"What do you call it? If I say a word against Frank Merriwell you want
to eat me up. It's come to that! You were ready to fight him any minute,
at first; now you're ready to lick the polish off his shoes, just like
the rest of those fellows."
"Nothing of the kind!" Badger hotly declared.
"Well, you're going to pitch for his picked team Saturday!"
"Kirk asked me to."
"And Merriwell sent him?"
"Yes!"
"And they have become such friends that they're almost chums. The
fellows are beginning to say that Dunstan Kirk manages the Yale
ball-team, and Frank Merriwell manages Dunstan Kirk. They are about
right, I guess!"
"I allow that I'm no nearer being Merriwell's chum than I ever was. We
could never be chums. But I'm not going to forget what he did for me on
the _Crested Foam_. He saved my life, then, Pike!"
"And proposes to wind you round his fingers and drag you at his heels to
make you pay for it!"
"So, when he sent me that invitation, and I talked it over with Kirk, I
thought I ought to accept it."
"Don't you know that Hodge will refuse to catch?"
"Don't talk about him!" Badger hissed.
"He has already said that he will not catch for such a scoundrel as
you!"
"Did he say that?"
"He says you will lose them the game; that it's an outrage to put you
into the box, and he won't be a party to it.
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