“And Merry sometimes speaks of the rackets he had there. It must be a great school.”
“One of the finest in the country,” nodded Frank. “If I have boys of my own, to Fardale they will go. If I had a younger brother, which, unfortunately, I have not, I’d see that he was sent to Fardale.”
“No wonder he’s stuck on Fardale,” said Browning. “It was there he met Elsie Bellwood.”
Browning was regarding Merry searchingly, and an expression of dissatisfaction settled on his strong face.
“But I didn’t think you’d let anybody, not even Hodge, cut you out with Elsie, Merriwell,” he ventured to say.
“There are lots of things you do not know, Bruce,” he spoke in a very quiet manner. “If you were joking, why that’s all right; but I fancied you spoke earnestly, and, if so, I don’t want you to get any false notions that you know it all.”
“Well, I know how things look from the road. You think a lot of Hodge, but no man has a right to give up a nice girl like Elsie Bellwood just because his particular friend gets struck on her.”
Frank was not a little surprised to hear Browning speak in this manner, for Bruce was the last man in the world to meddle with the business of another, especially in such a delicate matter as this. Such being the case, Merry knew that Browning must feel strongly on that particular point, else he’d never ventured to say a word.
Browning was sitting up now, looking grim and solid.
“He’s stuck on Elsie himself!” thought Frank, in surprise. “That is what’s the matter! He’s a big, strong fellow, and such men have a way of getting all broke up over girls like Elsie. It has made him sore to see Hodge walk off with her, same as he has since that Doctor Lincoln affair.”
“You are not in a position to correctly understand the matter, old man. Some time you may.”
Frank remembered that Bruce had not been in the best of spirits of late, and now he fancied he was beginning to understand the meaning of the change that had come over the big fellow. At last, Browning had realized that some great event had taken place, bringing about a condition of affairs that astonished and displeased him. Merriwell had withdrawn from Elsie, and Hodge had stepped in.
Perhaps, in his heart, Bruce had long admired Elsie, refraining from letting her or any one else know it because he was Frank’s friend, and Frank seemed to care for her. Such being the case, it must gall him greatly to see Merry apparently give up the blue-eyed, golden-haired girl without a struggle, letting Hodge step in and carry her off in triumph.