Frank’s face was very pale, but in his eyes still burned the strange fire that had startled and quelled Starbright. He straightened up and stood looking down steadily at Dick, for some moments remaining silent. At last he said:

“Are you sure you have not been drinking?”

“Dead sure of it,” asserted the freshman quickly. “I known what I saw and heard, Merriwell. Now, what do you think?”

He seemed to fancy Merry must cave in, but Frank quietly said:

“Just what I thought before.”

“Why, she——”

“She is perfectly square and upright. She has deceived nobody. She never deceived me in all her life, and I refuse to believe any wrong of her. I have perfect and absolute confidence in Inza Burrage.”

Again Starbright inwardly exclaimed:

“You love her—you love her! If you did not, you would not have such perfect confidence in her. Perfect love gives perfect confidence. You cannot fool me, Merriwell.”

Frank turned and paced the floor slowly, seemingly buried in deep thought.

“Walter?” he muttered, as if asking himself a question. And then over and over he repeated, “Walter, Walter?”

“That was the name,” said Dick. “And he was a tall, handsome fellow, with dark hair and eyes. He looked as if he had been much exposed to the weather, for his face was brown. Who is he, Merriwell? Who does she know by the name of Walter?”

Frank shook his head.

“I can’t say,” he confessed.

“Then it is somebody of whom she has never told you,” said Dick, as if this aided in proving her deceit. “Why didn’t she tell you about him if you were such firm friends?”

“I don’t know.”

The freshman half-fancied Merriwell was weakening.

“What if you had seen what I saw?” he cried. “Would you not have doubted?”

“No!” said Frank instantly. “Nothing could make me doubt Inza!”

Starbright fell back, breathing heavily.

“She has fooled him completely!” he whispered. “It is my duty to open his eyes, for he loves her. And I—she can never be the same to me again!”

“Why didn’t you speak to them?” asked Frank, having paused to face Dick. “Why didn’t you make yourself known?”

“I couldn’t.”

“Couldn’t?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“I was too thunderstruck to do anything. When they left the station arm in arm, I followed slowly, and saw them get into the cab. As the cab started off I sprang forward, but it was too late.”

“Well, you may depend on it,” said Frank, “that Inza can explain everything.”

“You do not doubt her now?”

“Not the least, for I know her.”

“You must know where she is stopping. It will be easy to find out if she can explain.”

“But I do not know where she is stopping. I cannot spend the time just now to tell you everything that happened after you left for New Haven, but it became necessary for her and her father to leave the hotel in Brooklyn and go out on Long Island. They did so, but returned very soon. Day before yesterday I went over to see them, but found they had left Brooklyn once more, and I did not learn whither they had gone. So, you see, I do not know where to find Inza.”

“Nor do I.”

“Then it is plain that we will have to let the matter rest a while. You will say nothing about it to any one, Starbright?”

“Little danger of that.”

“You will let liquor alone?”

“I will.”

“I am certain that everything will be cleared up in time, and Inza must never know how you doubted her. I would not have her know it for worlds, for she likes you, Dick, and it would hurt her more than you can dream.”

Starbright felt rebuked, but Merriwell’s words did not alter his conviction that Inza was fickle, and had deceived them both.

Only a short time before Dick had been played with and thrown over by Rosalind Thornton. Before that time he was a big-hearted, trusting boy; but his treatment in that case had awakened his suspicions and shattered his absolute and unswerving faith in all girls. Now he fancied he knew them very well, and his knowledge was not of the kind to lead him to trust them.

Despite his physical perfections, despite his wonderful feats of strength and skill, Starbright was still a very callow youth, greatly given to sudden impressions, and there was much for him to learn before he could develop into a steady, level-headed man. He was to be taught by experience that it is always very foolish, and sometimes decidedly dangerous, to jump at conclusions without clue and careful investigation of all cases.

There was a step at the door, which swung open to admit Jack Diamond, who sauntered in, dressed in the swellest possible manner and carrying a cane.

“Hello!” exclaimed the Virginian, pausing. “Didn’t know you had a caller, Merriwell. Am I intruding?”

“Of course not,” said Frank. “You know Starbright, Jack.”

“Starbright—of course! Why, how are you, Starbright? Glad to see you, my boy.”

Jack shook hands heartily with Dick.

“I thought you were on the other side,” said the freshman, trying to appear cool and composed.

“That’s where I would be if I were not a fool,” declared Jack, forcing a short laugh.

Frank gave the Southerner a quick look, observing that Jack’s face was flushed and his eyes filled with a light of joy.

“What’s happened, old man?” asked Merry. “You look as if you had heard good news.”

“So I have.”

“Mind telling?”

“I guess not. I made an ass of myself, Merriwell, and I’ve just found it out. To-day I received a letter from Juliet.”

“Really?”

“Yes; here it is.”

Diamond triumphantly drew it from a pocket near his heart.

“I’ll not let you read it,” he said, laughing, “for I think any man a cad who permits his friends to peruse his love-letters.”

“Then it is a love-letter?” cried Frank.

Jack nodded happily.

“Decidedly so!” he said. “In it Juliet has shown me what a great big chump I am. The man was her cousin, whom she had not seen for some time, as he had been in India. She was offended by my manner and words, and would not explain. That’s spirit for you, Merry! By Jove, I like it! Isn’t she like Inza! When I continued to be a duffer she grew more and more angry, which was perfectly natural. She was determined to punish me by letting me think she meant never to speak to me again. But she did not think I would jump out of London in such a hurry, and she was appalled when she learned I had gone. Ha, ha!

