“Say, this is comfortable,” remarked Leon, flinging himself upon the easiest chair and elevating his polished russet shoes to the top of a small table. “You’ve got a slick den here, though I don’t like your pictures much, and I don’t see what you want of so many books. It’s a bother to read books, and the pictures in my room are of the dead game sort. Got ’em out of the sporting papers, you know. The walls are pretty near covered by pictures of prize-fighters, fast trotters and sporting men. Excuse me if I smoke. I’m dying for a whiff.”
Without further words, he pulled out a package and selected a cigarette, which he coolly prepared and lighted. He was returning the package to his pocket, when Don held out a hand, saying:
“I believe I’ll try one of those things just for fun.”
Bentley let his feet fall from the top of the table to the floor, stared a moment at his companion, then handed over the cigarettes, laughing:
“That came near knocking me out. You were so set against cigarettes yesterday that——”
“You fancied I’d never change my mind. There is an old saying, ‘it’s only a fool who never changes his mind.’”
Don lighted one of the cigarettes, while Leon watched him with a sly, satisfied smile.
“You may not like the first one very much,” said the inveterate smoker, “but you’ll find they’ll grow on ye, and you will like them more and more, till, after a while, you won’t want to get along without them. I tell you they are great stuff.”
With the lighting of that first cigarette, a reckless sensation of indifference stole over Don, and he began to feel that, considering the circumstances, he had not done anything worth worrying about in deceiving his father and telling him a falsehood. In a few moments he was telling himself that cigarettes truly were, as Leon had declared, soothing to the nerves.
“They’re not so bad,” admitted Don; “but I’ll have to give this room a good airing, so aunt will not smell the smoke.”
“And you better not smoke too much of the first one,” Leon warned, craftily. “As you’re not used to ’em, it might make your head feel queer. After a while, if you keep it up, you can smoke as many as you like without noticing it at all. In fact, one or two will be just no satisfaction; more of an aggravation.”
“How long had you been outside?” asked the doctor’s son.
“Ten minutes, anyhow. I wanted to have a talk with you. I’d come over last night after leaving the club, but I thought you’d be abed. I wanted to tell you about the nasty trick this fellow Renwood is playing on me. I knew he had it in for me, and I tumbled in a minute when Sterndale proposed giving Harry Carter a trial in the line. I pinned him right down and asked him where he proposed trying Carter. When he said right or left tackle I knew what that meant, for Linton is solid as right tackle. If Carter shows up all right, I’m to be kicked out, and Carter goes in as left tackle. Renwood is at the bottom of it, the dirty cad!”
His companion’s words brought a feeling of surprise to Don Scott, who immediately recalled the broken bit of conversation he had overheard the previous evening as he crouched behind some bushes directly after leaving the football field. Hearing Sterndale speaking at that time of giving Carter a trial on the eleven, he had felt certain the new man was to be given the position made vacant by his resignation from the team; but now Bentley’s statement seemed to cast a new light on the captain’s intention.
“Are you sure you’re right, Bent?” asked the doctor’s son, earnestly. “Perhaps they’re not going to drop you; they may mean to give you another position.”
“Not on your life! When I tumbled to the game, I just demanded to know what Sterndale meant to do, and I forced him to declare himself.”
“How? What did he say?”
“Why, he said he’d keep me if Carter did not prove to be a better man. As if he thought I’d stand that!”
“What did you do?”
“I told him just what I thought about it. I gave him a piece of my mind, and don’t you forget it! I told him I was done with his old football team the moment he dropped me off to give Carter or any other fellow a trial in my position. I tell you, I was mad! Then I got out and left them to do anything they liked. Now that you’re not going on the team, Scott, I don’t believe I care a rap about playing with that gang.”
Leon made this final declaration in a manner which seemed to indicate that he regarded Don as his particular friend, for which reason, as Don had been treated shabbily, he was more than willing to withdraw from the eleven.
As he crouched behind the bushes near the football field, Don had heard Chatterton speak of somebody as being angry enough to do almost anything, and the listening lad then fancied the stammerer was referring to him; but now it seemed possible that quite another person had been the subject of the remark.
