le amusement in the usual babble and jests of his schoolmates, and
nothing aroused his resentment quicker than to be made the butt of a
harmless joke. He had once choked Cooper purple in the face in
retaliation for a jest put upon him by the audacious, rattle-brained
little chap; but later Chipper had accepted Roy's apologies and
protestations of regret, practically forgetting the unpleasant
incident, which, however, Roy never did.

"Ah-ha!" cried Sile Crane, bringing forth and flourishing a long,
burnt, battered bat. "Here's Old Buster, the sack cleaner. Haowdy do,
my friend? I'm sartainly glad to shake ye again."

"Up to date," said Cooper, tying his shoes, "I've never seen you do any
great shakes with Old Buster."

"Oh, ain't ye?" snapped Sile resentfully. "Mebbe yeou've forgot that
three-sacker I got with this club in the Clearport game."

"Um-mum," mumbled Chipper. "Now you mention it, I do have a faint
recollection of that marvelous accident. You were trying to dodge the
ball, weren't you, Sile? You just shut your blinkers and ducked, and
Pitkins' inshoot carromed off the bat over into right field and got
lost in the grass. If we all hadn't yelled for you to run, you'd be
standing there now, wondering what had happened."

"Yeou're another," flung back Crane. "I made a clean three-sacker, and
yeou know it."

"Well, anyhow, you got anchored on third and failed to come home when I
bunted on a signal for the squeeze. The Clearporters had barrels of
fun with you over that. I remember Barney Carney asking you if you'd
brought your bed."

"Oh, rats!" rasped Crane, striding toward the open gym door and
carrying his pet bat. "Some parts of your memory ought to be
amputated."

"What a cutting thing to say!" grinned Cooper, rising to follow.

The field, surrounded by a high board fence, was located near the
gymnasium, and in a few minutes all the boys were on it and ready for
business. Announcing that they would begin with a little plain
fielding practice, Eliot assigned them to their positions.

"Do you care to go into right, Roy?" he asked, turning to Hooker as the
last one.

"Not I," was the instant answer. "That's not my position. I'm no
outfielder. Right field, indeed!"

"Oh, very well," said Roger. "Tuttle, go ahead out."

"Sure," said Chub agreeably, waddling promptly away to fill the
position assigned him.

"Springer will bat to the outfield and Grant to the in," directed the
capt