er frame of
mind.

"Oh! so you're there, are you?" he sneered "I was just telling your good
friend Larry here that I considered you a greatly overrated substitute
pitcher; and that luck had as much to do with our winning that game
today as anything you did."

Frank Bird laughed in his face.

"Sure," he declared, cheerily. "I was a mighty small factor in the
victory, for I only played in one short inning. If I'd faced those hard
hitters of Cranford nine times I reckon it'd be hard to tell what they'd
have done to my poor inshoots and curves."

"But you held them in that inning, Frank, you know you did!" cried
Larry.

"Mere accident, my boy. Happened to be the weak end of their batting
list!" observed Frank, as if determined to agree with his enemy, and
thus spike his guns.

"Is that so?" demanded "Elephant" Small, who did not happen to be on the
nine, because of his customary slow ways. "Perhaps you'll be saying that
dandy two-bagger you whanged out, that brought in the winning run, was
also an accident?"

"Well, I must have just shut my eyes, and struck. I seem to remember
hearing a sound like a shot, and then they all yelled to me to run; so I
did, going on to second in time to see Peterkin gallop home," and Frank
looked as sober as a judge as he said this. The others saw the joke,
however, and, led by Larry, burst out into a laugh that made Puss and
his loyal backers scowl.

"If that bingle was an accident, don't we wish we had a few more players
who could shut their eyes and meet Frazer's terrible speed balls and
curves in the same way!" one fellow exclaimed.

"So say we all of us!" another cried.

Puss realized that the majority on board the _Siren_ were against
him. But he was not given to taking water; even his enemies, and he had
many in Bloomsbury, could hardly say that Puss was lacking in a certain
kind of grit; while stubbornness he possessed in abundance.

So he just shut his white teeth hard together, and looked scowlingly
around the bunch of fellows. And many of them felt a little chill when
those cold gray eyes rested upon them; for they knew of old what
happened when Puss Carberry made up his mind to mark a boy for future
attention.

Frank still stood there by the side of the boat, smiling. Perhaps his
very apparent unconcern served to make the other still more angry. There
had been bad blood between these two lads for a long time, and more than
once it threatened an eruption, which someh