“No.”

“Something is the matter with you, and I fancy I know what it is.”

“Perhaps so.”

“I’ve come to talk it over——”

The dark-eyed lad cut him short with a gesture.

“Don’t!” he exclaimed hoarsely. “Talk of anything else—baseball, spring sports, the Southern trip, anything!”

“What is that you have in your hand?”

Almost rudely Bart pushed Frank aside and walked to a desk, into the drawer of which he thrust the photograph. But when he turned round he felt certain Merriwell knew it was a picture of Elsie and that he had been seen pressing that picture to his lips.

“Sit down,” he invited again, with a motion toward a chair.

Frank did so.