As always happens the schedule of the fall’s games was changed somewhat at the last moment.

In the first change there was a decided advantage.  Wrexham withdrawing its challenge almost at the last, Coach Morton took on Welton High School for the first game of the season.

Now, Welton must have played for no other reason than to gratify a weak form of vanity, for there were few High School teams in the state that had cause to dread Welton High School.

For Gridley, however, the game served a useful purpose.  It solidified Captain Wadleigh’s team into actual work.  The score was 32 to 0, in favor of Gridley.  However, as Dick phrased it, the practice against an actual adversary, for the first time in the season, was worth at least three hundred to nothing.

“But don’t you fellows make a mistake,” cautioned Captain Wadleigh.  “Don’t get a notion that you’ve nothing bigger than Welton to tackle this year.  Next Saturday you’ve got to go up against Tottenville, and there’s an eleven that will make you perspire.”

Coach Morton had Tottenville gauged at its right value.  During the few days before the game he kept the Gridley boys steadily at work.  The passing and the signal work, in particular, were reviewed most thoroughly.

“Remember, the pass is going to count for a lot,” Mr. Morton warned them.  “You can’t make a weight fight against Tottenville, for those fellows weigh a hundred and fifty pounds more, to the team, than you do.  They’re savage, swift, clever players, too, those Tottenville youths.  What you take away from them you’ll have to win by strategy.”

So the Gridley boys were drilled again and again in all the special points of field strategy that Coach Morton knew or could invent.

Yet one of the best things that Mr. Morton knew, and one that always characterized Gridley, was the matter of confidence.

Captain Wadleigh’s young men were made to feel that they were going to win.  They did not underestimate the enemy, but they were going to win.  That was well understood by them all.

Now, in the games of sheer strategy much depends upon nimble ends.

Dick Prescott, in particular, was coached much in private, as well as on the actual gridiron.

“Keep yourself in keen good shape, Mr. Prescott,” Mr. Morton insisted.  “We need your help in scalping Tottenville next Saturday.”

As the week wore along Mr. Morton and Captain Wadleigh became more and more pleased with themselves and with their associates.

“I don’t see how we can fail tomorrow,” said Mr. Horton, quietly, to “Hen” Wadleigh, just after the School and the second teams had been dismissed.

It was not much after half-past three.  Practice had been brief, in order that none of the players might be used up.

“Prescott, in especial, is showing up magnificently,” replied Wadleigh.  “He and Darrin are certainly wonders at their end of the line.”

“You must use them all you can tomorrow, and yet don’t make them fight the whole battle,” replied Coach Morton.  “Save them for the biggest emergencies.”

“I’ll be careful,” promised Wadleigh.

Dick and Dave walked back into the city, instead of taking a car.

“How are you feeling, Dick?” asked Dave.

“As smooth as silk,” Prescott replied.

“I don’t believe I’ve ever been in such fine condition before,” replied Dave.

“That’s mighty good, for I have an idea that the captain means to use us all he can tomorrow.”

“Oh, Tottenville is as good as beaten, then,” laughed Dave, with all the Gridley confidence.

“I’d like to know just how strong Tottenville is on its right end of the line,” mused Prescott.

“I don’t care how strong they are,” retorted Darrin, with a laugh.  “You and I are not going to use strength; we’re going to rely upon brains –­Coach Morton’s brains, though, to be sure.”

The two chums separated at the corner of the side street on which stood the Prescott bookstore and home.  Dave hurried home to attend to some duties that he knew were awaiting him.

Dick, whistling, strolled briskly on.  He saw Dodge and Bayliss on the other side of the street, but did not pay much attention to them until they crossed just before Dick had reached his own door.

“There’s the mucker,” muttered Bayliss, in a tone intentionally loud enough for the young left end to overhear.

“I won’t pay any attention to them,” thought Dick, with an amused smile.  “I can easily understand what they’re sore about.  I’d feel angry myself if I had been left off the team.”

“Why do fellows like that need an education?” demanded Dodge, in a slightly louder tone, as the pair came closer.

Still Dick Prescott paid no heed.  He started up the steps, fumbling for his latch key as he went.

“You faker!  You mucker!” hissed Bayliss, now speaking directly to the young left end.

This was so palpable that Dick could not well ignore it.  Dropping the key back into his pocket, he turned to stare at the two “sorehead” chums.

“Eh?” he asked, with a quiet laugh.

“Yes; I meant you!” hissed Bayliss.

“Oh, well,” grinned Dick, “your opinions have never counted for much in the community, have they?”

“Shut up, you ignorant hound!” warned Bayliss belligerently.

“Too bad,” retorted Dick tantalizingly.  “Of course, I understand what ails you.  You were left off the High School team, and I was not.  But that is your own fault, Bayliss.  You could have made the team if you hadn’t been foolish.”