“I had a talk with Chatterton a while ago,” Leon went on, “and I tried to pump him about Sterndale’s intention in regard to me, but he pretended not to know what the fellow is going to do. But, say! he told me something that pretty near took my wind. You can’t guess what happened last night.”
“I won’t try to guess. What did happen?”
“Somebody went into the dressing-room under the grand-stand and raised the dickens generally.”
Don felt his heart give a great jump, but he tried to assume an appearance of calmness as he asked:
“Raised the dickens how? What did he do?”
“You know some of the fellows left their suits there, and the football was left there, too?”
“Yes.”
“Well, somebody went in there and took a knife and slit the suits into ribbons and slashed the football all to pieces.”
Don sprang to his feet with a cry, for Bentley’s words solved a mystery that had puzzled him greatly, and now he knew why it was that the fellow detected by him in the dressing-room had fought so fiercely to escape without being recognized.
Leon stared in surprise at his companion, whose face flushed and paled and who seemed to be shaking with excitement.
“Well, what’s the matter with you?” he asked.
“Who did it?” panted Don. “Does Chatterton know? Who was sneak enough to do such a trick?”
“I asked Chat if he knew, and he winked and said they had found proofs enough to hang the fellow who did the job.”
“What kind of proof?”
“He wouldn’t tell me. He said the chap must have cut himself, for there was blood on the floor.”
Don wondered if his visitor had observed his bandaged fingers; but, if so, Leon made no sign.
The doctor’s son walked to the window and looked out. Having opened the window, he turned back, and there seemed to be a look of triumph on his dark face.
“Bentley,” he said, “have you a suspicion who did that job?”
“Well, I’ve got a sneaking notion,” answered Leon, with a foxy smile, as he lighted a fresh cigarette.
“Whom do you suspect?”
“I questioned Chatterton pretty closely,” declared Bentley, wagging his head, “and I found out another fellow left the club-room directly after I did. It is my opinion that he’s none too good to do such a trick, and I’ll bet they’ll find it out.”
“Whom do you mean?”
“Somebody you and I love—I don’t think.”
“Renwood?”
“Sure thing.”
To Bentley’s surprise, his companion sat down, a sudden look of doubt and perplexity dawning on his face and growing swiftly.
“What reason have you to think Renwood would do such a thing?” questioned Don. “What could be his object?”
“I’ve heard something to-day that’s given me an idea. Renwood is acquainted with Winston, the Harvard man, who is coaching Highland.”
“What of that?”
“I’ve thought all the time that Renwood didn’t care a snap whether Rockspur won or not, and now I’ll bet my life he’s working to have us lose to them.”
“But I fail to see his object,” declared Don. “Why should he want Rockspur to lose?”
“That may come out later. If he is a particular friend of this Winston, he may be playing into Winston’s hands. Perhaps Winston wants to win a reputation as a coach; perhaps he’s expecting to bet money on the game; perhaps a lot of things. Anyhow, I’ll bet my pile that Renwood and Winston have it put up between them to down Rockspur.”
Don shook his head. A short time before he had been eager to believe anything bad of Renwood; but, for all that, he was not satisfied with Bentley’s explanation of Dolph’s reasons for invading the dressing-room and destroying the football and suits.
“I can’t see how such a trick would do him any good,” averred the logical Don. “If he wants to make a lot of flub players out of the Rockspur crowd, so they will lose the game, I should think he could find a better way to carry out his purpose. To me it seems that the destruction of the suits and football was a piece of petty spite, and, much as I’d like to, I can’t see any reason for such spite on the part of Renwood.”
“Then you don’t think he did it?” asked Bentley, in a disappointed way.
Don’s eyes fell on something that lay upon the table, half concealed by a magazine, and he suddenly sprang to his feet once more, snatching up this object and crying:
“Yes, I believe he did the job, even though I can’t understand why, and here in my hand is the proof against him!”
He displayed the handsome knife he had wrested from his antagonist of the previous night.
At sight of that knife Leon Bentley gave a start and turned pale.