The universal coach was very thoughtful for a moment.
“It’s good and it’s bad,” he said slowly. “I’m sorry the news is out, because it will be all over town, and it’s almost sure to get into the papers. The Harvard people were very decent. They simply made their protest and supplied us with the facts they had learned, leaving us to investigate, to report to them, and to do as we liked about making it public. I wonder how Parker heard about it. I certainly haven’t said anything and the only others who know anything about it are Jim himself and Bill Brady, who have given me their promise not to talk about it. I haven’t even told Tom Sherman about it yet.”
“If you ask me,” said Carter hotly, “it looks as if some sort of a conspiracy was on foot against Jim.”
He flushed, but went on bravely:
“We know there have been attempts of that sort before, because I was mixed up in one of them myself. Doesn’t it seem to you, Mr. Merriwell, that some one may be at work again, trying to do Jim up and make him look like a professional just to drive him off the team and keep him out of the captaincy?”
“It looks very much like that to me,” said the universal coach gravely. “And it’s a very hard charge to meet. The time is very short, and the evidence against Jim is very convincing.”
Then, feeling that as Carter knew so much, he had better hear the whole story, he told him of the episode of the missing registered letter, the receipt for which made up the real evidence against Jim.
Carter whistled.
“Well,” he said, “it ought to be easy to trace that letter. It seems to me it’s a sure thing that some one must have stolen it. And that’s a pretty serious offense. They wouldn’t dare destroy it, it seems to me. They might want to produce the letter later, in such a way as to make it look as if Jim had kept it hidden all the time. I should say that the best thing to do would be to keep a careful watch on Jim’s place, and make sure that no one gets away with any trick of that sort there. When people do a crooked thing like that, they almost always overreach themselves by trying to accomplish too much. That was the trouble when that scoundrel Harding was using me to make trouble for Jim.”
“You’ve certainly helped a lot by hearing that and coming to me,” said Dick heartily. “And you’ve given me an idea, beside, that I ought to have thought of myself. Can I count on you to help me in this business?”