“Well, she kept still just as long as she could, and then she wrote me this letter. She says she tried hard not to write it, and that she was determined to burn it after it was written; but she posted it instead of burning it, and now all the clouds are cleared away. I’ve just written a long reply, asking her forgiveness and begging permission to resume my suit. Gentlemen, I’m going back to London, and I’ll marry that girl just as soon as she’ll have me! I’m going to hurry up about it, too, before I make a fool of myself again and lose her for good.”

“Old man, I congratulate you!” cried Frank, as he grasped Jack’s hand. “But let this be a warning to you never again to entertain doubts of her without positive, absolute, and incontrovertible proof.”

As Merry said this he looked at Starbright, who flushed slightly and turned away.

Diamond was happy indeed. From the depths he had been lifted to the heights, and he felt that he was a very lucky fellow. He freely expressed himself to that effect.

“It’s more than I deserve,” he declared. “She would have treated me right if she’d refused ever again to have anything to do with me. I don’t know how I am going to set myself right in her eyes, and I shall feel guilty when I meet her. Merry, you must be the best man when we are married.”

“If it is possible, it will be a great pleasure,” smiled Frank.

“Oh, you’ll have to make it possible. But for you I’d never met her, you know. You have brought me all my good fortune, just the same as you bring good fortune to every one of your friends.”

Starbright had resumed his seat. There was a look of bitterness on his handsome, boyish face, but the happy Virginian did not observe it. Frank, however, could read Dick’s thoughts, and he knew the freshman had told himself that the Inza matter could not turn out after the manner of the misunderstanding between Jack and Juliet.

To Merry it seemed that this reconciliation between the Virginian and the English girl had happened at just the right time to serve as an object-lesson. Diamond had been foolishly jealous, had not trusted Juliet, and now he realized the full extent of his folly.

“Boys!” cried Jack, “I’ll blow you to dinner to-night! Why, I want to do something to make others happy, I am so happy myself! Where’ll we go—Del’s?”

Starbright shook his head.

“I can’t go,” he said. “I’m in training, you know, and it won’t do.”

“Training!” cried Diamond. “What, this early? Yes, I remember. But how happens it you are here?”

Dick did not feel like making an explanation just then.

“Business—er—business, you know,” he faltered.

“Well, a square feed will do you good, now that you are away from the training-table. Oh, that training-table! It gives every man a great appetite.”

But Starbright had no appetite.

“We’ll let you blow us at another time, Jack,” smiled Frank. “I don’t feel like stuffing myself to-night.”

“You never feel like stuffing yourself,” said the Virginian resentfully. “Ever since I can remember, you have been eating coarse bread, dodging pastry, eschewing pork and veal, and living like a dyspeptic.”

“With the result that I am as little like a dyspeptic as a man can possibly be. I eat coarse bread because there is little nutriment in white bread—all the important food-elements having been removed with the bran. The man who bolts his food is digging his own grave.”

“Hear, hear!” cried Diamond. “A lecture on diet by the great expert, Frank Merriwell! Look at him! Behold him! He is a perfect man, and all because he never ate improper food. Go thou and do likewise.”

Frank laughed a little.

“You are putting it pretty strong,” he said. “Merely eating the proper food will not make any man an athlete or give him perfect health. He must conform to other rules and regulations; he must take proper exercise, and he must not disregard the natural laws of health. A fellow who fancies he can indulge in excesses and retain his health is fooling himself in the worst way.”

“My dear fellow,” smiled Jack, “down in my country we are hospitable. We fling open our doors and invite our friends. Tables are loaded with the fat of the land, and every guest is supposed to take hold and eat his fill. You would find yourself out of order down there, with your rules and regulations.”

“Not at all. I should eat with the others, but I’d take care to eat slowly and not overload myself. That’s all. I have no use for cranks, but a man may stick to what he knows is right, and avoid what he knows is wrong, without giving anybody the right to dub him a crank.”

“Oh, I suppose that’s so, Merry. We all know you’re all right. But not every fellow can take care of himself and build himself up as you have done, though I reckon you were cut out for an athlete at the start.”

“That’s where you suppose wrong. I was a weak boy, with poor health and an imperfect body. When I realized that such was the case, I set about trying to find out what to do to build myself up. It was slow work at first, for sometimes I went wrong. Even after I got on the right track my progress was so slow that it was disheartening. Sometimes I fancied I was not advancing at all; but I stuck to it and won out in the end.”

“Well, we’re willing to give you all the credit you deserve,” said Jack; “but when a fellow has a stomach like an ostrich, what’s the use of dieting? When one can eat any old thing without having it hurt him, why should he deprive himself of the things he likes, and settle down on a coarse-food diet?”

“When a chap is growing, he demands more food than when he arrives at maturity, but that food should be of the nature best calculated to make a perfect man of him. I am certain that it would be a better thing for the boys of this country if they were aware of this.”

Starbright was paying little attention to Merry’s words, for his thoughts were all of a dark-eyed, beautiful girl whom he believed fickle and false.

Merriwell had seemed to welcome the opportunity to talk of something far removed from the subject of his conversation with the freshman. However, he noted the moody look on the unusually good-natured face of Dick, and he rattled on with his talk to prevent Diamond from observing and commenting.

“Why don’t you start out lecturing to the boys and young men of the country, Merry?” smiled Jack. “I know they would turn out in multitudes to hear you speak, and I think you might do much good.”

“Perhaps you are right,” acknowledged Frank. “A man might spend his time in a less profitable manner.”