There was a knock at the door and Tod Tenney came in. “Hello, Coach! Hi, Rus! Say, is there anything special this evening? Anything to discuss, I mean? If there isn’t I want to cut. There’s a shindig down town.” Tod grinned.
“‘Nobody knows,’” hummed Rus, “‘where the Old Man goes, but he takes his dancing shoes!’”
“Yes, there’s one thing,” answered the coach gravely. “I’d like your opinion, Tod. What do you think of this fellow Renneker?”
Tod already had the doorknob in hand, and now he turned it, pulled the portal inward and sort of oozed through the aperture. But before the countenance quite disappeared the mouth opened and the oracle spoke.
“He’s a false-alarm,” was the verdict.
Then the door closed.
Sunday afternoon Slim and Leonard went to walk again and, at Leonard’s suggestion, ended up at Number 102 Melrose avenue. Johnny McGrath seemed extremely pleased to see them, but Slim had to hint broadly before the lemonade pitcher appeared. They talked of yesterday’s game, which Johnny had attended. “I took my kid brother,” said Johnny. “He plays on his grammar school team now and then. He’s a sort of tenth substitute or something, as near as I get it. Well, he told me confidentially yesterday after we got home that his team could beat the stuffing out of ours!”
Slim laughed. “I wouldn’t want to say it couldn’t, the way we played yesterday. How does it happen, though, that the kid’s playing football when you can’t, Johnny?”
Johnny smiled. “Mother doesn’t know it, you see. Maybe I ought to tell on him, but he’s crazy about it and I haven’t the heart. Sure, I don’t believe he’s likely to get hurt, for all the playing he does.”