swatted the ball somewhere over into left field, and he didn't care where it landed. Gardiner's left field was forced to pick up the leather.

Greg didn't know that anyone had the ball. He didn't care; he had to make first, anyway.

He kicked the bag, turning for the second lap. Then he saw the sphere coming through the air, and slid back.

"Runner safe on first!"

Gridley, with its nerve always on hand, felt that there was a ray of hope. The good, old, strong and fierce school yell went up. The soprano voices of the girls sounded high on the air.

Now Dan Dalzell came up to the plate, bat in hand. Dan hadn't hit a thing during the afternoon, but he meant to do so, now. It was either that or the swan-song!

"Strike one!—-" a groan came from Gridley, a cheer from Gardiner.

But Dan was not in the least confused. He was ready for the next ball.

Biff! It was the pistol shot for Greg, who was off like a two-legged streak, with Dan, ninety feet behind but striving to catch up. The ball came to first only a quarter-second behind Dan's arrival.

"Both runners safe!"

"Oh, now, Purcell!"

The man now hovering over the plate knew he simply had to do something. He was captain of the nine. He had caught like a Pinkerton detective all afternoon, but now something was demanded of his brain and brawn.

"Strike one!" called the umpire, with voice that grated.

"Good-bye!"

"Strike two!" came again the umpire's rasping tones.

Even now Gridley fans wouldn't admit cold feet, but the chills were starting that way.

Crack!

"Whoop!" Then the battle-cry of Gridley rose frantically from all the seats—-Purcell had made first base.

"Prescott!"

"It's yours!"

"Don't fall down!"

Schimmelpodt, a wealthy old German contractor, rose from his seat, shouting hoarsely:

"Bresgott I gif fifdy tollars by dot Athletic Committee bis you win der game vor Gridley!"

The offer brought a laugh and a cheer. Schimmelpodt rarely threw away money.

Dick, smiling confidently, stood bat in hand.

Most other boys might have felt nervous with so much depending on them. But Dick was one of the kind who would put off growing nervous until the need of steady nerves was past.

It was always impossible for him to admit defeat.

The game stood two to nothing in favor of the Gardiner nine, but Gridley had bases full.

Dick's help might not have been needed for all the uneasiness that he displayed.

There was no pallor about his face, nor any flush. His hands grasped the willow easily, confidently.

"Strike one!"

Prescott had missed the ball, but it failed to rattle him.

"Strike two!"

The boy was still undaunted, though he had lost two chances out of the three.

Again he tried for the ball.

Swish! It was a foul hit, out sidewise. Gardiner's catcher darted nimbly in under the ball.

Home fans groaned.

As for Dick, he didn't turn his head to look. Catcher had the ball in his fingers, but fumbled it. It slipped.

"Hard luck," muttered the standing Gardiner fans, waiting to give their final cheer of victory.

Dick's next sight of the ball was when it sailed lazily over his head, into the hands of the man in the box.

"I hope Dick is bracing," groaned one of Gridley's subs.

"He isn't," retorted Dave Darrin. "He's just on the job, steady as iron, cool as a cucumber and confident as an American."

Gardiner's pitcher measured his man critically, then signaled the next ball.

It came, just as Dick, closely watching the pitcher, expected it to come, a swift, graceful out-curve.

Bang!

At least it sounded like a gunshot. Dick Prescott struck the ball with all his might. He struck with greatest force just barely below the center of the sphere.

It was a fearful crack, aimed right and full of steam and speed.

"Wow!"

Three base-runners, at the first sound had started running for all they were worth. Dick's bat flew like a projectile itself, fortunately hitting no one, and Prescott was running like Greek of old on the Olympic field.

One man in!

The ball had gone past the furthest limits of outfield. Before it had touched the ground Dick Prescott touched first and started for second.

Gardiner right and left fields were running a race with center field.

The latter was the one to get it, but his two supporters simply couldn't stand still.

Prescott kicked the second bag. Almost at the same instant the second man was in.

Score tied!

What about that ball?

It was rolling on the ground, now, many yards ahead of the flying center-field.

Dick was nearing third, the man ahead of him fast nearing the home plate.

Centerfield had the ball in his hands, whirling as if on springs.

Third man safe home—-Dick Prescott turning the third bag and into the last leg of the diamond.

Center-field threw with all his might, but the distance was long.

Second base had to stoop for the ball. Even at that, it got past his hands. He wheeled, bolted after the ball, got it and made a throw to the catcher.

Out of the corner of his eyes, young Prescott saw the arching ball descend, a good throw and a true one.

Yet, ere it landed in the catcher's hand, Dick, by the fraction of a second, had sprinted desperately across the home plate.

"Runner safe home!"

"Whoo-oopee! Wow! wow! wow!" rang the chorus of thousands.

"Four to two!"

"What about Gridley, now?"

"What about Dick Prescott?"

Then words were lost in volleys of cheers. The Gardiner fans who had risen to cheer slipped dejectedly down from the stand.

And Dick Prescott?

While running he had given no thought to his knee.

Now, as he dashed across the plate, and heard the umpire's decision, he tried to stop, but slipped and went down. He tried to rise, but found it would be better to sit where he was.

The game was over. Gridley, having made the winning runs in the last half of the ninth, the rules of the game forbade any further attempts to pile up score.

One of the first of the great crowd to leap over into the field and cross the diamond was Coach Luce. He ran straight to the young pitcher's side, kneeling close by him.

"You've given your knee a fearful twist, Prescott. I could see it," said Luce sympathetically.

"What do I care?" Dick called back, his face beaming. "The score's safe, isn't it?"

Had it not been for the state of his knee Prescott would have been snatched up by a dozen hands and rushed across the field in triumph. But Mr. Luce waved them all back. Dick's father and mother came hurrying across the field to see what was wrong with their boy.

"Let me lean on you as I get up, Mr. Luce," begged Dick, and the coach was only too quick to help the boy to his feet. Then, with the aid of Luce's arm, Dick was able to show his parents that he could walk without too much of a limp.

"You did it for us, Dick, old boy!" greeted Captain Purcell, as soon as he could get close.

"Did I?" snorted the young pitcher. "I thought there were four of us in it, with five others helping a bit."

"It was the crack you gave that ball that brought us in," glowed Purcell. "Gracious, I don't believe that Gardiner pitcher was ever stung as badly as that before!"

The band was playing, now. As the strain stopped, and the young pitcher came across the field, leaning now on Dave Darrin's arm, the music crashed out again into "Hail to the Chief!"

"You see, Purcell. You're getting your share of the credit now," laughed Dick. "The band is playing something about a captain, isn't it?"

In the dressing room Dick had abundant offers of help. Fred Ripley was the only silent one in the group. He changed his togs for street clothes as quickly as he could and disappeared. Later, Dave Darrin and Greg Holmes helped Dick on to a street car, and saw him safely home. That knee required further treatment by Dr. Bentley, but there was time, now, and no game depending on the result.

"Fred, I can't say much for your appetite tonight," remarked his father at the evening meal.

"Neither can I, sir," Fred answered.

"Are you out of sorts?"

"Never felt any better, sir."

"Being out in the open air all this April afternoon should have given you an appetite.

"I didn't do anything this afternoon, except sit around in my ball togs," Fred grumbled.

