nd offer to wager money. I'm not going
to offer any bets, Dave, but I feel pretty certain that Drayne
is just talking for effect."

"His offering to bet against his own crowd would be enough to
justify you in dropping Drayne from the squad altogether," hinted
Greg Holmes.

"Yes, of course," admitted Dick. "But we had enough of football
soreheads last year. Now, wouldn't it make us look like soreheads
if we took any malicious delight in dropping Drayne from the squad
just because he has been blowing off some steam?"

"But I wouldn't trust him on the job," snapped Dan Dalzell. "I
believe Phin Drayne would sell out any crowd for sheer spite."

"Even his country?" asked Dick quietly.

And there the matter dropped, for the time. Had Dick & Co. and
some other High School fellows but known it, however, Drayne
would have borne close watching.

CHAPTER III

Putting the Tag on the Sneak

Anything that Dick Prescott had charge of went along at leaps
and bounds. Hence the football eleven was in good shape ten days
earlier than Coach Morton could remember to have happened before.

"Your eleven is all ready to line up in the field, now, Captain,"
announced coach, one afternoon not long after, as the squad came
out from dressing quarters for practice.

"I'm glad you think so, sir," replied Dick, a flush of pleasure
mantling his cheeks.

"You have every man in fine condition. Condition couldn't be
better, in fact, for those of the men who are likely to get on
the actual battle line. And all the work is well understood,
too. In fact, Captain, you can all but rest on your oars during
the next fortnight, up to your first game."

"Hadn't we better go on training hard every day, sir?" inquired
the young captain.

"Not hard," replied coach, shaking his head. "If you do, you'll
get your men down too fine. Now, there's almost more danger in
having your men overtrained than in having them undertrained.
Your men can be trained too hard and go stale."

"I've heard of that," Dick nodded thoughtfully.

"Yes," continued coach, "and I've seen school teams that suffered
from training down too fine. Boys can't stand it. They haven't
as much flesh in training down hard, and they haven't as much
endurance as college men, who are older. Captain, you will train
your men lightly, three afternoons a week. For the rest, see
to it that they stick to all training orders, including diet and
hygiene and no tobacco. Bu