A CHANGE OF MIND.
As soon as the boys reached Dolliver’s, they put Darrel to bed and sent
in a telephone call for the doctor. Mr. Bradlaugh was back in town,
and he brought the doctor out in his automobile. While an examination
was being made to see whether Darrel’s arm had suffered any from the
exciting events of the afternoon, Merriwell was out at the car, going
over all the details of the affair for Mr. Bradlaugh’s benefit.
Merry began at the beginning, and that means, of course, that he had
to start with the coyote dog and the dynamite cartridge. When he had
finished, the president of the Ophir Athletic Club was breathing a
little harder than usual.
“That’s a most remarkable story, Merriwell,” said he, “and the most
remarkable part of it, to my mind, is the way Hawtrey let that pesky
nephew of his make a fool of him. He’d call off the football game,
would he, just because Jode Lenning happened to get into a scrap with
you! Wonder if he thinks that’s good sportsmanship? I wish to thunder
he’d got me on the phone and told me about this himself. Say, maybe I
wouldn’t have read the riot act to him.”
“The colonel has woke up, Mr. Bradlaugh,” laughed Merry, “and I’ll bet
Jode’s about at the end of his string.”
“Let me know what Hawtrey says to you when he calls at the Wells this
evening,” said Mr. Bradlaugh. “I think he knows a whole lot more now
than he did earlier in the afternoon, but he’s a queer proposition, and
you never can tell what he’s going to do. If he’s still a bit offish,
I’ll make it a point to see him myself.”
“What do you think about the way we mixed things with Lenning on
account of the dog?”
“If you hadn’t mixed things with him,” laughed Mr. Bradlaugh, “you’d
have had a chance to mix things with me. Plain brutality to a dumb
brute,” he went on, straightening his face, “is more than I’ll take
from any man.”
The doctor reported that Darrel’s arm had not been injured materially
by the rough usage it had had during the afternoon, but the owner of
the arm was warned to stay in bed for several days and not to try any
horseback exercise until given permission to do so.
Darrel was in a more cheerful frame of mind, when Frank and his chums
left, than he had been in for many a long day. He had accomplished
something for himself, and he knew that he would accomplish more. Best
of all, he had saved the colonel.
It was late when Merriwell, Clancy, and Ballard got back to Tinaja
Wells. Handy and Brad were anxiously awaiting their arrival.
“The boys have got wind of something, Chip,” said Handy, “and they’re
all up in the air. I think we’d better break camp and go in to town.”
“I think so, too,” said Merry. “We ought to have a week’s work on the
home field before the game with Gold Hill.”
“Why,” spoke up Brad, “I thought that was all off.”
“So it was,” laughed Merriwell, “but I’ve got a hunch that it will be
on again before long.”
During supper he repeated for the Ophir lads the same account that he
had given to Mr. Bradlaugh at Dolliver’s. As might have been expected,
the recital was greeted with delight by all the campers, and the
demonstration wound up with a volley of cheers for Ellis Darrel.
It was quite fitting, perhaps, that Colonel Hawtrey should arrive at
Tinaja Wells during the cheering. As he strode through the half gloom
and into the light of the cook fire, he pulled off his hat and waved it
about his gray head.
“You’re cheering my nephew, Ellis Darrel,” he shouted, “and I reckon I
ought to be allowed to join in. Now that you’re done with Darrel, why
not give three rousers for Merriwell? Come on, boys, all together!”
With that, the cañon fairly rang with a hearty three times three and a
tiger. When silence finally settled over the camp, the colonel, still
keeping his hat in his hand and his place by the fire, made a brief
address to the Ophir fellows:
“I have come here this evening,” said he, “for the purpose of
apologizing to Merriwell. I misjudged him, and because of that
I crowded him pretty hard in a talk I had with him early in the
afternoon. He took it well, and didn’t pitch into me. I suppose,” and
the speaker laughed, “that he kept hands off on account of my gray
hairs.
“During our conversation, if I remember, I told Merriwell that there
would be no further competitions between the Gold Hill and the Ophir
athletic organizations, and I declared, in pretty strong terms, that
there’d be no football game next Thanksgiving Day. Well, I’ve changed
my mind about that. The two clubs are going to meet and mingle in all
the contests the games committees can arrange for. And we’re going to
act like true sportsmen, every one of us, just as the chip of the old
block has acted during his trouble on account of the coyote dog. ‘Fair
play and no favor,’ that’s the idea, and we’ll stand up to it as firmly
as Merriwell has done. I reckon that will be all.”
Clancy started the cheering for Colonel Hawtrey, and when it was done,
all the campers flocked around the colonel and shook him by the hand.
“It’s a great day for Ellis Darrel, Clan,” said Merry to his red-headed
chum.
“It’s a great day for everybody, Chip,” answered Clan, “and especially
for true sportsmanship between the clubs.”
“A great day for everybody,” qualified Billy Ballard, “except Jode
Lenning.”