"I hope you'll have a few good games to pitch this season," his father went on. "You worked hard enough, and I spent money enough on the effort to prepare you."

"You can't beat some people's luck—-unless you do it with a club," grumbled Fred, absently.

"Eh?" asked his father, looking up sharply from his plate. But the boy did not explain.

Late that night, however, breaking training rules for the tenth time, Fred was out on the sly to meet Tip Scammon. The pair of them laid plans that aimed to stop Dick Prescott's career as High School pitcher.



CHAPTER XIX

SOME MEAN TRICKS LEFT OVER

Mr. Schimmelpodt had offered that fifty dollars in a moment of undue excitement.

For two or three days afterward he wondered if he couldn't find some way out of "spending" the money that would yet let him keep his self-respect.

Finding, at last, that he could not, he wrote out the check and mailed it. He pinned the check to a half-sheet of paper on which he wrote, "Rah mit Prescott!"

A few days later Mr. Schimmelpodt turned from Main Street into the side street on which Dick's parents kept their store and their home.

"Ach! Und dere is de door vot that boy lives by," thought Mr. Schimmelpodt, just before he passed Dick's door. "Yen der game over was, und I saw dot boy go down—-ach!"

For Mr. Schimmelpodt had suited the action to the word. Out from under him his feet shot. But Mr. Schimmelpodt, being short and flabby of leg, with a bulky body above, came down as slowly as big bodies are supposed to move. It was rather a gradual tumble. Having so much fat on all portions of his body Mr. Schimmelpodt came down with more astonishment than jar.

"Ach! Such a slipperyishness!" he grunted. "Hey, Bresgott—-! look out!"

The door had opened suddenly at this early hour in the morning. Dick, charged with doing a breakfast errand for his mother at the last moment, sprang down the steps and started to sprint away.

At the first step on the sidewalk, however, Dick's landing foot shot out from under him.

He tried to bring the other down in time to save himself. That, too, slipped. Dick waved his arms, wind-mill fashion in the quick effort to save himself.

"Bresgott," observed the seated contractor, solemnly, "I bet you five tollars to den cents dot you——-"

Here Schimmelpodt waited until Dick settled the question of the center of gravity by sprawling on the sidewalk.

"—-Dot you fall," finished the German, gravely. "I—-Und I yin!"

"Why, good morning, Mr. Schimmelpodt," Dick responded, as he started to get up. "What are you doing here."

"Oh, choost vaiting to see bis you do the same thing," grunted the contractor. "It was great sport—-not?"

"Decidedly 'not,'" laughed Dick, stepping gingerly over a sidewalk that had been spread thinly with some sticky substance. "Can I help you up, Mr. Schimmelpodt?"

The German, who knew his own weight, glanced at the boy's slight figure rather doubtfully.

"Bresgott, how many horsepower are you alretty?"

But Dick, standing carefully so that he would not slip again, displayed more strength than the contractor had expected. In another moment the German was on his feet, moving cautiously away, his eyes on the sidewalk. Yet he did not forget to mutter his thanks to the boy.

As Dick now went on his way again, slipping around the corner and into a bakeshop, he noticed that his right wrist felt a bit queer.

"Well, I haven't broken anything," he murmured, feeling of the wrist with his left hand. "But what on earth happened to the sidewalk."

As he paused before his door on the way back, he looked carefully down at the sidewalk. Right before the door several flags in the walk appeared to be thinly coated with some colorless specimen of slime.

"It looks as though it might be soft soap," pondered Prescott, examining the stuff more closely. "It'll be dry in a half an hour more, but I think I had better fix it."

In the basement was a barrel of sand that was used for sanding the icy sidewalk in winter. As soon as Dick had run upstairs with the bread he went below, got a few handfuls of sand and fixed the sidewalk.

At recess Dick noticed just enough about his wrist to make him speak about it to Submaster Luce.

"Let me see it," demanded coach. "Hm!" he muttered. "Another peculiar accident, and only two days before our game with Chichester! See Dr. Bentley about your wrist at his office this afternoon. I'm beginning to think, Prescott, that it's a fortunate thing for you that the medical director is paid out of the fund. You'd bankrupt an ordinary citizen if you're going to keep on having these tumbles."

Dr. Bentley's verdict was that, while the wrist was not in a condition that need bother men much in ordinary callings, yet, as a pitcher's wrist, it would need rest and care.

"I've just got the tip that I'm to pitch in the Chichester game," said Dave, coming to his chum that afternoon.

"Yes; Doe thinks I ought to look after this wrist—-that it wouldn't stand extraordinary strain during the next few days. But, Dave, old fellow, watch out! Keep your eye on the sidewalks near your home. Don't prowl in lonely places after dark. Act as if you were made of glass until you get on the field at the Chichester game."

Darrin glanced shrewdly at his friend, then nodded.

"I'm on, Dick! Confound that fellow, Ripley. And he's as slick and slippery as an eel. I don't suppose there is any way that we can catch him?"

"If I knew a way I'd use it," growled Prescott. "I'm sick of having this thing so onesided all the time. Ripley plans, and we pay the piper. The blackguard!"

"Then you're sure Ripley is at the bottom of these accidents?"

"The accidents are planned," retorted Dick. "Who else would care to plan them, except that disagreeable fellow?"

"I'd like to get just proof enough to justify me in demanding that he stand up before me for twenty rounds," gritted Dave Darrin.

Dave did take extraordinary care of himself, and was on hand to pitch at the game with Chichester. This game, like the first, was on the home grounds.

It was a close game, won by Gridley, two to one. In some respects Chichester's fielding work was better than the home team's. It was undying grit that won the battle—-that and Dave Darrin's pitching.

As the jubilant home fans left the ball grounds it was the general opinion that Dave Darrin was only the merest shade behind Dick Prescott as a pitcher.

"Either one of them in the box," said Coach Luce to a friend, "and the game is half won."

"But how about Ripley?"

"Ripley?" replied the coach. "He made a good showing in the tryouts, but we haven't had in the field yet. He will be, though, the next game. We play Brayton High School over at Brayton. It's one of the smaller games, and we're going to try Ripley there."

Then the coach added, to himself:

"Ripley is presentable enough, but I believe there's a big yellow streak in him somewhere. I wouldn't dare to put Fred into one of the big games requiring all the grit that Prescott or Darrin can show!"



CHAPTER XX

A TIN CAN FOR THE YELLOW DOG

With Ripley in the box Gridley won its third game of the season, beating Brayton High School by a score of five to two.

"It ought to have been a whitewash against a small-fry crowd like Brayton," Coach Luce confided to Captain Purcell.

"What was our weak spot, Coach?"

"Have you an opinion, Captain?" asked the coach.

"Yes, but I'm afraid I'm wrong."

"What is your idea?"

"Why, it seemed to me, Mr. Luce, that Ripley went stiff at just the wrong times. Yet I hate to say that, and I am afraid I'm unfair, for Rip surely does throw in some wonderful balls."

"You've struck my idea, anyway," responded Mr. Luce. "Please don't say anything about it to the other men. But, between ourselves, Captain, I think we'll do well to give Ripley few and unimportant chances this season. Most people can't see where real grit comes in, in baseball"

"Yet you think the lack of grit, or stamina, is just what ails Rip?" asked Captain Purcell keenly.

