Deering of Deal; Or, The Spirit of the School
by Latta Griswold · English · Gutenberg #47597 · 481,171 chars · public domain (US)
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Title: Deering of Deal; Or, The Spirit of the School
Author: Latta Griswold
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Language: English
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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK DEERING OF DEAL; OR, THE SPIRIT OF THE SCHOOL ***
DEERING OF DEAL
[Illustration: LOGO]
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
NEW YORK · BOSTON · CHICAGO
DALLAS · SAN FRANCISCO
MACMILLAN & CO., LIMITED
LONDON · BOMBAY · CALCUTTA
MELBOURNE
THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, LTD.
TORONTO
[Illustration: “DON’T HAVE A FIT, DEERING, IT’S ONLY MACLAREN”]
DEERING OF DEAL
OR
THE SPIRIT OF THE SCHOOL
BY
LATTA GRISWOLD
“_Toujours fidèle et sans souci_”
New York
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
1914
_All rights reserved_
COPYRIGHT, 1912
BY THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
Set up and electrotyped. Published October, 1912.
Reprinted July, 1913, July, 1914.
PRESS OF T. MOREY & SON
GREENFIELD, MASS., U. S. A.
To
JOHN GLENOE WRIGHT
LEE HALL JONES
ROBERT GROSVENOR
LUCIUS SCOTT LANDRETH, JR.
HARRY L. FENNER
SAMUEL M. SHOEMAKER, JR.
in warm friendship and in memory of
many happy days at school
FOREWORD
The Author desires to state that none of the characters in this story,
either boys or masters, are portraits. The incidents are entirely
fictitious, and Deal School, though it shares certain topographical
features with the school with which the Author is connected, exists
only in his imagination.
ST. GEORGE’S SCHOOL,
NEWPORT: _18 April, 1912_.
[Illustration: MAP OF DEAL SCHOOL]
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I. DEAL SCHOOL 1
II. A HAZING BEE 10
III. “PAX” 24
IV. MICHAELMAS TERM 35
V. THE BOXFORD GAME 47
VI. AFTERMATH 61
VII. LOVEL’S WOODS 71
VIII. A MIDNIGHT LARK 87
IX. AN ENDING 107
X. FINCH 120
XI. THE DISCOMFITURE OF DUCKY THORNTON 130
XII. A GATING AND A GAME 146
XIII. THE NIGHT OF THE BONFIRE 159
XIV. THE SPECTACLE 169
XV. TONY PLAYS THE PART OF A GUARDIAN ANGEL 188
XVI. A RIFT IN FRIENDSHIP 204
XVII. LEAVE-TAKING 216
XVIII. THE HEAD PREFECTSHIP 232
XIX. THE RESULT OF THE PROTEST 250
XX. FINCH’S HOUR 267
XXI. SELF-SACRIFICE 284
XXII. THE CHAPEL 294
XXIII. THE LAST TERM 306
ILLUSTRATIONS
“Don’t have a fit, Deering, it’s only Maclaren” _Page 99_
_Frontispiece_
Map of Deal School ix
FACING PAGE
Like a flash he slipped off his coat and cast it full in
Chapin’s face 22
“After due consideration Captain Maclaren and I have decided to
play Deering at left end in to-morrow’s game.” 50
Tony dodged ... and raced on with a clear field 158
He opened the drawers and thrust malicious disturbing hands
among the contents 210
Tony was putting his questions now rapidly and with intention for
he had become suspicious 254
With terrible effort he got to the surface again 292
“You will certainly be coming up to college next year?” 306
“Tall, eager, a face to remember,
A flush that could change as the day;
A spirit that knew not December,
That brightened the sunshine of May”
Fresh breezes blow and touch their favorite hill,
The waters quiver in the mellow light,
Wafts Paradise her fragrance o’er the marsh,
The Campus gleams with crimson and with white.
Fair banners flutter in the flowing winds,
And hopes are gleaming from the eyes of youth;
Old songs, from hearts that throb with loyal blood,
Arise, and echo with the ring of truth.
Bright laughter, merry shouts attune the air,
And over all the place is cast the gleam
That early summer lends unto the hours,
The passing hours that flow as doth a dream.
Fleet eager boys the base attain; the ball
In ambient air speeds like a fleeing bird;
Swift hands and sure arrest its vagrant flight,
As from a hundred throats hurrahs are heard.
Dear scenes! as pensive through them wandering,
The shadows lengthen in the slanting light;
Mists float across the golden campus, gleam
As light of stars in stilly depths of night.
