Mr. Bates’ reply to Dick’s letter was contained in his regular weekly epistle and was decidedly non-committal. He appeared to accept Dick’s statements as to the latter’s studiousness and progress but made little comment. Only, a mail later than the letter, came two copies of the Leonardville daily, each with a paragraph circled in red ink. Seeing them, Dick sighed and shook his head even before he read them. Thursday’s paper held the following under the caption “High School Jottings”:

Dick shuddered over that and took up the second paper. “Leonardville is Proud of Him,” he read. “Richard Corliss Bates, the younger son of our prominent citizen and successful merchant, Mr. Henry L. Bates, of Euclid Boulevard, is a fine example of the coming citizens of Leonardville. Young Bates is well and favourably known to a wide circle of friends in this city who will be pleased to learn of his success in the various branches of his career at Parkinson School, Warne, Mass., of which famous institution of learning he became a student in September last. While attending the local High School Richard Bates was unusually popular, both for his personal traits and for the brilliancy displayed by him in athletics. As a football player he was easily supreme in this part of the State and his prowess was recognised widely. A number of schools and colleges sought his services but young Bates chose the school which his brother, Stuart Bates, now of Philadelphia, attended. There, in the short space of two months, Richard has already made his presence felt and is in a fair way to attain renown both for scholastic attainments and athletic supremacy. He entered into competition at the beginning of the school year for the position of quarter-back on the School Football Team, an honor for which there were dozens of contenders, and now holds the place of first substitute, with every indication of becoming the regular incumbent of the position before the football season ends. He has also recently been elected to membership in one of the school’s most exclusive organizations, the Banjo and Mandolin Club, to which, because of a rare musical talent, he will doubtless prove a valuable addition. In his classes Richard stands high. There is, we understand, talk amongst his friends in the High School of organising a party to go to Warne on the occasion of the Parkinson-Kenwood football game, which is held the Saturday before Thanksgiving, to see him play and to do honour to one who is so pleasingly upholding the traditions of Leonardville young manhood. His career will be watched with sympathetic interest by a host of well-wishers in our fair city.”

Having completed the reading of that, Dick not only shuddered again but groaned loudly, so loudly that Stanley, at the table, looked up from his studies and viewed him with alarm.

“What’s the matter?” asked Stanley.

“It’s that rotten paper again,” moaned Dick, casting the offending sheet to the floor and turning a disheartened gaze to the window. Stanley smiled, pulled the paper toward him dexterously with one foot, rescued it and read. And as he read he chuckled, and Dick, seeing what was happening, made a dash to wrest the paper away.

“No, get out of here! Let me read it, you simp!” Stanley fended Dick off with feet and one hand. “Everybody else has,” he laughed, “so why shouldn’t I?”

Dick scowled, shrugged, thrust his hands into his pockets and subsided on the window-seat. “Go ahead then,” he muttered. “But if you laugh I’ll kill you!”

So Stanley put the paper between them and made no sound, although certain twitchings of his hands aroused the other’s suspicions. When he was through Stanley lowered the paper from in front of a very serious countenance.

“Well?” said Dick morosely. “Say it, you chump!”

“Why, I—well, of course, Dickie, it’s a bit—a bit fulsome, you know, but I can’t see anything in it to be mad about.”

“You can’t, eh? Well, I can! What do you suppose dad thinks when he reads that sort of piffle? No wonder he wasn’t more—more cordial in his letter!”

“But the paper says a lot of very nice things about you, Dick,” protested Stanley. “That about the exclusive Banjo and Mando——”

“Oh, shut up!” growled Dick. “They make me sick.”

“And I’m sure,” pursued the other gravely, “any fellow would be flattered at having his friends come all the way from Pennsylvania to see him play in the big game.”

“Huh! That’s only guff, thank goodness! Gee, if that happened——”

“But this paper says it’s likely to happen,” Stanley objected. “If it was me, I’d be pleased purple!”

“Yes, you would!” jeered Dick. “Someone’s been filling that newspaper chap with a lot of hot air. That’s the sort of stuff they print about anyone that—that does anything; like moving away or dying or—or getting married. It doesn’t mean anything, but the trouble is that dad has seen it and I’ll bet he believed it.”

“Why not? Besides, it says here ‘In his classes Richard stands high.’ That ought to please him, anyway!”

“I’d like to know what they know about my classes. The whole thing’s sickening.”

“Oh, I don’t know,” murmured Stanley judicially, casting his eyes down the column again. “Say, you never told me that ‘a number of schools and colleges’ were after you, old man. That’s hot stuff! You’ve been hiding your bush under a lightning.”

“Well, they really were, Stan, but I didn’t brag of it. Not here, anyway. I did show the letters to Blash one time when he was here, just as a sort of joke. But I don’t see how the paper got hold of it. I suppose Sumner White blabbed.”

“Well, cheer up, Dickie. Folks may not think you wrote that yourself. There’s always that chance. Even if they do——”

“Stan! Does it—does it sound as if I’d—I’d done it?”

“N-no, only the election to the Banjo——”

“The High School Argus got that from The Leader, you idiot! I suppose the guy that wrote all this drivel found it in the Argus and just—just dilated on it.”

“Dilated is good,” chuckled Stanley. “Whoever he is, I’d say he delights to dilate. Well, cut it out and paste it in your scrap-book, Dick. It’ll interest your grandchildren some day.”

