e behind Dick
Prescott as a pitcher.

"Either one of them in the box," said Coach Luce to a friend,
"and the game is half won."

"But how about Ripley?"

"Ripley?" replied the coach. "He made a good showing in the tryouts,
but we haven't had in the field yet. He will be, though, the
next game. We play Brayton High School over at Brayton. It's
one of the smaller games, and we're going to try Ripley there."

Then the coach added, to himself:

"Ripley is presentable enough, but I believe there's a big yellow
streak in him somewhere. I wouldn't dare to put Fred into one
of the big games requiring all the grit that Prescott or Darrin
can show!"

CHAPTER XX

A TIN CAN FOR THE YELLOW DOG

With Ripley in the box Gridley won its third game of the season,
beating Brayton High School by a score of five to two.

"It ought to have been a whitewash against a small-fry crowd like
Brayton," Coach Luce confided to Captain Purcell.

"What was our weak spot, Coach?"

"Have you an opinion, Captain?" asked the coach.

"Yes, but I'm afraid I'm wrong."

"What is your idea?"

"Why, it seemed to me, Mr. Luce, that Ripley went stiff at just
the wrong times. Yet I hate to say that, and I am afraid I'm
unfair, for Rip surely does throw in some wonderful balls."

"You've struck my idea, anyway," responded Mr. Luce. "Please
don't say anything about it to the other men. But, between ourselves,
Captain, I think we'll do well to give Ripley few and unimportant
chances this season. Most people can't see where real grit comes
in, in baseball"

"Yet you think the lack of grit, or stamina, is just what ails
Rip?" asked Captain Purcell keenly.

"You can judge, from what I've said," replied Coach Luce.

"I'm glad then, Coach, for it shows I wasn't so far off the track
in my own private judgment."

Yet, to hear Fred Ripley tell about the game, it wasn't such a
small affair. He judged his foemen by the fact that they had
to contend with _him_.

"Five to two is the safest margin we've had yet," he confided
to those who listened to him at the High School. "More than that,
we had Brayton tied down so that, at no time in the game, did
they have any show to break the score against us. Now, if Luce
and Purcell fix it up for me to pitch the real games of the season"

"Oh, cut it out, Rip," advised one listener, good-naturedly.
"Brayton is only a fishball team, anyway. Not a real, sturdy
beef-eater in the lot."

T