"You can judge, from what I've said," replied Coach Luce.

"I'm glad then, Coach, for it shows I wasn't so far off the track in my own private judgment."

Yet, to hear Fred Ripley tell about the game, it wasn't such a small affair. He judged his foemen by the fact that they had to contend with him.

"Five to two is the safest margin we've had yet," he confided to those who listened to him at the High School. "More than that, we had Brayton tied down so that, at no time in the game, did they have any show to break the score against us. Now, if Luce and Purcell fix it up for me to pitch the real games of the season"

"Oh, cut it out, Rip," advised one listener, good-naturedly. "Brayton is only a fishball team, anyway. Not a real, sturdy beef-eater in the lot."

The season moved on briskly now. Dick pitched two games, and Darrin one in between Prescott's pair. Dick's first game was won by a score of one to nothing; his second game, the return date against Gardiner, was a tie. The game in which Darrin pitched was won by a score of three to two.

Then came a game with a team not much above Brayton's standing.

"Prescott and Darrin must be saved for some of the bigger games," decided Coach Luce. "Purcell, don't you think it will be safe to trust Ripley to pitch against Cedarville High School?"

"Yes," nodded the captain of the nine. "I don't believe Cedarville could harm us, anyway, if we put left field or shortstop in the box."

Fred Ripley was notified. At once Cedarville became, in his talk, one of the most formidable nines on the state's High School circuit.

"But we'll skin 'em, you'll see," promised Fred, through the week. "Be at the game, and see what I can do when I'm feeling well. Cedarville has no chance."

Ripley was in high spirits all through the week. All through that Saturday forenoon he moved about in a trance of exultation. Yet, underneath it all, he was somewhat seedy in a physical sense, for he had been out late the night before to meet Tip and hand over some money.

Late that Saturday forenoon, Lawyer Ripley returned from a business trip. Soon after he returned home, and had seen a man in his library, he went in search of his wife.

"Where's Fred?" demanded the lawyer.

"He went out up the street, to get a good walk," replied Mrs. Ripley. "You know, my dear, he is to pitch for Gridley in one of the biggest games of the season this afternoon."

"Hm!" said the lawyer. "Well, see here. Let Fred have his luncheon. Don't say a word until then. As soon as he is over with the meal, send him to me in the library. Don't give him any hint until he has finished eating."

"Is—-is anything wrong?" asked Mrs. Ripley, turning around quickly.

"Just a few little questions I want to talk over with the boy," replied Mr. Ripley.

It was shortly after one o'clock when Fred stepped into the library. This apartment was really in two rooms, separated by folding doors. In the front room Mr. Ripley had his desk, and did his writing. Most of his books were in the rear room. At the time when Fred entered the folding doors were closed.

"You wished to see me, sir?" Fred asked, as he entered.

"Yes," said his father, pointing to a chair; "take a seat."

"I hope it isn't anything that will take much time," hinted Fred. "you know, sir, I've got to be at the field early this afternoon. I am to pitch in one of the biggest——-"

"I'll try to be very brief," replied the lawyer, quietly. "Fred, as you know, whenever I find I have more money about me than I care to carry, I put it in the private safe upstairs. Your mother and I have a place where we hide the key to that old-fashioned safe. But, do you know, I have been missing some money from that safe of late? Of course, it would be sheer impudence in me to suspect your mother."

"Of course it would," agreed Fred, with feigned heartiness. He was fighting inwardly to banish the pallor that he knew was creeping into his cheeks.

"Have you any theory, Fred, that would help to account for the missing of these sums of money?" pursued the lawyer, one hand toying with a pencil.

"Do you suspect any of the servants?" asked the boy, quickly.

"We have had all our servants in the family for years," replied the lawyer, "and it would seem hard to suspect any of them."

"Then whom can you suspect, sir?"

"Fred, do you know, I have had a quiet little idea. I am well acquainted with the scrapes that young fellows sometimes get into. My experience as a lawyer has brought me much in contact with such cases. Now, it is a peculiar thing that young fellows often get into very bad scrapes indeed in pursuing their peculiar ideals of manliness. Fred, have you been getting into any scrapes? Have you found out where your mother and I hide the key to the safe? Have you been helping yourself to the money on the sly?"

These last three questions Lawyer Ripley shot out with great suddenness, though without raising his voice.

The effect upon young Ripley was electrical. He sprang to his feet, his face dramatically expressive of a mingling of intense astonishment and hurt pride.

"Dad," he gasped, "how can you ask me such questions?"

"Because I want the answer, and a truthful one," replied the lawyer, coolly. "Will you oblige me with the answer? Take your time, and think deliberately. If you have made any mistakes I want you to be fair and honorable with me. Now, what do you say, sir?"

Fred's mind had been working like lightning. He had come to the conclusion that it would be safe to bluff his denial through to the end.

"Father," he uttered, earnestly, in a voice into which he tried to throw intense earnestness and sincerity, "I give you my word of honor, as a Ripley, that I know nothing more about the missing money than you have just told me."

"You are sure of that, Fred?"

"Sure of it, sir? Why, I will take any oath that will satisfy——-"

"We don't want any perjury here," cut in the lawyer, crisply, and touched a bell.

The folding doors behind them flew open with a bang. As Fred started and whirled about he beheld a stranger advancing toward them, and that stranger was escorting—-Tip Scammon.

The stranger halted with his jailbird companion some five or six feet away. The stranger did not appear greatly concerned. Tip, however, looked utterly abashed, and unable to raise his gaze from the floor.

"With this exhibit, young man," went on the lawyer, in a sorrowful tone, "I don't suppose it is necessary to go much further with the story. When I first began to miss small sums from the safe I thought I might merely have made a mistake about the sums that I had put away. Finally, I took to counting the money more carefully. Then I puzzled for a while. At last, I sent for this man, who is a detective. He has come and gone so quietly that probably you have not noticed him. This man has had a hiding place from which he could watch the safe. Early last evening you took the key and opened the safe—-robbed it! You took four five-dollar bills, but they were marked. This man saw you meet Tip Scammon, saw you pass the money over, and heard a conversation that has filled me with amazement. So my son has been paying blackmail money for months!"

Fred stood staggered, for a few moments. Then he wheeled fiercely on Scammon.

"You scoundrel, you've been talking about me—-telling lies about me," young Ripley uttered hoarsely.

"I hain't told nothing about ye," retorted Tip stolidly. "But this rich man's cop (detective) nabbed me the first thing this morning. He took me up inter yer father's office, an' asked me whether I'd let him explore my clothes, or whether I'd rather have a policeman called in. He 'splained that, if he had to call the poor man's cop, I'd have to be arrested for fair. So I let him go through my clothes. He found four five-spots on me, and told me I'd better wait an' see yer father. So I'm here, an' not particular a bit about having to go up to the penitentiary for another stretch."

"It hasn't been necessary, Fred, to question Scammon very far," broke in the elder Ripley. "That'll do, now, Haight. Since Scammon volunteered to give the money back, and said he didn't know it had been stolen, you can turn him loose."

The detective and Tip had no more than gone when Lawyer Ripley, his face flushed with shame, wheeled about on his son.

"So you see, Fred, what your word of honor the word of a Ripley—-is sometimes worth. You have been robbing me steadily. How much you have taken I do not know as I have not always counted or recorded money that I put in the safe."

