A half-dozen young fellows ran for the nearest carriage, toward which Agnew was conducted as rapidly as possible. Harry Rattleton seemed dazed, and began to look about on the ground as the crowd thinned out there, Merriwell hurried to him.

"What's the matter?" he anxiously asked.

"The sh.e.l.ls were knocked out of my hands!" gasped Rattleton. "And not half of them seem to be here!"

Merriwell's look became anxious. He stooped down with Harry and began to gather up the sh.e.l.ls.

"A shrewd trick, but it didn't work!" he exclaimed, holding up a cartridge. "Here is one of those that were fixed for me, anyway. And now I know that Agnew did it, and that he intended to kill me!"

The other sh.e.l.ls which Agnew had prepared were gone, having been gathered up in the midst of the tumult and excitement and cleverly slipped by Agnew into his pockets.

"Who fired that shot?" Merriwell asked.

"I don't know!"

Others were gathering round.

"He tried to kill me, Harry, and I shall strike back. And when I strike I shall strike in a way to make the stroke felt!"

CHAPTER XI.

FRANK PREVENTS TROUBLE.

Badger's belief that Hodge had juggled the sh.e.l.l which exploded in the gun was not very strong when he left the grounds of the gun club, but his hatred of Hodge was not in any degree lessened thereby. Only by a supreme exercise of will-power had he been able to keep himself from rushing upon Bart when the latter made his bitter comments to Merry.

"Merriwell is all right, but Hodge isn't even a piece of a man!" he growled, as he made his way home, his thoughts in a chaotic state. "I shall have to punch his head for him. Merry wouldn't have beat me shooting if I had taken my own gun along! I reckon I was a fool for going into the thing. Hodge isn't any too good to slip that sh.e.l.l in on Merry! And if he didn't do it, who did? And I'd like to know what was in it? That's whatever!"

Bart's feelings against the Westerner were quite as bitter. He almost hated the ground on which Badger's shadow fell. It seemed unlikely that Frank could ever reconcile these two antagonistic characters.

Bart was sore also about the way Frank's friends were treating him. Nor was the feeling lessened by his own inner conviction that he had dealt rather shabbily with one who had been as true a friend to him as Merry had been, and that the other members of the "flock" had good grounds for looking on him with disfavor.

"I shall never crawl on my knees for the friendship and good-will of any of them!" was his thought, as he turned a corner on his way to the lighted campus, on the evening of the second day after the shooting.

"And as for Badger----"

He ran violently against a man and was hurled backward. The man was Badger.

"What do you mean by that?" the Westerner demanded, for he, also, had been almost knocked from his feet, and he, too, had been feeding his hot anger with inflammatory thoughts against Bart. "You did that on purpose!"

Hodge lunged at the Kansan's face. But the blow did not fall. The fist was knocked down, and a strong grasp on his shoulder turned him half-round.

"Stop this!" came sternly from Frank Merriwell, who was also on his way to the campus.

"Let me get at him!" Bart panted, trying to wrench away. "He ran into me and tried to knock me down just now. I can't stand it! I won't stand it!"

"Oh, let him come on!" the Westerner grated. "I've been aching for a crack at him for a month! I'll polish him off in short order, if you will just let him come on! He thinks because he knocked me out once that he can do it again!"

"If you fellows are determined to fight, I'll arrange for you to get at each other some time, but you are not going to fight here, and that is flat!"

"Oh, well, let it go!" said Bart, with intense bitterness and disgust.

"I'll not trouble him here. But if we ever do come up against each other, I'll hammer the life out of him!"

"I don't doubt you'd kill me if you could!" the Kansan sneered. "I rather think you tried it the other day."

"What do you mean?" Bart demanded, again bristling. "Do you mean the sh.e.l.l that blew up the gun?"

"It's strange you can guess so easy!" Badger insinuated.

"See here, Badger," said Frank, who had stepped between the belligerents. "You insult me when you intimate that Bart knew anything about that sh.e.l.l. That sh.e.l.l was slipped into my box by Morton Agnew. I have discovered enough already to convince me of that. I saw him do something to-day, too, which puts a big club into my hand!"

Badger's face changed, but he would not admit that he might be wrong in laying the dastardly deed at the door of Bart Hodge.

"When you've got the proof, I'll look at it," he doubtingly remarked, turning about.

"Oh, don't talk to him!" Hodge growled. "I wouldn't waste words on him."

"I'll hammer your face for this some day!" Badger panted, turning back.

"It's right here, ready for the hammering whenever you get ready to try it!" Hodge snapped, and then moved away with Merriwell. Seeing that they were heading toward the campus, the Westerner went now in a different direction.

"I don't know why I should let Merriwell come in and interfere in that way," he grumbled. "I allow that it really was none of his affair. But I permitted him to order me to stand back, and I stood back. Of course, I'm under obligations to him, and all that, and he said good words to Winnie for me when I seemed to need them--but, hang it all! he isn't my boss! Who made him my master? It's all right for him to lead Hodge around by the nose that way, but----"

"h.e.l.lo!" came in an inquiring voice, and Badger, looking up, saw Morton Agnew. The Westerner's face took on an unpleasant look, and he did not answer the hail.

"Don't be surly!" said Agnew, coming boldly on.

"What do you want?" snapped the Kansan.

Then the thought came to him that it would be a good idea to treat Agnew with some consideration, for thereby it might be possible to get the inside facts about the sh.e.l.l that ripped the gun open and came so near mangling his arm.

"What do you want?" he asked again, toning down his gruffness.

"I know we're not friends," said Agnew, with the suavity of a confidence man, "but that is no reason why we should always remain foes. I saw you here, and you looked lonesome. I'm a rather lonesome bird myself to-night, so I whistled to you."

"I allow you've the most gall of any man I ever saw!" was Badger's thought.

Aloud, he said:

"We'll go down this way, then. Did I look lonesome? Well, I wasn't feeling any lonesome, I can tell you--none whatever!"

"Perhaps you object to my company?" drawing back.

Badger knew that this was a piece of acting, and he wanted to crack Agnew on the jaw for it. But he held himself in check. Really Badger seemed to be gaining some self-control--a thing that was entirely foreign to him when he first knew Merriwell. He was enabled to hold himself in by the intense desire he felt to discover if Agnew slipped the "fixed" sh.e.l.l into the box. That was an important point just then.

"Come along!" the Westerner grunted. "You said that you were lonesome, if I am not. I'm not so hoggish as to want to run away from a man who thinks he can get good out of my company."