“I’ve heard him described, and I thought I had him spotted as he passed through the office. To settle any doubts, I looked at the register. There was his name, plain enough: ‘Simeon Guffey, Gold Hill.’ I don’t like the idea of his sneaking around Ophir like this.”
“Don’t be in a taking about it, old man,” said Frank soothingly. “Where did he go?”
“There was a horse out in front, and he got into the saddle and pointed for the cañon trail. On his way back to Gold Hill, I reckon.”
“Come on up to my room,” said Merry. “Clan, you and Pink had better come, too.”
When they had the captain behind the closed door, Frank told him about the squabble in the back yard, and how, in a most surprising way, Guffey had been discovered under the empty packing case. Frank propounded his theory as to why Guffey was in that peculiar place, and produced the “hypoderm” in evidence.
Handy was experiencing an attack of nerves and was ready to see the hidden hand of the Gold Hill club in anything and everything that looked a little off color.
“There’s something back of his being here,” he declared, “and it’s a heap more than you imagine, Merriwell. Guffey didn’t blow into town for any good. He may use the dope, but you can gamble that he’s not using it to an extent that queers him in his work as coach.”
It was several minutes before Frank and his chums could calm Handy sufficiently for a talk about football. At last, however, they began a study of the club eleven with the view of shifting the players around and getting better results.
“I wouldn’t drop any of the boys from the regular team, Chip,” said the captain earnestly.
“It would be a bad move at this late day,” Frank answered, “to put in some new men from the scrub team. If we had two weeks left I don’t know but I’d try it, but with only four days for good, hard practice, dropping anybody from the eleven would be a mistake. Win or lose, Handy, we’ll use the material we have. We can do a little shifting, though.”