“Don’t let him bully you!” cried Skelding. “He’s the kind of fellow to pretend to hate Merriwell, but, now Merriwell has got the best of him a few times, he’s ready to crawl round and bow down before his conqueror.”
“You’re a prevaricator, by the clock!” said the Kansas man promptly. “Because I cut clear of you does not make it that I’m ready to pick up with Merriwell. We are enemies still.”
“You’re the one who is still,” chuckled Ollie Lord, dodging behind Skelding. “You don’t dare open your mouth to Merriwell any more.”
“You’re not worth noticing, you imitation of a man!” broke from Badger. “If there is anything in the world that can make me cease to hate Merriwell it will be because you chaps hate him so much.”
Badger’s words had been spoken rather loudly, and now Chickering noted that a crowd was gathering, and he began to feel that it was time to close up. He gave the others the tip to do so, and backed out of the crowd himself.
Somebody asked Badger what he thought about Merriwell being dropped.
“Say,” cried the Westerner, “whatever do you take me for? I reckon it’s pretty generally known that I’m no friend of his. That being the case, my opinion would not amount to shucks.”
“He knows enough not to talk as much as Merriwell,” said somebody.
“Who says Merriwell talks too much?” roared Bruce Browning. “He’s one of the closest-mouthed fellows living.”
“Well, he talked so much to-day that he got it in the neck.”
“That’s all right. Somebody had to talk. The team is being worked to death. Anybody that knows anything about football knows that. The men know it, but Merriwell was the first and only one who has dared say so.”
“Hurrah! hurrah!” cried the students. “What’s the matter with Frank Merriwell?”
“He’s all right!” thundered a great chorus of voices.
Somebody, wishing to arouse another expression of sentiment, cried:
Quick as a flash, Danny Griswold squealed:
This aroused laughter and applause. All kinds of talk was made on the campus that night. Merriwell was discussed from a hundred different standpoints. The great majority of the students were friendly toward him, and they were highly indignant over the manner in which he had been treated.
A knot of Frank’s admirers gathered and told anecdotes about him. One of them related how, that very day, after being dropped from the eleven, he had lifted old Mother Muggs from the slippery sidewalk and carried her home in a cab.