MORE DISCOURAGEMENT.
It seemed as though everything was going wrong for Merriwell. As if
the poor showing of the regular eleven, after weeks of practice, was
not sufficiently discouraging, this loss of the thirty dollars had to
happen by way of heaping up the measure.
While Frank was getting his shower and his rub-down, his thoughts were
about equally divided between the ragged work of the players and the
mysterious disappearance of the money.
So far as the football team was concerned, two weeks yet remained
before the game with Gold Hill, and the young coach grimly resolved
that at least ten days of the fourteen should see such driving practice
as the squad had never known. He would change the line-up, pound the
whole machine into form, and give Ophir a winning team in spite of fate!
Merry knew, from practical experience, just how much could be
accomplished in two weeks—provided a fellow went at it hard enough. He
would give the eleven a drilling which would make the time spent at
Tinaja Wells look like a loafing bee.
Having made up his mind to this, the discouraging afternoon’s work on
the grid lost much of its sting. What sting there was left, merely
roweled the coach’s determination to give Ophir a winning eleven.
Merry was the son of the best all-round athlete and coach the country
had ever known. That fact was universally admitted. The lad, his white
skin glowing under the manipulations of the Mexican rubber, felt the
old indomitable spirit tingling through his veins. He would show them,
by Jove! He would prove that he was a chip off the old block! Down in
that out-of-the-way corner of Arizona he would lick that pioneer team
into shape—or he’d know the reason why.
Somehow or other, young Merriwell experienced a glow of satisfaction.
There was a fascination in overcoming difficulties—in winning success
in spite of them. Where’s the credit if a fellow romps to victory
without any opposing hardships? It takes the hard knocks, the glowering
possibilities of failure, to put us “on our toes” and make us buck the
line of fate with a do-or-die determination to “get there.”
Merry had reached that point. Hovering disaster caused him to reach out
and lay firm hold of the invincible spirit that every lad, if he is
worth his salt, has always at the back of his nature. And this spirit
is alive with electric force. Every fellow who falls back upon it feels
a thrill in every nerve. This it was that brought Merry his glow of
satisfaction.
Having conquered the disturbing features of the practice game, the
lad’s thoughts turned to the loss of the money. There was not an
avaricious hair in his head, and it was not the mere fact that he was
minus thirty dollars that bothered him; it was the ugly suspicion that
there might be a thief among some of those Ophir fellows. He hated to
think it, and it was because of the fact that, even in thought, he did
not want to do the Ophir club an injustice, that he had warned Clancy
and Ballard to keep mum on the subject of the lost money.
Oddly enough, there was a pocket piece mixed up with the missing
silver, and the most of Merry’s regret centered about that. It was
a silver half dollar, neatly plugged, which had been “worked off” on
Merry by some one in Sandstone, Cal. When he found that the fifty-cent
piece was minted in the year of his birth, he immediately accepted
it as a souvenir. With the lapse of time a sentimental interest had
developed in the coin and Merriwell hated to lose it.
By the time the regulars and the scrubs got out of the gym, the
hilarity of the second-string men had faded. They had played a good
game and, with unexpected luck, had held the regulars. The joy aroused
by this excellent showing had manifested itself directly after the
game, but the scrubs had been doing a little reflecting while taking
their showers and getting into their clothes.
Every member of the O. A. C. was fiercely eager to win the coming
game with Gold Hill. If the club team, after weeks of coaching, could
not take a game from a picked-up eleven, what chances would it have
with Gold Hill? This thought pushed aside the joys of the afternoon,
and filled scrubs, as well as regulars, with painful doubts.
Merry emerged smiling from the bathrooms. As he came out into the
groups of players, lingering in front of the gym, many a glum face was
turned wonderingly in his direction. What meant that sunny, confident
smile on the face of the coach? Was it possible that he had seen
anything hopeful in the afternoon’s miserable work?
Hannibal Bradlaugh, son of the president of the club, stepped up to
Merry.
“I reckon, Chip,” said he, “that you think that this club team is a
joke. Is that what amuses you?”
“It’s not a joke, Brad,” laughed Merry, “although it has tried to be
one this afternoon. During the next two weeks I’m going to show you
fellows what real work is, see? And, when we face Gold Hill you’re
going to win. Regulars and scrubs will be here at two-thirty, Monday
afternoon. To-morrow, Handy,” he added, to the captain of the club
team, “you and I will have a little talking match at the Ophir House.”
Hope, like the measles, is “catching.” All the players, even to Spink,
Mayburn and Doolittle, began to feel better.
As Merry walked through the clubhouse, on his way to the trail that led
back to town, he was halted by Mr. Bradlaugh, the club’s president. Mr.
Bradlaugh’s face was long and gloomy. There was a curious gleam in his
eyes as they fixed themselves upon Merry’s smiling face.
“Gad,” murmured the president, “you don’t seem worried, Merriwell.”