Fred's face had now taken on a defiant look. He saw that his father did not intend to be harsh, so the boy determined to brave it out.

"Haven't you anything to say?" asked the lawyer, after a brief silence.

"No," retorted Fred, sulkily. "Not after you've disgraced me by putting a private detective on my track. It was shameful."

That brought the hot blood rushing to his father's face.

"Shameful, was it, you young reprobate? Shameful to you, when you have been stealing for weeks, if not for months? It is you who are dead to the sense of shame. Your life, I fear, young man, cannot go on as it has been going. You are not fitted for a home of wealth and refinement. You have had too much money, too easy a time. I see that, now. Well, it shall all change! You shall have a different kind of home."

Fred began to quake. He knew that his father, when in a mood like this, was not to be trifled with.

"You—-you don't mean jail?" gasped the boy with a yellow streak in him.

"No; I don't; at least, not this time," retorted his father. "But, let me see. You spoke of an engagement to do something this afternoon. What was it?"

"I was to have pitched in the game against Cedarville High School."

"Go on, then, and do it," replied his father.

"I—-I can't pitch, now. My nerves are too——-"

"Go on and do what you're pledged to do!" thundered Lawyer Ripley, in a tone which Fred knew was not to be disregarded. So the boy started for the door.

"And while you are gone," his father shot after him, "I will think out my plan for changing your life in such a way as to save whatever good may be in you, and to knock a lot of foolish, idle ideas out of your head!"

Fred's cheeks were ashen, his legs shaking under him as he left the house.

"I've never seen the guv'nor so worked up before—-at least, not about me," thought the boy wretchedly. "Now, what does he mean to do? I can't turn him a hair's breadth, now, from whatever plan he may make. Why didn't I have more sense? Why didn't I own up, and 'throw myself on the mercy of the court'?"

In his present mood the frightened boy knew he couldn't sit still in a street car. So he walked all the way to the Athletic Field. He was still shaking, still worried and pale when at length he arrived there.

He walked into the dressing room. The rest of the nine and the subs were already on hand, many of them dressed.

"You're late, Mr. Ripley," said Coach Luce, a look of annoyance on his face.

Outside, the first of the fans on the seats were starting the rumpus that goes under the name of enthusiasm.

"I—-I know it. But—-but—-I—-I'm sorry, Mr. Luce. I—-I believe I'm going to be ill. I—-I know I can't pitch to-day."

So Coach Luce and Captain Purcell conferred briefly, and decided that Dave Darrin should pitch to-day.

Darrin did pitch. He handled his tricky curves so well that puny Cedarville was beaten by the contemptuous score of seventeen to nothing.

Meanwhile, Fred Ripley was wandering about Gridley, in a state of abject, hopeless cowardice.



CHAPTER XXI

DICK IS GENEROUS BECAUSE IT'S NATURAL

"Say, will you look at Rip?"

No wonder Harry Hazelton exploded with wonder as he turned to Dan Dalzell and Greg Holmes.

In this warmer weather, the young men loitered in the school yard until the first bell.

These three members of Dick & Co. were standing near the gateway when Fred Ripley turned the nearest corner and came on nervously, hurriedly, a hang-dog look in his face.

What had caught Harry Hazelton's eye, and now made his comrades stare, was the new suit that Fred wore. Gone was all that young man's former elegance of attire. His stern father had just left the boy, after having taken him to a clothing store where Fred was tricked out in a coarse, ready-made suit that had cost just seven dollars and a half. A more manly boy would have made a better appearance in such clothes, but it was past Fred Ripley. And he was miserably conscious of the cheap-looking derby that rested on his head. Even his shoes were new and coarse.

Ripley hurried by the chums, and across the yard, to be met at the door by Purcell, who stared at him in candid astonishment.

"Oh, say, Rip!" demanded Purcell. "What's the bet?"

"Shut up!" retorted Ripley, passing quickly inside.

"Fine manners," grinned Purcell to a girl who had also paused, impelled by excusable curiosity.

Dick, when he came along, heard the news from Hazelton and the others.

"What can be the cause of it all?" asked Tom Reade, wonderingly.

"Oh, some row with his father," decided Dick slowly. "When I was up on Main Street I saw them both going into Marsh's clothing store."

"I asked poor old Rip what the bet was," chuckled Purcell as he joined the group.

"Say, if you want to have fun at recess," proposed Dan Dalzell, "let's about twenty of us, one after the other, go up and ask Rip what the bet is, and how long it's for?"

"Say," retorted Dick sternly, eyeing hapless Dan, "I believe, if you got into a fight and knocked a fellow down, you'd jump on him and keep hammering him."

"Not much I wouldn't, old safety-valve," retorted Dan, reddening. "But I see that you're right, Dick. Rip has never been any friend of ours, and to jump him now, when he's evidently down at home, would be too mean for the principles of Dick & Co."

"I'd rather give the poor fellow a helping hand up, if we could," pursued young Prescott musingly, "Purcell, do you think there'd be any use in trying that sort of thing?"

"Why, I don't know," replied Captain Purcell, easy going and good hearted. "Barring a few snobbish airs, I always used to like Rip well enough. He was always pretty proud, but pride, in itself, is no bar to being a decent fellow. The only fellow who comes to harm with pride is the fellow who gets proud before he has done anything to be proud of. At least, that's the way it always hit me."

"Ripley certainly looked hang-dog," commented Hazelton.

"And he must feel mightily ashamed over something," continued Dick. "I wonder if his father has found out anything about Tip Scammon and certain happenings of last year. That might account for a lot. But what do you say, fellows? If Ripley has been a bit disagreeable and ugly, shall we try to make him feel that there's always a chance to turn around and be decent?"

"Why, I'd believe in trying to point out the better road to Old Nick himself," replied Dave Darrin warmly. "Only, I don't believe in doing it in the preachy way—-like some people do."

"That's right," nodded Dick. "See here, Purcell, if Ripley is looking down in the mouth at recess, why don't you go up to him and talk baseball? Then call us over, after you've raised some point for discussion. And we'll tip two or three other fellows to join in, without, of course, getting a crowd."

"I'll try it," nodded Purcell. "Though I can't guess how it will turn out. Of course, if Rip gives us the black scowl we'll have to conclude that no help is wanted."

It was tried, however, at recess. Purcell went about it with the tact that often comes to the easy going and big hearted. Soon Purcell had Dick and Dave with Fred and himself. Then the other chums drifted up. Two or three other fellows came along. After some sulkiness at first Fred talked eagerly, if nervously. On the whole, he seemed grateful.

When Dick reached home that day he felt staggered with astonishment. Waiting for him was a note from Lawyer Ripley, asking the boy to be at the latter's office at half-past two.

"I shall take it as a very great favor," the note ran on, "and, from what I know of you, I feel certain that you will be glad to aid me in a matter that is of vast importance to me."

"What on earth is coming?" wondered Dick. But he made up his mind to comply with the request.

Promptly to the minute Dick reached the street door of the office building. Here he encountered Dave Darrin and Dalzell.

"You, too?" asked Dick.

"It looks as though all of Dick & Co. had been summoned," replied Dave Darrin.

On entering the lawyer's office they found their other three chums there ahead of them. Tip Scammon was there, also, looking far from downcast.