Then faces in the wreathes of mist appear,
Dear faces that we loved in long ago
Shine brightly; voices murmur in the air,
Beloved voices that we used to know.
Fades far the dreamy present, fades the day,
With its enduring hopes and passing fears;
Old Boys surround us; and the heart is glad
For all the friendliness of vanished years.
DEERING OF DEAL
CHAPTER I
DEAL SCHOOL
If one chanced to examine the catalogues of Kingsbridge College for the
past hundred years it would be found that in most of them is recorded
the name of some dead and gone Deering—a name famous in the annals of
the South—who came up from Louisiana, “marched through the four long
happy years of college,” as the old song has it, with an arts degree
to his credit; or, perchance, marched out at the end of one or two of
them with nothing to his credit at all. Kingsbridge was a tradition in
the Deering family, southern though it was—a tradition that was hardly
broken, even when in 1861 Victor Deering and a hundred other chivalrous
youths threw their text-books out of the windows and enlisted in the
armies of the Confederacy. Victor’s father, Basil, too, was in the war,
and laid down his arms at Appomattox as a brigadier-general—brevetted
for gallantry on the field of action. For a while it seemed that
no Deerings would go to Kingsbridge, but time at length healed the
old antagonisms, and when it became a question where young Anthony,
Victor’s boy, should go to college, there was no longer any question
that Kingsbridge should be the place.
Preparing for Kingsbridge, before the war, had meant going first for
three or four years to Deal School, another Cæsarean seat of learning,
almost as well known as the college itself. The warm-hearted old
general had as fond memories of the school-topped, wind-swept hill
above the rocks of Deal, as he had of the meadows and hills about
Kingsbridge. There were a great many family counsels held in the old
house on the bayou; some prejudices pocketed; some feminine qualms
appeased and tears dried; and a great deal of correspondence was
exchanged between the Head Master of Deal and the old General, who
ruled his family to the third and fourth generation.
And so at length on a bright crisp September morning, when he was about
fifteen years old, Anthony Deering found himself getting out of the
little way-train that runs from Coventry to Monday Port across the
Cæsarean flats, and enquiring diligently for a hack to drive him out to
Deal School. He had made the journey up from New Orleans alone, without
a quaver until he came to his journey’s end. He was a day late for
the opening of school, so that he was the only passenger to alight at
Monday Port.
A vociferous cabman offered him the services of a dilapidated fly and
a bony horse. He looked about for better, but not finding them, he
pulled his belt a trifle tighter, swallowed the lump in his throat, and
quieted the man by thrusting his bag into his hand. Then he jumped into
the crazy vehicle, and shouted in a high voice, “Deal School!”
Tony had never been to Monday Port before, but he had heard a great
deal of it from his mother, who had spent gay summers there in
her girlhood, before the war. It had once been a favorite resort
for Southerners, but after their exodus, was taken up by Northern
people, and for a decade or so was one of the most popular Cæsarean
watering-places. The town occupied a long stretch of level country
between the sea and a range of low-lying sandhills. Its streets were
pretty and clean, shaded for the most part by maple trees, with modest
cottages on either side, and here and there more pretentious modern
“villas,” representing almost every conceivable style of architecture.
Tony was not much interested in Monday Port, however, and he eyed these
pleasant homes with a rueful glance, which gave an odd expression to
his attractive young face; for despite the shadows in his gray-blue
eyes and the frown on his dark brows, it was evident that he was
anything but a surly or fretful lad. There was a sparkle in the depths
of the shadow; lines of cheerfulness behind the frown; the glow of
health in his cheeks.
At last the old horse dragged the fly listlessly out of the shady
street and they came into an open space, which fronted on a broad sheet
of water flowing down with a fine sweep to the sea. A long bridge led
across Deal Water to a straight white road which cleft a clean path
through the rising meadowland. Eastward the wide expanse of green
was edged by a line of tawny sands, where the turf swept down to the
bluffs. Beyond lay the sea, sparkling like a great splendid jewel. Tony
loved the sea, and a thrill went through him as he saw it again now
after a long time. A load seemed lifted from his heart, though there
was still some wistfulness for the sleepy bayou and the old plantation
and the dear familiar faces. He remembered how so many Deerings before
him had crossed that great still pond on their way to school, and had
known that restless sea during happy boyhood.
