The sound of the cheering spectators came to their ears. Into the room rushed several bronzed, healthy-looking baseball men all in a hilarious condition of triumph. One of them espied Dick and cried:
“You’ll have your hands full coaching the rest of our pitchers now, Merriwell! By Jove, Keene pitched a corking game! And he says you made him fit for the job! We won, four to three! Hurrah for our new coach!”
“Rah! rah! rah! New coach! new coach! Merriwell,” cried another chap, flinging his sweater into the air.
“Congratulations, Merriwell,” said Lynch. “You’re a winner at anything you attempt. You always come out on top.”
Dick now coached Keene for the great forthcoming game with Cornell. When the two teams met, Yale came out victorious and again Merriwell was hailed as a hero and the credit for the victory freely given him.
Meantime, however, the pistol carried by Mike Lynch on the day he was struck senseless by a foul ball had been found, and trouble was brewing for Mike.
CHAPTER XLII.
BAD NEWS.
Wilbur Keene, bronzed, flushed, well satisfied, yet modest in bearing, entered the locker house, surrounded by his comrades of the varsity nine, which had just defeated Cornell in the game for which Merriwell had coached Keene and which proved to be one of the closest and most exciting games of the season.
Every one was congratulating Wilbur and telling him what a wonderful game he had pitched. Perhaps it would be more accurate to say nearly every one was congratulating him. Two of the varsity pitchers, Pumper Welch and Dudley Towne, had not expressed themselves. Towne seemed wavering, but Welch wore a sullen, half-sneering look upon his not unhandsome face. Hitherto Pumper had been considered the leading pitcher for Yale, and now he realized that a rival who might snatch some of these honors from him had suddenly arisen.
“You certainly held ’em down in the tight places, Keene, old man,” cried the tall Scotchman, Greg McGregor, slapping Wilbur on the shoulder. “You pulled out of the bad holes in beautiful shape.”