The high school rivals

by Frank V. Webster

"As I was saying," he began, his voice trembling with emotion, "you must watch out for Phil Thomas, the Landon left guard. He'll try to make Bart's nose bleed—the way he did last year. If he does, Bart'll lose his head and the game will be lost."

More than two score of people were within earshot of these words, and as they realized that the boy who had been so wantonly insulted in public had not allowed his personal feelings to outweigh his desire to have Baxter win, they broke into hearty cheers, many of them pressing forward to shake Fred's hands.

"Ouch! this hurts more than the other!" he exclaimed, and, wriggling like an eel, he slipped from the crowd with the same skill that made him so hard a runner to tackle on the football gridiron.

But though the students were prevented from showing their sympathy to Fred, they were able to let the rich bully know in what light they regarded his action—which they did in no uncertain manner, turning their backs on him, as with one accord, and paying no further attention to him whatsoever.

Though they strove to regain their former lightheartedness, the incident had cast a damper on their spirits, and many of Baxter's supporters considered it an omen of disaster for the various teams.

Realizing the prolongation of such feeling would have a bad effect upon the morale of the various elevens, Sandow, Hal and several other Firsts went through the train rallying the students. And with such good effect that when the train arrived at Landon they had practically regained their former high spirits.

That both schools might be able to witness the game between the First Teams, the contests between the Third and Second Forms were always held in the morning.

But that the Baxter students were still determined to let Bart understand they resented his treatment of Fred, was evident when the elevens lined up. Only a handful were present to watch the contest between the Seconds, the rest flocking to watch the Thirds.

The result of this wholesale boycott of the Second team was that it was defeated by the overwhelming score of 30 to 4—despite brilliant work by Buttons, who proved himself the star of the game—while the Thirds, encouraged by the cheering of their schoolmates, won their game, 12 to 6.

Elated by their victory of their Seconds, which they had conceded to Baxter, the Landon students declared the game between the Firsts was already won—and such proved to be the case, for Sandow and Hal were unable to defeat the entire Landon eleven, though the game was a tie, 0 to 0, until the last fifteen minutes of play, when the captain of the Baxter team was obliged to leave the game, after which Landon scored a touch-down, and won, to the score of 6 to 0.