“Yes, I will!” declared Dick venomously. He seized the paper and tore it into shreds and then cast it from him into the general direction of the waste-basket. “Like fun!”

“When—er—that is, how many do you think there’ll be in the party, Dick?” asked Stanley innocently.

“What party?” Dick scowled his puzzlement.

“Why, the party that’s coming on to see you——”

But he didn’t finish, for Dick was on him like a whirlwind, the chair went over backward—Stanley accompanying it—and there was a rough time in Number 14 for the ensuing four minutes. At the end of that time Dick sat astride Stanley’s chest and demanded apologies, and Stanley, weak from laughing, gave in. “Just the same,” he added, wiping his eyes as he scrambled to his feet again, “just the same, Dick, I think you ought to make some sort of plans for their entertainment—All right! All right! I won’t open my mouth again! I was just thinking——”

“Don’t think!” ordered Dick sternly. “Sit down there and help me write a letter to that editor man that’ll blister his hide and make him let me alone after this! Come on now. How would you begin it?”

In the end it turned out to be a very brief and very formal and extremely polite epistle which thanked the Leonardville Sentinel for its interest but requested that hereafter Mr. Richard Bates’s name be excluded from its columns since Mr. Richard Bates disliked publicity.

“Great stuff!” commented Stanley when Dick had read over the final draft. “Sounds so fine and modest. Hadn’t you better enclose a check for that write-up, though? You don’t want him to think——”

Stanley, however, was now looking into the muzzle of a paper-weight, so to speak, and his words dwindled to silence. Dick, cowing him further with a sustained glare, replaced the paper-weight and directed an envelope. When the letter was sealed and stamped Dick again fixed his companion with a ferocious and intimidating look. “You keep quiet about this, Stan,” he said, “or I’ll bust you all up into a total loss! Understand?” Stanley nodded.

“Well, say so then!”

“Dick, you have my sacred word of honour that never so long as I do live will I so much as breathe a single syllabub of this thing save that I do have your permission to so do, though wild hearses drag my body asunder and——”

“Oh, shut up! But you remember! If I find you’ve told Blash or—or anyone I’ll lick you, Stan!”

“I hear and I obey in fear and trembling,” responded Stanley humbly. “Least of all will I ever divulge a word to that exclusive organization, the Banjo and Mandolin Club, Dick! And if you want any assistance in entertaining——”

Stanley beat the paper-weight to the door by one fifth of a second, establishing what was undoubtedly a record over the course!

Dick mailed the letter to the editor of the Sentinel and tried to dismiss the annoying affair from memory. In this effort he was well aided by Coach Driscoll, for the coach didn’t allow him much time that week for vain regretting. Dick and Stone were alternated in practice every day and none could have said with any degree of certainty that either was the favourite. Cardin was quite evidently relegated to third place, in token of which he drove B Squad around the field in signal drill while Dick and Gus Stone confined their attentions to A. The Second Team was licked to a frazzle on Tuesday in a thirty-minute session, was held scoreless on Wednesday, although given the ball eight times on the First’s ten-yard-line, and was again decisively beaten Thursday. On Friday the First Team went through signals and did some punting and catching and then were sent back to the showers. But work was no longer over when twilight fell these days, for there was an hour of black-board talk in the gymnasium Trophy Room after supper each night. There, with the squad seated on some old yellow settees dragged in from the balcony, Coach Driscoll, with chalk and eraser and pointing finger, explained and questioned. On Friday night Mr. Driscoll talked defence against shifts, first chalking his diagram on the black surface beside him.

“Chancellor uses several forms of shift plays,” he began. “For a punt she uses a tackle-over. You know how to meet that, I think, but we’ll go over it again to refresh your memories. When you see the opponent shifting a tackle to either side you must yourselves shift a full space in that direction. I’m speaking to the five centre men now. Suppose Chancellor calls for ‘tackle-over left.’ Centre, guards and tackles move a space to the left. That brings centre opposite the opposing right guard and left guard opposite the opposing right tackle, as shown on the board. Our left tackle is out here opposite their right end, our left end still further out where he can dash around to spoil the kick—if he’s smart enough! Right end stays well out and a little back of the line, and it’s his duty to spot fakes and give the news the moment he does it. If a forward-pass develops on his side his place is under the ball. Right half-back plays about three yards back, between his guard and tackle. Full-back occupies a similar position on the other side, ready to go in or out, as play develops. He and left tackle must look after the opposing tackle and end. Behind him, more to the right and well back, is the left half. The quarter, of course, is up the field. Chancellor will almost always punt from that formation, but she may fake, and it is those fakes you must watch out for. Full-back must be especially alive. He must watch the enemy’s back-field and her right end too. If the latter goes out to receive a pass he must get to him promptly and block him. On the other hand, if a punt comes, as it is likely to nine times in ten, this defence puts three men where they ought to be able to sift through in time to hurry the punter if not to actually block the kick. And if you can hurry the punter, in Chancellor’s case her left half-back, you are doing something. For ‘tackle-over right’ you merely reverse this diagram. Chancellor will sometimes punt from ordinary formation to fool you, but not often, for her punter likes plenty of room. Now, fellows, are there any questions? Let’s have this perfectly understood, for it’s a formation you’ll have to use often tomorrow.”

Sometimes they adjourned to the gymnasium floor and lined up and then walked through the evolutions of some play not clearly understandable in the Trophy Room. After these evening sÉances Dick, for one, was likely to have much difficulty in getting to sleep, his mind being a weird confusion of plays and signals.