Lawyer Ripley looked very grave. He looked, too, like a man who had a serious task to perform, and who meant to go about it courageously.

"Young gentlemen, I thank you all," said the lawyer slowly. "I am pursuing a matter in which I feel certain that I need your help. There has been some evil connection between Scammon and my son. What it is Scammon has refused to tell me. I will first of all tell you what I do know. I am telling you, of course, on the assumption that you are all young men of honor, and that you will treat a father's confidence as men of honor should do."

The boys bowed, wondering what was coming. Lawyer Ripley thereupon plunged into a narration of the happenings of the day before, telling it all with a lawyer's exactness of statement.

"And now I will ask you," wound up Mr. Ripley, "whether you can tell me anything about the hold that Scammon seems to have exercised over my son?"

"That's an embarrassing question, sir," Dick replied, after there had been a long pause.

"Do you know the nature of that hold?"

"Yes, sir."

"May I ask how you know?"

"I overheard a conversation, one night, between your son and Tip Scammon."

"What was the substance of that conversation?" pressed the lawyer.

"I don't quite see how I can tell you, sir," Dick responded slowly and painfully. "I'm not a tale bearer. I don't want to come here and play the tittle-tattle on your son."

"I respect your reluctance," nodded Lawyer Ripley. "But let me put it to you another way. I am the boy's father. I am responsible for his career in this world, as far as anyone but himself can be responsible. I am also seeking what is for the boy's best good. I cannot act intelligently unless I have exact facts. Both my son and Scammon are too stubborn to tell me anything. In the cause of justice, Prescott, will you answer me frankly?"

"That word, 'justice,' has an ominous sound, sir," Prescott answered. "It is generally connected with the word punishment, instead of with the word mercy."

"I suspect that my son has been your very bitter enemy, Prescott," said the lawyer keenly. "I suspect that he has plotted against you and all your chums. Would you now try to shield him from the consequences of such acts?"

"Why, sir, I think any boy of seventeen is young enough to have another chance."

"And I agree with you," cried the lawyer, a sudden new light shining in his eyes. "Now, will you be wholly frank with me if I promise you that my course toward my son will be one that will give him every chance to do better if he wants to?"

"That's an odd bargain to have to make with a father," smiled Dick.

"It is," admitted Lawyer Ripley, struck by the force of the remark. "You've scored a point there, Prescott. Well, then, since I am the boy's father, and since I want to do him full justice on the side of mercy, if he'll have it—-will you tell all of the truth that you know to that boy's father?"

Dick glanced around at his chums. One after another they nodded. Then the High School pitcher unburdened himself. Tip Scammon sat up and took keen notice. When Dick had finished with all he knew, including the tripping with the pole, and the soft-soaping of the sidewalk before his home door, Tip was ready to talk.

"I done 'em all," he admitted, "includin' the throwin' of the brickbats. The brickbats was on my own hook, but the pole and the soft soap was parts of the jobs me and Fred put up between us."

"Why did you throw the brickbats on your own hook?" asked Lawyer Ripley sharply.

"Why, you see, 'squire, 'twas just like this," returned Tip. "After I'd done it, if I had hurt Prescott, then I was goin' to go to your son an' scare 'im good an' proper by threatenin' to blab that he had hired me to use them brickbats. That'd been good fer all his spendin' money, wouldn't it?"

"Yes, and for all he could steal, too," replied Lawyer Ripley.

"I didn't know nothing about his stealin' money," retorted Tip, half virtuously. "I jest thought he had too much pocket money fer his own good, an' so I'd help him spend some of it. But, see here, lawyer, ye promised me that, if I did talk, nothin' I told yer should be used against myself."

"I am prepared to keep that promise," replied Mr. Ripley coldly.

The sound of a slight stir came from the doorway between the outer and inner office. There in the doorway, his face ghastly white, his whole body seeming devoid of strength, leaned Fred Ripley.

"I had almost forgotten that I asked you to come here," said Mr. Ripley, as he looked up. "How long have you been here?"

"Not very long, perhaps, but long enough to know that Dick Prescott and the rest have been doing all they can to make matters harder for me," Fred answered in a dispirited voice.

"As it happens, they have been doing nothing of the sort," replied the lawyer crisply. "Come in here, Fred. I have had the whole story of your doings, but it was on a pledge that I would give you another chance to show whether there's any good in you. Fred, I can understand, now that you've always thought yourself better than most boys—-above them. The truth is that you've a long way to go to get up to the level of ordinary, decent, good American boyhood. You may get there yet; I hope so. But come, sir, are you going to make a decent apology to Prescott and his friends for the contemptible things you've tried to do to them?"

Somehow, Fred Ripley managed to mumble his way through an apology, though he kept his eyes on the floor all the while. Full of sympathy for the father who, if proud, was at least upright, Dick and his chums accepted that apology, offered their hands, then tip-toed out, leaving father and son together.



CHAPTER XXII

ALL ROADS LEAD TO THE SWIMMING POOL

In the next few weeks, if Fred Ripley didn't improve greatly in popularity, he was at all events vastly quieter and more reserved in his manner.

Tip Scammon had vanished, so far as common knowledge went. Mr. Ripley, feeling somewhat responsible for that scamp's wrong doing, in that Fred had put him up to his first serious wrong doing, had given Scammon some money and a start in another part of the country. That disappearance saved Scammon from a stern reckoning with Prescott's partners, who had not forgotten him.

Fred was again a well-dressed boy, also a well-mannered one. He had very little to say, and he kept his snobbishness, if any remained, well concealed.

Dick & Co., after the scene in the lawyer's office, if not exactly cordial with the unhappy junior, at all events remembered that they had agreed to "forget." Nor were Prescott and his chums priggish enough to take great credit to themselves for their behavior. They merely admitted among themselves that any fellow ought to have the show that was now accorded to the younger Ripley.

Baseball had gone off with an hurrah this season, though there had been an enormous amount of hard work behind all the successes.

Now, but one game remained. Out of fourteen played, so far, only one had resulted in a tie; the others had all been victories for Gridley.

With the warm June weather commencement was looming near. One Wednesday morning there was a long and tedious amount of practice over the singing that was to be offered at the close of the school year.

"Huh! I thought we'd never get through," snorted Prescott, as he raced out into the school yard. "And we were kept ten minutes over the usual time for recess."

"Gee, but it's hot to-day," muttered Tom Reade, fanning himself with his straw hat.

"Oh, what wouldn't I give, right now, for a good swim down at Foster's Pond!" muttered Purcell moodily.

"Well, why can't we have it?" suggested Gint.

"We couldn't get back by the time recess is over," replied Purcell.

"The end of recess would be when we did get back, wouldn't it!" asked a senior.

"Let's go, anyway!" urged another boy, restlessly.

As students were allowed to spend their recess quietly on the near-by streets, if they preferred, the girls generally deserted the yard.

The spirit of mischievous mutiny was getting loose among the young men. Nor will anyone who remembers his own school days wonder much at that. In June, when the end of the school year is all but at hand, restraints become trebly irksome.

Dick's own face was glowing. As much as any boy there he wanted a swim, just now, down in Foster's Pond. Oh, how he wanted it!

"See here, fellows," Prescott called to some of the nearest ones. "And you especially, Charley Grady, for you're studying to be a lawyer."

