s likely to
fancy that it could be done with less trouble in a crooked manner, and
his natural instinct would switch him off from the course he should have
followed.

He was not at all fond of Walter Gordon, but he liked him better than he
did Merriwell, and it was gall and wormwood for him when he heard how
Merriwell had replaced Gordon in the box at Cambridge and had pitched a
marvelous game for three innings.

"Oh, it's just that fellow's luck!" Roll muttered to himself. "He seems
to be lucky in everything he does. The next thing I'll hear is that he
is going to pitch on the 'Varsity team."

He little thought that this was true, but it proved to be. That very day
he heard some sophomores talking on the campus, and he lingered near
enough to catch their words.

"Is it actually true, Parker, that Pierson has publicly stated that
Merriwell is fast enough for the Varsity nine?" asked Tad Horner.

"That's what it is," nodded Puss Parker, "and I don't know but Pierson
is right. I am inclined to think so."

"Rot!" exclaimed Evan Hartwick, sharply. "I don't take stock in anything
of the sort. Merriwell may make a pitcher some day, but he is raw. Why,
he would get his eye batted out if he were to go up against Harvard on
the regular team."

"Oh, I don't know about that," said Andy Emery. "He is pretty smooth
people. Is there anybody knows Pierson made such an observation
concerning him?"

"Yes, there is," answered Parker.

"Who knows it?"

"I do."

"Did you hear him?"

"I did."

"That settles it."

"Yes, that settles it!" grated Roland Ditson as he walked away. "Parker
didn't lie, and Pierson has intimated that Merriwell may be given a
trial on the Varsity nine. If he is given a trial it will be his luck to
succeed. He must not be given a trial. How can that be prevented?"

Then Ditson set himself to devise some scheme to prevent Frank from
obtaining a trial on the regular nine. It was not an easy thing to think
of a plan that would not involve himself in some way, and he felt that
it must never be known that he had anything to do with such a plot.

That night Ditson might have been seen entering a certain saloon in New
Haven, calling one of the barkeepers aside, and holding a brief
whispered conversation with him.

"Is Professor Kelley in?" asked Roll.

"He is, sir," replied the barkeeper. "Do you wish to see him?"

"Well--ahem!--yes, if he is alone."

"I think he is alone. I do not think any of h