Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this file which includes the original illustrations. See 61107-h.htm or 61107-h.zip: (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/61107/61107-h/61107-h.htm) or (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/61107/61107-h.zip) TOM SLADE PICKS A WINNER [Illustration: A DARK FIGURE GLIDED SILENTLY FROM BEHIND A TREE.] TOM SLADE PICKS A WINNER by PERCY KEESE FITZHUGH Author of the Tom Slade Books the Roy Blakeley Books the Pee-Wee Harris Books the Westy Martin Books Illustrated by Howard L. Hastings Published with the approval of The Boy Scouts of America Grosset & Dunlap Publishers : : New York Made in the United States of America Copyright, 1924, by Grosset & Dunlap CONTENTS I Suspense II A Visitor III The Doctor’s Orders IV The Unseen Triumph V A Promise VI The Lone Figure VII An Odd Number VIII The Light Under the Bushel IX The Emblem of the Single Eye X Before Camp-fire XI Friendly Enemies XII Archie Dennison XIII Gray Wolf XIV Under a Cloud XV Tom’s Advice XVI Old Acquaintance XVII Tom Acts XVIII Pastures New XIX Advance XX Another Promise XXI A Bargain XXII Shattered Dreams XXIII The Lowest Ebb XXIV Strike Two XXV New Quarters XXVI July Twenty-fifth XXVII Strike Three XXVIII Voices XXIX When It Turns Red XXX Jaws Unseen XXXI The Home Run XXXII Tom’s Big Day XXXIII It Runs in the Family TOM SLADE PICKS A WINNER CHAPTER I SUSPENSE The boy lay in a large, thickly upholstered Morris chair in the living room. His mother had lowered the back of this chair so that he could recline upon it, and she kneeled beside him holding his hand in one of hers while she gently bathed his forehead with the other. She watched his face intently, now and again averting her gaze to observe a young girl, her daughter, who had lifted aside the curtain in the front door and was gazing expectantly out into the quiet street. “Is that he?” Mrs. Cowell asked anxiously. “No, it’s a grocery car,” the girl answered. Her mother sighed in impatience and despair. “Hadn’t you better ’phone again?” she asked. “I don’t see what would be the use, mother; he said he’d come right away.”