"What has a lawyer to do with the aching desire for a swim?" inquired Grady.

"Well, post us a bit," begged Dick. "What was it the great Burke had to say about punishing a community?"

"Why," responded Grady thoughtfully, "Burke laid down a theory that has since become a principle in law. It was to the effect that a community cannot be indicted."

"All of us fellows—-all of us might be called a community, don't you think?" queried Dick.

"Why—-er—-aha—-hem!" responded Grady.

"Oh, come, now, drop the extras," ordered Dick. "Time is short. Are we a community, in a sort of legal sense? Just plain yes or no."

"Well, then, yes!" decided Grady.

"Whoop!" ejaculated Dick, placing his straw hat back on his head and starting on a sprint out of the yard. His chums followed. Some of the fellows who were nearer the gate tried to reach it first. In an instant, the flight was general.

"Come on, Rip! You're not going to hang back on the crowd, are you?" uttered one boy, reproachfully. "Don't spoil the community idea."

So Fred Ripely tagged on at the rear of the flight.

"What is it, boys—-a fire?" called Laura Bentley. A dozen girls had drawn in, pressing against the wall, to let this whirlwind of boys go by.

"Tell you when we get back," Purcell called. "Time presses now."

It took the leaders only about four minutes to reach Foster's Pond. Even Ripley and the other tail-enders were on hand about a minute later. There was a fine grove here, fringed by thick bushes, and no houses near. In a jiffy the High School boys were disrobing.

"And the fellow who 'chaws' anyone else's clothes, to-day," proposed Dick, "is to be thrown in and kept in, when he's dressed!"

"Hear! hear!"

Dick was one of the first to get stripped. He started on a run, glided out over a log that lay from the bank, and plunged headlong into one of the deepest pools. Then up he came, spouting water.

"Come on, in, fellows! The water's grand!" he yelled.

Splash! splash! The surface of the pond at that point was churned white. The bobbing heads made one think of huckleberries bobbing on a bowl of milk.

Splash! splash! More were diving in. And now the fun and the frolic went swiftly to their height.

"This is the real thing!" vented one ecstatic swimmer. "Down with 'do-re—mi-fa-sol!"

"As long as we're all to be hanged together, what say if we don't go back at all to-day?" questioned Purcell.

There were some affirmative shouts, but Dick, who had just stepped back on the bank for a moment shook his head.

"Don't be hogs, fellows!" he urged. "Don't run a good thing into the ground. We'll have our swim, get well cooled off—-and then we'd better go back looking as penitent as the circumstances seem to call for."

"I guess it's the wise one talking," nodded Purcell, as he climbed to the bank preparatory to another dive.

For at least twenty minutes the High School boys remained at their delightful sport. Then cries started here and there:

"All out! All out!"

Reluctantly the youngsters began to leave the water.

"Now, don't let anyone lag," begged Purcell. "As we ran away together, we ought all to go back together."

So dressing went on apace. Then the fellows began to look at each other, wonderingly. To be sure, they didn't stand so much in personal awe of the principal. But then Mr. Cantwell had the Board of Education behind him. There was Superintendent Eldridge, also, and back of it all, what parents might—-oh, hang it, it began to look just a bit serious now.

"Who are the heroes here?" called out one fellow.

"Why?" demanded another.

"Well, we need our assured brave ones to lead going back."

"That's where the baseball squad comes in, then," nodded Purcell. "School nine and subs first, second team following. Then let the chilly-footed ones bring up the rear."

"We can go back in column of fours," proposed Dick, as he fastened on his collar, "with no leaders or file-closers. Then it will be hard to guess at any ring-leaders."

"That's the best idea yet," agreed Purcell. "Then, fellows, a block from the school, let the baseball squad form first, and then all of the rest of you fall in behind in column of fours, just as you happen along."

"And keep good ranks, and march the best you know how," urged Dick. "Unyielding ranks may suggest the community idea to Prin."

"Then we won't have to explain it," laughed Grady.

"Oh, come, now," shouted another, "don't flatter yourselves that we're going to get out of some tall explaining."

A block from the school the order was given to form fours. This was quickly done. Purcell, Dick, Darrin and Dan Dalzell composed the first four as the line turned into the yard.

There at the main doorway the culprits beheld the principal. And that gentlemen certainly looked almost angry about something. The weather indications were for squalls in the High School.

"Go to your seats in the assembly room," said the principal, coldly, as the head of the line neared him. As the boys wore no overcoats it was not necessary to file down to the locker rooms first. They marched into the hat room just off of the assembly room. And here they found Mr. Drake on duty.

"No conversation here. Go directly to your seats," ordered Mr. Drake.

The few girls who were not at classes looked up with eyes full of mischievous inquiry when the boys entered the big room. The principal and Mr. Drake took their seats on the platform. The late swimmers reached for their books, though most of them made but a pretense of study. Almost at once there was another diversion made by the girls who were returning from recitations.

Then the bell was struck for the beginning of the next period. Out filed the sections. The boys began to feel that this ominous quiet boded them no good. Not until closing time did the principal make any reference to the affair.

"The young ladies are dismissed for the day," he remarked. "The young gentlemen will remain." Clang!

Then a dead silence fell over the room. It was broken, after a minute, by the principal, who asked:

"Where were you, young gentlemen, when the end of recess bell rang this morning!"

No one being addressed, no one answered.

"Where were you, Mr. Purcell?"

"Swimming at Foster's Pond, sir."

"All of you?"

"All of us, sir, I think."

"Whose idea was it?"

"As I remember, sir, the idea belonged to us all."

"Who made the first proposal?"

"That would be impossible to say, now, sir."

"Do you remember anything about it?"

"Yes, sir."

"What was it?"

"I believe the fellows voted that Mr. Grady, who is studying to be a lawyer, should represent us as counsel."

"Ah! I shall be very glad, then, to hear from Judge Grady," the principal dryly remarked.

"Judge" Grady bobbed up, smiling and confident—-or he seemed so. As for the rest of the fellows, the principal's frigid coolness was beginning to get on their nerves.

"Mr. Principal," began Grady, thrusting his right band in between his vest buttons, "the illustrious, perhaps immortal Burke, once elucidated a principle that has since become historic, authoritative and illuminating. Among American and English jurists alike, Burke's principle has been accepted as akin to the organic law and the idea is that a community cannot be indicted."

It was a fine speech, for Grady had real genius in him, and this was the first chance he had ever had. The principal waited until the budding legal light had finished. Then Mr. Cantwell cleared his throat, to reply crisply:

"While I will not venture to gainsay Burke, and he is not here to be cross-examined, I will say that the indictment of the community, in this instance, would mean the expulsion of all the young men in the High School. To that form of sentence I do not lean. A light form of punishment would be to prohibit absolutely the final baseball game of the school season. A sever form would be to withhold the diplomas of the young men of the graduating senior class. I think it likely that both forms of punishment will be administered, but I shall not announce my decision to-day. It will come later. The young men are dismissed." Clang!

Dismay would have been a mild name for what the fellows felt when they found themselves outside the building. Of the principal, in a rage they were little afraid. But when the principal controlled his temper he was a man in authority and of dangerous power.

