“I’m ready to do my best,” said Jim. “I never felt better in my life than I do right now, and this afternoon, when I let out some steam with Taylor, my curves were breaking better than they have all season. I seemed to be able to put the ball just where I wanted it every time.”
“How about the captaincy next year?” said Brady. “I suppose it’s pretty well settled that Jim here is to get it? Carter isn’t going to run, and Jackson’s got the football job. I can’t think of any one else who’s in line for it.”
“You’re too modest, Bill,” said Jim, with a laugh. “What’s the matter with your being captain yourself? You’d make a better one than I ever would.”
But Brady only laughed.
“Me?” he said. “I’m not gunning for any trouble of that sort. It’s too much like work. I’d rather play under some one else and watch them struggling with all the worries of that job. Look at old Sherman. He worries about the team the whole time. I bet he’s lost ten pounds, and he’s been lying awake nights, planning out ways to make the team better.”
“Sherman’s a good captain,” said Dick Merriwell. “I’ll be well pleased if Phillips is elected, but I don’t take sides in that sort of thing. It’s for the team to choose the captain, and for me, after he’s chosen, to work with him to turn out the best possible team for Yale. That’s what Parker couldn’t seem to understand.”
“There’s a lot of things he hasn’t understood yet,” said Bill Brady grimly. “But I guess he’ll find them out before he’s much older, and I think he’s just about enough of a man to come out and admit that he’s been wrong when it’s brought home to him. He’s got a wrong start, but he isn’t such a bad fellow when you get right down to cases with him. It’s more a case of being foolish than anything else with him.”
“That’s what I thought,” said Dick. “I’m glad to hear you say that. He’s done good work for Yale already, and I hope he’ll do a lot more before he gets through. He’s the sort that ought to turn into a useful citizen, and a credit to the college.”
“We ought to get along without all this trouble between Yale men,” said Jim Phillips. “I hate to see it. It’s bad for the college, and it never does any one any good. I’m not looking for trouble here, and I’m going to do all I can to keep out of it hereafter.”