"Oh, they're cads, all right," assented Dave. "Yet that bunch of fellows contains some of the material that is needed in putting forth the best High School team this year!"
"Humph!" commented Dave disgustedly. "Yet, Dick, I was almost surprised that you would stop and listen, without letting the fellows know you were there."
"It does seem sneaky, at first thought," Prescott admitted, almost shamefacedly.
"Hold on there!" ordered Dave. "I don't believe you'd do a thing like that, Dick Prescott, unless you had an honorable reason for it."
"I did it because the honor of the High School is so precious to me—-to us all," Dick replied. "We want to put forth a winning team, as Gridley High School has always done. Now, these 'soreheads' aim to defeat that by keeping a few of the best players off the eleven. I listened, Dave, because I wanted to know what the trouble was, and just who was making it. Now, I guess I know how to deal with the 'sore-heads.' I'll make them ashamed of themselves."
"How?"
"One thing at a time, Dave. In our excitement we've almost forgotten that we started out to find Theodore Dodge and clear up the mystery of his disappearance."
CHAPTER V
AT THE END OF THE TRAIL
"The further we go the more mysterious this becomes," mused Dick, as he and Darrin stood together over a clump of faintly-marked footprints, a quarter of an hour later.