After his own meal, and some scowling reflection, Mr. Cantwell set out to find his friend and backer in the Board of Education, Mr. Gadsby. That custodian of local education heard Mr. Cantwell through, after which he replied:

"Er—-um——ah—-my dear Cantwell, you can't very well prohibit the game, or talk of withholding diplomas from the young men of the graduating class. Either course would make you tremendously unpopular. The people of Gridley would say that you were lacking in—-era sense of humor."

"Sense of humor?" raged the principal, getting up and pacing the floor. "Is it humorous to have a lot of young rascals running all over one's authority?"

"Certainly not," responded Mr. Gadsby. "You should—-er—-preserve discipline."

"How am I to preserve discipline, if I can't inflict punishments?" insisted Mr. Cantwell.

"But you should—-er—-that is—-my dear Cantwell, you should make the punishments merely fit the crimes."

"In such an outrageous case as to-day's," fumed the principal, "what course would have been taken by the Dr. Thornton whom you are so fond of holding up to me as a man who knew how to handle boys?"

"Dr. Thornton," responded Mr. Gadsby, "would have been ingenious in his punishment. How long were the boys out, over recess time?"

"Twenty-five minutes."

"Then," returned Mr. Gadsby, "I can quite see Dr. Thorton informing the young men that they would be expected to remain at least five times as long after school as they had been improperly away from it. That is—-er—-ah—-he would have sent for his own dinner, and would have eaten it at his desk, with scores of hungry young men looking on while their own dinners went cold. At three o'clock—-perhaps—-Dr. Thornton would have dismissed the offenders. It would be many a day before the boys would try anything of that sort again on good old Thornton. But you, my dear Cantwell, I am afraid you have failed to make the boys respect you at all times. The power of enforcing respect is the basis of all discipline."

"Then what shall I do with the young men this time?"

"Since you have—-er—-missed your opportunity, you—-er—-can do nothing, now, but let it pass. Let them imagine, from day to day, that sentence is still suspended and hovering over them."

Wily Dick Prescott had been to see Mr. Gadsby, just before the arrival of the principal. In his other capacity of reporter for "The Blade" the High School pitcher had said a few earnest words to his host. Mr. Gadsby, with his eye turned ever toward election day and the press, had been wholly willing to listen.



CHAPTER XXIII

THE AGONY OF THE LAST BIG GAME

"Ya, ya, ya! Ye gotter do somethings!"

This from Mr. Schimmelpodt. That gentleman was waving one of his short, fat arms wildly. It may as well be stated that from the smaller extremity of that arm, namely, his hand—-a small crimson and gold banner attached to a stick cut circles in the air.

"Go to it, Gridley!"

"Get busy! You can't take a black eye at this end of the season."

Gridley High School with a season's record of one tied game and a long tally of victories, seemed now in dire straits.

Sides were changing for the last half of the ninth inning.

Gridley had taken seven runs. Wayland High School, with six runs already to their credit, was now going to bat for the last inning unless the score should be tied.

The perfect June day, just before commencement, had brought out a host. Wayland had sent nearly four hundred people. The total attendance was past four thousand paid admissions.

Herr Schimmelpodt, who, since his first enthusiasm, had not missed a game, was now among the most concerned.

The band was there, but silent. The leader knew that, in this state of affairs the spectators wanted to make the noise themselves.

"Oh, you Dick!"

"Strike 'em out as fast as they come up."

"Save Gridley!"

"Aw, let somebody have a game," roared a voice from the Wayland seats, "and we need this one!"

"Prescott, remember the record!"

"No defeats this year!"

"Don't give us one, now!"

Dick & Co. were in full force on the nine today. True, Dave Darrin sat only on the sub bench to-day, but he was ready to give relief at any moment if Gridley's beloved pitcher, Prescott, went under.

Holmes was out in left field; Hazelton was the nimble shortstop; Dalzell pranced at the first bag on the diamond; Tom Reade was eternally vigilant on second base.

Gridley's High School girls, devoted feminine fans as any in the world, were breathing soft and fast now. If only Dick, backed at need by the outfield, could keep Wayland from scoring further, then all was well. If Wayland should score even once in this inning, it would make a tie and call for a tenth inning. If Wayland scored twice—-but that was too nerve-racking to contemplate.

Then a hush fell. The umpire had called for play.

Dick let drive with his most tantalizing spitball. The leather fell down gracefully under the Wayland's batsman's guess, and Purcell mitted the ball.

"Strike one!"

A hopeful cheer went up from Gridley seats, to be met with one word from Wayland fans:

"Wait!"

Dick served the second ball. Swat! There it went, arching up in the air, a fair hit. As fast as he could leg it went Holmes after it, and with good judgment. But the ball got there before Greg did. In a twinkling, the young left fielder had the ball up and in motion. Tom Reade caught it deftly at second, and wheeled toward first. But the runner saw his error in leaving first, and slid back in season.

Turning back, with his lips close together, Dick tried a new batsman. Two strikes, and then the visitor sent out a little pop-over that touched ground and rolled ere Harry Hazelton could race in and get it, driving it on to first base.

"Safe at first," called the umpire, and the other Waylander had reached second.

"O-o-o-h!"

"Don't let 'em have it, Dick—-don't!"

The wail that reached his ears was pathetic, but Prescott paid no heed. He was always all but deaf to remarks from the spectators. He knew what he was trying to do, and he was coming as close as a hard-worked pitcher could get to that idea at the fag-end of the game.

The fatigue germ was hard at work in the young pitcher's wrist, but Dick nerved himself for better efforts. Despite him, however, a third batsman got away from him, and from Greg, and now the bases were full.

"O-o-oh, Dick!"

It was a wail, full of despair. Though he paid no direct heed to it the sorely pressed young pitcher put up his left hand to wipe the old sweat out of his eyes. His heart was pounding with the strain of it. Dick Prescott, born soldier, would have died for victory, just then. At least, that was what he felt.

The Wayland man who now stood over the plate looked like a grinning monkey as he took the pitcher's measure.

"Go to it, Dickson—-kill the ball!" roared the visiting fans. "Just a little two-bagger—-that's all!"

Dick felt something fluttering inside. In himself he felt the whole Gridley honor and fame revolving during that moment. Then he resolutely choked down the feeling. The umpire was signaling impatiently for him to deliver.

Dick essayed a jump ball. With a broadening grin Dickson of Wayland reached for it vigorously. He struck it, but feebly. Another of those short-winded, high-arched pops went up in air.

There was no hope or chance for Hazelton to get to the spot in time—-and Wayland's man away from third was steaming in while Purcell made the home plate at a bound.

Dick raced—-raced for all he was worth, though his heart felt as if steam had shut down.

Across the grass raced Prescott, as though he believed he could make history in fifths of seconds.

In his speed he went too far. The ball was due to come down behind him.

There was no time to think. Running at full speed as he was, Pitcher Dick rose in the air. It looked like an incredible leap—-but he made it. His hands pulled the slow-moving popball down out of the air.

Barely did Dick's feet touch the ground when he simply reached over and dropped the ball at Purcell.

The captain of the Gridley nine dropped to one knee, hands low, but he took the leather in—-took it just the bare part of a second before the Waylander from third got there.

For an instant the dazed crowd held its breath just long enough to hear the umpire announce.

"Striker out! Out at home plate. Two out!"

Then the tumult broke loose.