“Is that the school?” he cried to the driver, springing up as he caught
sight of a pile of buildings which crowned a hill-top at the end of
the long white road ahead of them. There seemed to be a great many of
these buildings, standing shoulder to shoulder, long and low for the
most part, but one higher than the rest, marked by a tapering spire.
The rays of the morning sun glinted on the windows so that they seemed
ablaze with light. A fresh breeze was blowing off the ocean. There was
the smell of seaweed in the air and of herby autumnal flowers. Here and
there a field was stained literally purple with Michaelmas daisies,—a
vivid contrast to the deep green of the meadows.
Tony could scarcely contain himself as the fly crawled up the steep
road. Then, just as they reached the summit, a few paces before
they turned into the school drive, another splendid view opened to
them unexpectedly. On the other side of the school grounds the hill
descended much more precipitously toward a point of rocky land which
jutted into the sea; to the east the land bent with an enormous curve,
embracing a wide beach about a mile in length; then, turning sharply
again, rose into hilly land, thickly wooded, rocky-shored, which
crowded about the great inlet, somewhat misnamed the Strathsey River.
Across the morning haze gleamed the shores of a broad peninsula known
as Strathsey Neck. In the midst of the river,—or bay, for it was
really that,—a pile of rocks jutted from the waters, on which was
situate a lighthouse, marked in the charts as Deigr Light.
Tony was a little bewildered by the unexpected impelling beauty of the
situation. The cab turned into the school driveway then, and at the end
of a graveled elm-shaded avenue, he saw a low long building of gray
stone—of Tudor architecture, he learned afterwards—approached by a
broad flight of stone steps.
A maid-servant met him at the door, surmised that he was the new boy,
and said, “I will show you at once to the Doctor’s study.” They passed
through a large hall, which Tony just could see was attractive, with
its black oak paneling and the great open fireplace at the farther end,
and then he was ushered into a cheerful pleasant-looking room, his hand
was heartily clasped, and a gruff kindly voice bade him welcome.
Tony looked up, and saw a pair of sharp blue eyes, set deep under
shaggy gray brows in a firm strongly-lined face, under a mass of thick
gray hair, looking enquiringly into his. It was a kindly, inquisitive
glance, as though their owner were wondering what manner of boy this
was. Doctor Forester was growing old now, but he was still in the prime
of his activity as a vigorous and effective head master. He looked
down upon the fair copper-colored head of the boy, and into his frank
gray-blue eyes, which looked back fearlessly.
“Ah, Deering, I am glad to see you. I am sorry you are late, however,
for it is not the best way to begin,” he said, speaking with a
sharp accent, and in quick phrases, which Tony was to learn were
characteristic.
“I know, sir, but my grandfather—”
“Your grandfather, my boy, used to get caned once a week by old
Doctor Harvey for the same incorrigible offense. But I understand the
situation. You are not to blame. You are to have a room in Standerland
Hall and sit at Mr. Morris’s table in the dining-room. Stop here a
moment, while I send for a boy to show you about. Then you can get your
books, and go into class the last morning period. We are going to try
you in the Third. The master-in-charge will assign you a seat in the
schoolroom.” The doctor touched a bell on his desk. “Send Lawrence to
me, please,” he said to the servant who answered it; and then turning
to Deering again, “Well, my boy, how is your grandfather? Has he told
you that we were at Kingsbridge together? He was a senior when I was a
freshman. He rescued me one night at a hazing-bee. Those were good old
days—never the like of _them_ again! I am glad they are sending you
north to school and college. Ah, Lawrence! come in, come in. Lawrence,
this is Anthony Deering. He is to be in your form and hall. Take him
about a bit—that’s a good fellow—introduce him to the masters—and
report to Mr. Morris before the last period. Good-bye now. Come to the
Rectory to tea this afternoon, Deering, and we can have some talk
about the General.”
The Doctor said all this very rapidly, and almost before Deering and
Lawrence had finished their embarrassed greeting, he had turned to his
desks and was busy with his papers.
James Lawrence—or Jimmie, as he was always called—was a slender,
dark-haired handsome youth. He had a frank countenance, an engaging
smile, black hair, and beautiful dark eyes. He recovered his
self-possession in a moment and looked Tony over critically, as he
waited for the Doctor to finish speaking. “Very good, sir,” he said, at
length. “Come along, Deering, and I’ll show you where you are to room.”
