"Better wait," advised Mr. Martin with a laugh and a quick look at his colleague. "If you sent Blue Hill another challenge so soon, they'd only laugh at you, and very likely they would say you arranged the whole coaching plan merely to beat them. If you will permit us to suggest something, we have another scheme."
"What is it?" sung out Innis with engaging frankness.
"We will play some other strong team before we again ask Blue Hill to let us have a chance at them," suggested Mr. Martin. "Then, if we win, as I hope we shall, we will be more in their class. Beating Dunkirk hardly put us there, even though we made a bigger score against them than Blue Hill did. And then, after you get your second wind, so to speak, we will consider getting into the Military League. Do you agree to that plan?"
"Sure!" came instantly from all present. The boys would have agreed to anything that would have paved the way to tackling Blue Hill.
"Then we'll go ahead on that understanding," proceeded the coach. "And now for the second part of the plan. You know it is of little benefit to play some team weaker than you are. What you want to do is to take on some eleven that you know is going to be hard to beat. That will bring out whatever good points we have not yet discovered. Is that clear?"
Once more the boys looked at each other in some astonishment. What was the coach leading to?
"Am I making myself clear?" he asked again.
"Yes. Sure. Go ahead," were some of the answers.
"Then the plan of Mr. Spencer and myself is this," went on Mr. Martin. "We will put you through some hard practice in the next week, and then we will challenge Haskell University."
For a moment there was a period of intense silence in the room. Then several half-astonished gasps could be heard. Once more the boys looked at one another, but this time, instead of with puzzled glances, it was more with looks of fear, or at least uncertainty.