Tom, dazed, smiled weakly. "Do you mean—do you mean they want me to play?" he murmured.
"Oh, no," scoffed Steve, pushing him toward the bed on which he subsided in a heap. "They want you to carry the footballs and sweep the gridiron! Of course they want you to play, you old sobersides! Don't you see that with Sawyer on pro there's a big hole in the line? I suppose they'll give Churchill the first chance at it, but he won't last the game through. Think of both you and I making the 'varsity, Tom! How's that for luck, eh? Not bad for the old Tannersville High School, is it? I guess we've gone and put Tannersville on the map, Tom!"
"Gee, I'm scared!" muttered Tom, looking up at Steve with wide eyes. "I—I don't believe I'll do it!"
"You don't, eh? Well, you're going to do it! Get your old duds on and hurry up. It's after six."
"I'll have to tell Brownell I'm not going to the feast." Tom gazed fascinatedly at his best trousers draped across the chair back. "Anyway, I wasn't keen on going—without you," he murmured.
"There's only one drawback," said Steve a few minutes later, when they were on their way to supper. "And that is that I promised Durkin to buy a rug from him."
"A rug? We don't need any rug, do we?" asked Tom.
"Not a bit. But this is a genuine Begorra; Durkin says so himself. And I agreed to buy it if he'd tell 'Horace' about Sawyer. Unless—unless you'd rather have the shoe-blacking stand, Tom?"
"I would. If we had that, perhaps you'd keep your shoes decent!"
Steve tipped Tom's cap over his eyes. "Rude ruffian!" he growled affectionately.