"What do you mean by that, Hi Porter?" demanded Ben, hotly. "You have insinuated that sort of thing too many times in my hearing. And I want you to understand that you can't put on any captain's airs over me, now that we are off the field. I am my own master for to-night anyway." "Come, come, boys," interposed Larry, soothingly. "Don't let us mar the enjoyment of this evening by lugging in any old quarrels or little differences. We shall all have to pull together to-morrow, if we are to beat the Calumets. They are going to give us a stiff brush, and you may depend on that. Come, Hiram, let's be off." Burton said something, sullenly and indistinctly, about the certainty of the defeat of the Catalpas, to-morrow, which caught the ear of "The Lily," who, still puffing with the effects of his tussle with Neddie Ellis, was regarding the malcontent Ben with an expression of wonder on his good-natured face. He slowly dropped out a few words of comment, in his usual fashion, upon Burton's unfriendly attitude and then added: "I say, I wonder why you don't give up playing base ball, since you find so little fun in it. 'Pears to me you are all the time out 'o sorts--like. You don't enjoy good health, Ben, and that's what is the matter along of you. Now, why do you think that the Calumets are going to get away with us, to-morrow?" But before Ben could form a reply and cover the confusion that crept over his face, Neddie Ellis, who was the universal favorite of the club, broke in with, "Oh, I say, boys, do you know what these Chicago people call us? why they call us 'The Cats.' That's short for Catalpas, I suppose. We ought to call the Calumets 'The Cads,' and I guess that would be getting even." Under cover of the laugh which this sally raised, Hiram, Larry, and young Heaton departed to fulfil their engagement on the north side, Ben Burton looking after them with a darkened countenance. "Ben is angry because he is not invited to Judge Morris's," said Larry, as the three young fellows stepped lightly off in search of a street car. "He has a jealous temper, and the least thing that looks like a slight sets him off." "Well," said Albert, "Alice said that the Judge would have liked to have invited the whole nine, if he had had room to entertain them properly; but he hadn't, and so he invited only those with whom the governor was most acquainted." "To say nothing of Miss Alice?" added Hiram, slyly. Albert admitted that Miss Alice's wishes were consulted in the matter, and that it was only natural that she, being a visitor, should indicate her preferences in the matter.