Clancy, whose ability and willingness to fight had earned him a
reputation during his playing days. "You've had a grouch for a week or
more. As for you, Kohinoor, don't think you can fight your way through
this league. The first thing you have to do is to learn to stand
punishment and keep your temper."

"No fresh prison pup can swell up and try to cut into my affairs,"
muttered Williams, sullen under the rebuke.

McCarthy sprang up to avenge the fresh insult, but before he could act
or speak he was forestalled.

"Oh," said Clancy sharply. "So you're the fellow who has been making
that kind of talk? I've been trying to find out where it came from.
One more bit of that kind of conversation will cost you a bunch of
salary."

"I've heard it everywhere," muttered Williams, taken aback by the
sudden defense of the recruit by the manager.

"Well, don't hear any more of it," snapped Clancy, and McCarthy,
feeling he had emerged with the honors, discretely maintained silence.

"What started Adonis after you this morning?" asked Swanson, as he
hurled garments around the room and wrought disaster to the order of
his trunk as he hunted pajamas.

"Guess he was just trying to start something," responded McCarthy,
still reading.

"Girl?" inquired Swanson.

"What makes you think that?"

"He was mad when he saw you at breakfast with Betty. He's jealous of
everyone who talks to her."

"She's a dandy girl," said McCarthy, generously. "I don't much blame a
fellow for being jealous when he is engaged to a girl like that."

"Engaged to Betty Tabor? That stiff?" ejaculated Swanson. "Say, did
he spring a line of talk like that on you? Why, he has been crazy
about her for three years, but she knows what he is, and she won't talk
to him any more than to be polite."

"I thought it was odd," commented McCarthy, his heart becoming
strangely lighter.

"Don't make any mistake, though," added Swanson earnestly, as he turned
out the lights. "You've stirred up a bad enemy. He won't fight you
openly; but keep an eye on him."

Swanson's warning fell upon deaf ears. McCarthy's attack of blues was
cured, and he fell asleep to the music of street car wheels that seemed
to say: "She isn't engaged, she isn't engaged," as they rolled past the
hotel.

CHAPTER V

_The Tempter_

The Bears were coming into their hotel after the first game of the
series with the Pilgrims. The throng in the lobby pressed forward,
forming