For an instant or two Dick stood dizzy just where he had landed on his feet.

Umpire Davidson came bounding over.

"Do you want to call for a relief pitcher, Prescott?"

"No—-Wayland pitched all through with one man!"

Back to the box marched Dick Prescott, but he took his time about it. He had need of a clear head and steadier nerves and muscles, for Wayland had a man again at third, and another dancing away from second. There was plenty of chance yet to lose.

"Prescott ought to call you out," whispered Fred Ripley to Dave.

"And I'd get out there on the dead run, just as you would, Rip. But you know how Dick feels. Wayland went through on one man, and Dick's going to do it if he lives through the next few minutes!"

While that momentary dizziness lasted, something happened that caused the young pitcher to flush with humiliation. Sandwiched in between two strikes were called balls enough to send the new batsman to first, and again the bases were full. One more "bad break" of this kind and Wayland would receive the tie run as a present. And then one more—-it would be the High School pitcher handing the only lost game of the season as a gift to the visitors!

Dick braced himself supremely for the next man at bat.

"Strike one!"

It wasn't the batter's fault. A very imp had sat on the spitball that Prescott bowled in.

"Strike two!"

The batsman was sweating nervously, but he couldn't help it. Dick Prescott had fairly forced himself into the form of the first inning. But it couldn't last.

Gink! It was only a little crack at the ball, struck rather downward. A grounding ball struck the grit and rolled out toward right infield. There was no shortstop here. The instant that Prescott took in the direction he was on the run. There was no time to get there ahead of the rolling leather. It was Dick's left foot that stopped it, but in the same fraction of a second he bent and swooped it up—-wheeled.

Wayland's man from third base looked three fourths of the way in. Captain Purcell, half frantic, was doubled up at the home plate.

Into that throw Dick put all the steam he had left in. The leather gone from his hand, he waited. His heart seemed to stop.

To half the eyes that looked on, ball and runner seemed to reach the home plate at the same instant. The umpire, crouching, squinting, had the best view of all.

It was an age before Dick, with the mists before his eyes, heard the faraway words for which thousands waited breathlessly:

"Out at home—-three out!"

Three disheartened base runners turned and slouched dispiritedly toward the dressing rooms.

"You could have hit that ball a better swipe," growled Wayland's captain to the last man at bat. The victim of the rebuke didn't answer. He knew that he had faced a pitcher wholly rejuvenated by sheer grit and nerve force.

At its loudest the band was blaring forth "At the Old Ball Game," and thousands were following with the words. Wayland fans were strolling away in dejection, but Gridley folks stood up to watch and cheer.

The whole nine had done its duty in fine shape, but Dick Prescott had made himself the idol of the Gridley diamond.

When the band stopped, the cheers welled forth. The lion's share was for Prescott, but Darrin was not forgotten. Even Ripley, who had pitched three of the minor games, came in for some notice.

Dick?

With the strain and suspense gone he felt limp and weak for a few minutes. Under the cold shower he revived somewhat. Yet, when he started homeward, he found that he ached all over. With the last game of the season gone by, Dick half imagined that his right wrist was a huge boil.

At the gateway Schimmelpodt, that true devotee of sport, waited. As the young High School pitcher came forth Herr Schimmelpodt rested a fat hand on the boy's shoulder, whispering in his ear:

"Ach! But I know vere is dere a real jointed fishpole. It was two dollar, but now it stands itself by, marked to one-nineteen. In der morning, Bresgott, it shall be yours. Und listen!"

Dick looked up into the blinking eyes.

"Dot fishpole for der summer use is goot fine! Und venever you see me going by bis my vagon, don't you be slow to holler und ask me for a ride!"



CHAPTER XXIV

CONCLUSION

Commencement Day!

For a large percentage of High School boys and girls, the end of the sophomore year marks the end of their schooling.

This was true at Gridley as elsewhere. When the crowd came forth from commencement exercises at the Opera House on this bright, warm June afternoon, there were not a few of the sophomores who were saying good-bye to the classic halls of instruction.

Not so, however, with Dick & Co. They were bound all the way through the course, and hoped to take up with college or other academic training when once good old Gridley High School must be left behind.

"What are you going to do this summer, Prescott?" asked Dr. Bentley, gripping the lad's arm, as Dick stood on the sidewalk chatting with Dave Darrin.

"Work, mostly, doctor. I'm getting near the age when fellow should try to bear some of the expense of keeping himself."

"What will you work at?"

"Why, reporting for 'The Blade.' I believe I can capture a good many stray dollars this summer."

"Good enough," murmured Dr. Bentley, approvingly. "But are you going to have any spare time?"

"A little, I hope—-just about enough for some rest."

"Then I'll tell you where you can take that rest," went on the medical man. "My family are going into camp for the summer, in three days. They'll be over at the lake range, on a piece of ground that I've bought there. You can get over once in a while, and spend a night or two, can't you? Mrs. Bentley charged me to ask you and Darrin," added the physician. "Belle Meade is going to spend the summer in camp with Laura."

Both boys were prompt with their thanks.

"Confound it," muttered Dr. Bentley, "I'm forgetting two thirds of my message at that. The invitation includes all of Dick & Co. Now remember you'll all be looked for from time to time, and most heartily welcome."

Both boys were most hearty in their thanks. This took care of whatever spare time they might have, for Dave, too, was to be busy a good deal of the time. He had work as an extra clerk at the express office.

Then the two girl chums came along. Dick and Dave strolled along with Laura and Belle. The other partners of Dick & Co. were soon to be seen, their narrow-brimmed straw hats close to bobbing picture hats.

"Your father gave us a message, Laura," Dick murmured to the girl beside him.

"And you're going to accept it?" asked the girl quickly.

"At any chance to be honestly away from work," Dick promised fervently. "Yet at my age a fellow must keep something of an eye toward business, too, Laura."

"Yes," she answered slowly, glancing covertly at the bronzed young face and the strong, lithe body. "You're nearing manhood, Dick."

"Just about as rapidly as you're growing into womanhood, Laura," answered the boy.

Dave and Belle were chatting, too, but what they said wouldn't interest very staid old people.

Gridley was prouder than ever of its athletic teams. The great record in baseball, with Dick & Co. in the team, was something worth talking about.

Lest there be some who may think that a season of baseball with no defeats is an all but impossible record, the chronicler hastens to add that there are, through the length and breadth of these United States, several High School teams every year that make such a showing.

Yet, in baseball, as in everything else, the record is reached only by nines like the Gridley crowd, where the stiffest training, the best coaches and the best individual nerve and grit among the players are to be found.

Did Fred Ripley truly make good?

What else happened?

These and various other burning questions must now be answered in the chronicle of the time to which they belonged. So the reader is referred to the next volume in this series, which is to be published at once under the caption: "The High School Left End; Or, Dick & Co. Grilling on the Football Gridiron."

At the same time, no interested reader will allow himself to overlook the second volume in the "High School Boys' Vacation Series," which runs parallel with this present series. All the wonderful summer vacation adventures that followed the sophomore year of Prescott and his chums will be found in the volume published under the title, "The High School Boys' In Summer Camp; Or, The Dick Prescott Six Training for the Gridley Eleven." It is a thrilling story that no follower of the fortunes of these lads can afford to overlook.

THE END