CHAPTER X.
HODGE IN DANGER.
Frank was crossing the campus when a voice called to him:
“Hey, Merry, hold on; want to speak with you.”
He looked around, and saw Danny Griswold hurrying toward him. There was a strangely serious look on the face of the little fellow, who was of a jovial nature and seldom inclined to take anything seriously.
The moment Frank saw Danny’s face, he realized something was wrong.
“What is it, old man?” he asked, as Griswold came up, panting.
“They’re looking for the fellow who did it.”
“Did what?”
“Broke his ribs.”
“Broke whose ribs?”
“The cop’s.”
“Why, the little fellow with the red head and liver face.”
“The one who tried to arrest Browning?”
“Same.”
Frank whistled.
“And his ribs were broken?”
“That’s it. He says it wasn’t the big fellow who did it, but some other chap slammed him up against a stone post and smashed his ribs in. Officers have been here trying to locate the fellow. We’re in danger of being pulled up as witnesses—or worse.”
“Accused, you mean?”
“Any of us may be.”
“Well, who did it, anyway?”
“Hodge.”
Frank started.
“Hodge?” he cried. “Are you sure, old man?”
“No.”
“Then why did you say that?”
“Noon says Hodge slammed the cop up against the post.”
“Noon says so, eh? Did he see it?”
“Says he did.”
“And he is talking about it openly?”
“Don’t know about that. He talked to me about it.”
“Anybody else present?”
“No.”
“I must see Noon.”
Merriwell was aroused, for he realized that Bart Hodge was in danger. Were Hodge arrested for injuring the policeman, and should the charge be proved against him, his college career might come to a sudden termination.
Frank had pulled his friend out of more than one bad hole, and he believed he understood Bart’s nature pretty well. Hodge was again on the high road to an honorable career, guided by Merriwell’s hand, but to thwart him at the very outset of his college life would mean almost certain ruin.
Merry’s teeth came together with a click when he realized the danger that menaced Bart.
“I’m afraid you made a mistake in introducing that freshman to our gang,” complained Griswold. “None of the fellows cared to know him, but they accepted him simply because of your friendship toward him. This is the result.”
Frank was not pleased by Danny’s words. They did not sound as if they came from the little fellow’s mouth.
“None of my friends were forced to meet Bart Hodge,” he said, quietly. “Hodge and I were schoolmates together,and, when he came to Yale, I was not going to be cad enough to cut him because he is in a lower class than myself. I am not built that way.”
“Oh, you might have treated him decent, without having him in your room so much.”
“No, you are mistaken. At Fardale Academy we were roommates. What sort of a fellow would I have been had I shown, when he came to Yale, that he was not wanted in my room?”
Danny did not answer the question, but stood grinding his heel into the ground, looking downward.
“I trust you see plainly enough that I did what any white man should do, Gris?” said Frank, letting a hand fall on Danny’s shoulder.
“Oh, I am not going to set myself up as a judge of your actions,” was Griswold’s impatient retort. “All I know is what it has brought us to. If I am pulled up and forced to tell what I know about the way the cop was hurt——”
“What will you tell? What do you know? You confessed to me that you did not see it.”
Frank cut in rather sharply, giving Griswold a start. Danny looked rattled and flushed.
“Oh, I didn’t see it, but Noon told me——”
“That sort of evidence will not go, old man, and you should know it. Take my advice, and keep still. This business must be hushed up, and it will be the fellow who talks too much that will get us into trouble.”
“What if you are pulled up and questioned? Are you going to swear to a lie?”
It was Frank’s turn to flush, but the flush was one of indignation.
“Did you ever know me to lie?” he asked, sharply.
“No, but this is different, and——”
“It will not be necessary for me to lie about this in orderto shield Hodge. I did not see anything. I did not see the cop injured. I can swear to that, and it’s all they’ll ever get out of me.”
After a moment of silence, Griswold said:
“We may be able to protect Hodge by keeping silent, but I want to give you some advice, Merry. I am serious now. Don’t grin at me. This is one time in my life when I am not thinking of anything funny, as the fellow said when the surgeons were getting him ready to cut off his leg. If you are wise, you’ll let up on one thing you have been trying to do.”
Frank could not help grinning when he thought of taking advice from Griswold, but he tried to look serious, and said:
“Go on.”
“You have been pushing Hodge for the nine. Is that right?”
“Well,” admitted Frank, “I have been using my influence to get him on, for I know he is a corker.”
“Drop it!” cried Danny, pulling out a package of cigarettes and extracting one. “It won’t go, and you are going to get the other candidates for the position of catcher down on you. Hodge is a very fresh freshman, and he does not stand a show of getting on the nine this year.”
“I am not so sure of that,” said Frank, quietly. “I got on in my freshman year, if you will remember.”
“I know, but circumstances brought that about. Yale was in a hole for pitchers. You did some clever twirling on the freshman nine, and you were tried as a desperate expedient. That is the secret of your getting on the ’varsity nine your first year in college.”
“Well, Hodge did some clever backstop work last Saturday, when the scrub played the regular nine. He played on the scrub, and he made a better record than either Noon or Stone, who took turns on the regulars.”
“Oh, that was a chance, and it didn’t show his mettle, for there was nothing at stake. He had better opportunities than the other fellows, that’s all.”
“Come off!” cried Frank, dropping into slang. “He did better throwing, and he would have caught every man who tried to steal second if the pitcher had not been a little slow in his delivery. As it was, he caught four men, while Noon and Stone caught only one each. He did not have a passed ball, for all that the pitcher was wild as a hawk, and he got three fine hits.”
“Two of which were off you, Merry. That part of it didn’t fool anybody. Ha! ha! ha!”
Frank flushed again.
“By that I presume that you mean to insinuate that I gave him easy ones, so he might hit it out. Look here, Gris, I have told you that I do not lie. Now I am going to tell you that I did my level best to fool Hodge, for he had told me that he would bat my eye out. I thought I knew his weak points. I gave him a high inshoot, and he got a pretty single off it; I gave him one round his ankles, and he lifted it out for three bags. The fellow who says I favored him in the least says something that is not true.”
“Oh, well,” said Danny, shortly, “I am not here to talk baseball. Anyway, I don’t think Hodge stands a ghost of a show to catch on. Noon is the man who will get there.”
“Nit!” muttered Frank, as Danny walked away, smoking.