and with his companion stood staring at Frank and Ned.
"Hum! I should say so," sniggered Durkin with a chuckle. "Pah! How it smells of onions and dishwater!"
"Take your friend and introduce him to Ritchie," sneered Banbury. "He needs a new catcher for his measly team that we're going to wallop to-morrow."
"Say," spoke Frank steadily, though with a flashing eye, "I'll bet you that my friend here—understand, my friend, Ned Foreman—would prove as good a catcher as he has to my knowledge run a business where he was trusted and did his duty well. I'll make another bet—you'll be the second-rate scholar you are now two years further on, when my friend is the boss of some surveying camp, where the smartest fellow is the one who has learned the cooking and science both—not a smattering—but from the ground up."
"Yah!" yawped Banbury, but he saw something in Frank's eye that warned him to sheer off promptly.
"You'll run up against a few cads like that fellow," explained Frank to Ned. "Use 'em up in one chapter, and stick to the real friends I'll introduce you to."
"Jordan, you're a true-blue brick," declared Ned
