“I say, Chip! For the love of Mike come up on the mesa! There’s something going on up there that would give a cast-iron cat a conniption fit.”
It was afternoon in the camp at Tinaja Wells. All the Ophir squad of football players had been taken up Mohave Cañon by Handy, the captain, on a hike. Only a camp guard consisting of Merriwell, Ballard, Clancy, and their new chum, Ellis Darrel, had been left behind. Fritz Gesundheit, the fat German cook, and Silva, the Mexican packer and camp roustabout, had not gone up the cañon, having nothing to do with the Ophir eleven, but they had vanished from the flat soon after a dozen lads, in running togs, had trotted out of sight. Professor Phineas Borrodaile, whose duties as tutor for Merry and his chums were over for the day, had gone off somewhere on a geological excursion. Clancy also had strolled off, but suddenly he reappeared in camp, his freckled face red with suppressed mirth. He was scarcely able to talk, but as he reeled around and gasped for breath he managed to make his request for the others to go back with him to the mesa.
Merriwell, Ballard, and Darrel jumped up from the shade of the cottonwood where they had been sitting and stared at the red-headed chap in amazement. Clancy, unable to control himself, leaned weakly against the trunk of the cottonwood and laughed until he choked.
“What the mischief ails you, Clan?” demanded Merry.
“Where’d you get the funny powder, anyhow?” inquired Ballard.
“Pass the joke around, pard,” urged Darrel.
With a violent effort Clancy managed to smother his hilarity.
“Carrots and Hot Tamale have got the athletic bug,” explained Clancy, “and the stunts they’re doing on the mesa would bring tears to a pair of glass eyes. One is trying to make a better showing than the other, and, if I’m any prophet, they’ll get to slugging before they’re many minutes older.”
The campers had not only given Fritz the nickname of “Carrots” but they had also dubbed Silva the “Hot Tamale.”
“We don’t want those two fellows to get to hammering each other,” Merriwell remarked. “Ever since Carrots took the Mexican’s place as cook there’s been bad blood between those two.”