“Don’t insult me with your opinions fellow!” cried Bayliss, growing angrier every instant.  At least, he appeared to be working him self up into a rage.

“Oh, I don’t care anything about your opinions, and I have no anxiety to spring mine on you,” retorted Dick, in an indifferent voice.  Once more he fumbled for his latch key.

“You haven’t any business talking with gentlemen, anyway,” sneered Bert Dodge.

Dick flushed slightly, though he replied, coolly: 

“As it happens, just at present I am not!”

“What do you mean by that?” flared Bert.

“Oh, you know, you don’t care anything about my opinions,” laughed Dick.  “Let us drop the whole subject.  I don’t care particularly, anyway, about being seen talking with you two.”

“Oh, you don’t?” cried Bayliss, in a voice hoarse with rage.

In almost the same breath Bert Dodge hurled an insult so pointed and so offensive that Dick’s ruddy cheek went white for an instant.

Back into his pocket he dropped the latch key, then stepped swiftly down before his tormentor.

“Dodge,” he cried warningly, “take back the remark you just made.  Then, after that, you can take your offensive presence out of my sight!”

“I’ll take nothing back!” sneered the other boy.

“Then you’ll take this!” retorted Dick, very quietly, in a cold, low voice.

Prescott’s fist flew out.  It was not a hard blow, but it landed on the tip of Bert Dodge’s nose.

“You cur!” cried Dodge chokingly.  “Wait until I get my coat off.”

“No; keep it on; I’m going to keep mine on,” retorted Prescott.  “Guard yourself, man!”

“Jump in, Bayliss!  We’ll thump his head off!” gasped Dodge, with almost a sob in his voice, to was so angry.

Bayliss would have been nothing loath to “jump in.”  But, just as Dick Prescott, after calling “guard,” aimed his second blow at Bert, Fred Ripley, Purcell and “Hen” Wadleigh all hurried up to the scene.

For Bayliss to be caught fighting two-to-one would have resulted in a quick thrashing for him.  So Bayliss stood back.

“Bad blood, is there?” asked Wadleigh, as the new arrivals hurried up.

“Prescott, after insulting Bert, flew at him,” retorted Bayliss, panting some with the effort at lying.

Dodge was now standing well back.  He had parried three of Dick’s blows, but had not yet taken the offensive.  As Dodge was a heavier man, and not badly schooled in fistics, Dick had the good sense to go at this fight coolly, taking time to exercise his judgment.

“What’s it all about?” demanded Wadleigh.

Just for an instant Bayliss felt himself stumped.  Then, all of a sudden, an inspiration in lying came to him.

“Prescott got ugly because the Dodges never paid that thousand-dollar reward,” declared Bayliss.

Dick heard, and with his eye still on Dodge, shouted out:  “That’s not true, Bayliss.  You know you are not telling the truth!”

Bayliss doubled his fists, and would have struck Prescott down from behind, but Wadleigh, who was a big and powerful fellow, caught Bayliss by his left arm, jerking him back.

“Now, just wait a bit, Bayliss,” advised “Hen,” moderately.  “From what I know of Prescott I’m not afraid but that he’ll give you satisfaction presently –­if you want it.”

“You bet he’ll have to!” hissed Bayliss.

“If Prescott loses the argument he has on now,” added Purcell, significantly, “I fancy he has friends who will take his place with you, Bayliss.”

Then all turned to watch the fight, which was now passing the stage of preliminary caution.

Several boys and men had run down from Main Street.  Now, more than a score of spectators were crowding about.

“Hurrah!” piped up one boy from the Central Grammar School.”  The mucker bantam against the ‘sorehead’ lightweight!”

There was a laugh, but Bert Dodge didn’t join in it, for, after receiving two glancing, blows on the chest, he now had his right eye closed by Dick’s hard left.

The next instant the bewildered Dodge received a blow that sent him down to the sidewalk.

“I think I’ve paid you back, now,” Prescott remarked quietly.

At this moment Mr. Prescott, hearing the noise from the back of his bookstore, came to the door.

“What is the trouble, Richard?” inquired his parent.

Dick stepped over to his father, repeating, in a low voice, the insult that Dodge had hurled at him.

“You couldn’t have done anything else, then!” declared the elder Prescott, fervently; and this was a good deal for Dick’s father, quiet, scholarly and peace-loving, to say.

Bert and Bayliss walked sullenly away amid the jeers of the onlookers.  Once out of their sight, Bert, fairly grinding his teeth, said: 

“Bayliss, I’ll have my revenge yet on that mucker Prescott –­” and then, as if struck by a sudden thought, he added savagely: 

“The Tottenville game’s tomorrow –­you know?”

“Yes?” said Bayliss inquiringly.

“Well, wait till tomorrow afternoon, and I’ll take the conceit out of the miserable cur –­just you wait.”