“Where were you when the balloon went up, Mr. Bradlaugh?” Frank
inquired.
“On the clubhouse balcony, watching the ascension. What’s got into the
boys?”
“Just an off day with them, I think. That will happen to the best
teams, you know.”
“I was badly disappointed. After three weeks at Tinaja Wells, the
eleven seems to put up a poorer article of football than they did when
they left here to go into camp. I’m afraid they’ve been having too good
a time, up the cañon.”
“They worked hard and faithfully at the Wells, Mr. Bradlaugh,” declared
Frank. “The change from the mesa to their home field may have had a
bad effect on them. Come Monday afternoon and watch them, and I think
you’ll see something worth while. We have two weeks before the big
game, and, by then, the squad will be tinkered into winning form.”
“Not two weeks, Merriwell.”
Frank started and flung a quick look at Mr. Bradlaugh.
“Has there been a change in the date?” he asked.
“There has. Colonel Hawtrey and I had a talk about Thanksgiving Day,
and made up our minds that it’s time we followed the practice that
prevails in the East. We’ll not play any more on that particular day,
and we decided that our respective clubs will come together on Saturday
afternoon of next week.”
Frank’s smile faded. The time for whipping the team into shape had been
cut down one-half. Seven days were left—six days, with Sunday out—and
not all of those six days could be given to hard work. The practice
should slow up for two days before the game.
“Holy smoke!” he muttered. “When did all this happen?”
“This morning,” Mr. Bradlaugh answered. “I haven’t had a chance to tell
you before. Had I seen the work of our men previous to my conference
with Colonel Hawtrey, you may be sure that I should have put off the
big game as long as possible. Now it’s too late. A week from to-day we
face Gold Hill. What can you do in that short time?”
“This is a crack right between the eyes,” murmured Frank, “and it
knocks all my calculations galley west.”
“It’s certainly discouraging,” agreed Mr. Bradlaugh, “but there’s no
help for it. I hear that the Gold Hillers are playing the game as
they never played it before. They have a new coach who seems to have
inaugurated some new plays and a whole lot of improvements.”
“A new coach?” echoed Frank. “What’s his name?”
“Guffey. I’ve heard that he’s a phenomenon, not only as a coach, but as
a player.”
Merriwell’s face clouded. Here was more discouraging news, and he
couldn’t help wondering where the lightning was going to strike next.
Mr. Bradlaugh was quick to note the change in Frank’s face and manner.
He knew the young coach’s hopes had received a severe setback, and he
tried to temper the blow.
“I don’t know who this Guffey is,” said he, “and I don’t care. You’re a
heap better than he is, and I’ll bank on it.”
A ghost of a smile flickered about the boy’s lips.
“I’ve been coaching the Ophir team for a long time, Mr. Bradlaugh,” he
remarked, “and you saw the afternoon’s performance. It wasn’t a credit
to me any more than it was to the eleven.”
“That’s the wrong way to look at it,” was the warm response. “If you
haven’t the material to work with, what can you do?”
“I’ve got the material,” insisted Frank. “Your son is a crack half
back; Handy, at full, and Spink, at quarter, are class A, and I haven’t
any fault to find with the rest of the men. There’ll be some shifting,
though, and I may take a couple of players from the scrubs for the
regulars.”
“Suppose this Guffey gets into the Gold Hill line-up? He’s an amateur,
the colonel tells me, and, by our rules, is qualified to play. Will you
jump into the fight if Guffey does?”
“I’m going to do all I can to make Ophir win,” Frank answered
determinedly.
“You still have hopes, then?”
The young coach had again got himself well in hand. The obstacles were
thickening, and, because of them, final victory over Gold Hill would be
a prize worth while.
“Ophir is going to win!” he declared, and there was a look on his face
and a gleam in his dark eyes that went far to dispel the president’s
gloomy forebodings.
“You’re a brick!” said Mr. Bradlaugh, clapping Frank on the shoulder.
“That’s the spirit, my lad, that leads many a forlorn hope to victory.
We’re going to win—I consider that settled. If you’re on your way back
to town, jump into my car and I’ll take you. I was only waiting for a
word with you before I started.”
The clubhouse and athletic field were a short mile out of Ophir. On the
way back Merry communed with himself and took heart out of his very
discouragements.
The poor showing of the club team, the short time in which to make a
winner out of it, the good work of Gold Hill under Guffey—all these
things Merry considered well; and, in the final summing up, they merely
spurred him to fresh endeavors. He was out for Gold Hill’s scalp, and
he was going to get it.
That night, in a most peculiar way, some more disturbing details were
brought home to him. It was about one in the morning when he heard a
pebble rattle against the window of his room. He got up, lifted the
window cautiously, and looked out into the dark.
“It’s Bleeker,” came a low voice, “Bleeker, of Gold Hill. Don’t give
me away, Merriwell, but come down. I’ve something I want to tell you.”