Somewhere behind a screen of palms and flowers an orchestra gave forth sweet music. The heroes of Yale, the gridiron gladiator, the baseball man, the hammer-thrower, the sprinter, and others who had done things, were in great demand by the pretty girls.
But of all the heroes present Frank Merriwell was the most popular. The girls crowded to get a look at him, to speak to him, to hear his voice and receive a smile from him.
“He is it!” declared Jack Ready. “He has the call in this little game. I don’t know another fellow who wouldn’t look a little foolish or self-conscious. He doesn’t seem to know that he’s just about the whole blooming show. That makes him all the more popular. I am for boycotting him.”
“Boycott him!” growled Browning. “He’ll be girl-caught if he doesn’t look out. There isn’t a pretty girl here who doesn’t stand ready to fling herself at his head on the slightest provocation.”
“But what sort of a show do we stand?” sighed Ready sadly. “All the girls seem to want to talk about Merriwell, Merriwell, Merriwell. I just told a saucy young miss that I thought him perfectly horrid. She gave me the icy eye at once. Bet a button she won’t know me the next time we meet.”
“You should know better. You’re old enough.”
“But I’d like to be a little bit of a tin hero to somebody,” the queer sophomore sobbed. “I’m going to do something. I have made up my mind to do something to produce notice. What would you advise?”
“Shoot yourself,” said Bruce gravely. “You’ll get an obituary notice.”
“Thanks!” retorted Jack. “I am not seeking posthumous glory, my wise friend. I don’t know of anything I have less use for. I want to do something that will make a lot of stunning girls cuddle round me like flies around a molasses-barrel. Now, if I could only take part in a duel!”
“You will ‘duel’ to avoid such a method of obtaining glory,” said Bruce.
“That’s all anybody finds in your vicinity,” said Bruce, moving away.
Next to Merriwell, Dick Starbright seemed the most popular with the girls. The handsome freshman giant had won his spurs on the football-field. Having the build of a Spartan gladiator, the rosy face of a boy, and the pleasant manners of a Yale gentleman, it was not strange that he should find himself almost constantly the center of a bevy of handsome girls. And he knew what it meant when, in a careless, apparently thoughtless, manner, some of them rested their hands on his arm for a moment. They wanted to feel his muscle!