“You may think the old gentleman is in the clouds,” he said, as they
turned into a long corridor leading from the Doctor’s study, “but we
have to wake up early in the morning to fool him—not that we don’t,
you know!—but he is keen enough to make it mighty interesting. Why I
have got twenty-five distinct directions about you already. You are
to sit next me at table, for instance, and poor old Teddy Lansing is
transferred to Mr. Williams.”
“Will he mind?” asked Tony, a trifle anxiously.
“Well, you’ll find out if he does mind. Teddy’s a noisy brute. There!
that’s the way into the schoolroom,” he interrupted himself to say,
“you’ll wish you could forget it in a week or so. Take a tip, watch
Kit Wilson and me; we’ll show you a trick or two. But you are so
beastly new.... See that animated broomstick toddling along? That’s old
Roylston, the Latin master; you’ll meet him too soon for your comfort;
we won’t stop now, despite the Doctor’s instructions. Give him a wide
berth, and don’t bluff him.”
By this time they had got outside the Old School on the terrace, with
the wonderful outlook over bay and sea. Tony began to make some remark
about the view.
“Oh, the view!” exclaimed Lawrence, “You’ll get used to that too.
That’s Lovel’s Woods over yonder,” he said, pointing to a stretch of
thickly-wooded hilly land by the Strathsey shore, “rather useful in the
winter term. You’re in Standerland, eh? That’s that long crazy gray
stone building over the quad. Lucky dog to get a room, say I. Bill
Morris is the master—a decent sort; an old boy, strong therefore with
the doctor. Thank heaven and the Head that you’re going to be under
Bill. No, we aren’t going over there now. You’ll have to scamper over
there to wash up before dinner. I’ve got a page of Cæsar to do before
last period, so let’s toddle to the schoolroom. Bill’s in charge, and
he’ll smooth things over. Wait for me after school and I’ll pilot you
in to grub.”
They had brought up now at the entrance to the Schoolhouse, which
was connected with the Old School by a cloister and formed the north
side of a great quadrangle. To the west lay Standerland House and the
Chapel, a pure Gothic structure with a beautiful tower and spire,
and the Rectory, the Head Master’s residence, between. Eastward lay
the Gymnasium and the Refectory or dining-hall, the latter on a line
with the Old School. North of the Schoolhouse was another quadrangle,
flanked by Standerland and the Gymnasium, with Montrose and Howard
Houses on its northern side. Beyond that still lay the playing-fields.
All this Jimmie barely had time to indicate, as the two boys ran up
a wide flight of steps, traversed a broad corridor, and entered the
schoolroom, where he introduced Tony to the master-in-charge.
Tony could never remember what was said by either of them; he felt
as if the gaze of the hundred pair of eyes, belonging to the hundred
boys bent over their desks, was burning into his back. There was a
vague sort of comfort in the pleasant tones of Mr. Morris’s voice, and
somehow he came back to consciousness a little later, and found himself
seated at a desk, with a brand new copy of the _Gallic Wars_ open
before him, and his lips pronouncing over and over in a meaningless
sort of way—“_Gallia est omnis divisa in partes tres_....”
Thus Deering’s school days at Deal began.
CHAPTER II
A HAZING BEE
As a matter of fact Tony did not get over to Standerland all that
day. He had waited for Lawrence after that first curious hour in the
schoolroom and the subsequent recitation in Cæsar with Mr. Gray,
generally known as “Pussie,” a clever, sarcastic young master, who
mercifully however paid him no attention. Instead then of running
over to the dormitory to wash up, Jimmie led him down a flight of
back stairs in the Schoolhouse, and through a series of subterranean
passages, to a remote little room, in which stood a stationary
washstand in official disuse, which had probably been designed for
the use of the servants. This Jimmie announced with pride to be his
private luxury. “It saves a deal of time and trouble to wash here,” he
explained. Tony could not see that it really did, but he felt at once a
boy’s pleasure in doing the irregular thing.
In this makeshift of a washroom they found another boy, already washing
his hands. He was a bright-eyed, fair-headed, stockily-built youth,
whose face sparkled with good nature. “Hello, Jim,” he cried, as they
came up, “who is your new friend?”
“Deering was his father’s name,” Jimmie answered facetiously, “Anthony
was bestowed upon him by his sponsors in baptism.”
“So! Well, fellow Christian, where do you hail from?”
“I?—I come from Louisiana.”
“Louisiana! that’s a heck of a way to come. Well, Deering Anthony, lace
my boots while I dry my hands.”
“Go to the deuce, Kit!” Lawrence broke in. “Deering’s in the Third.
Take your sloppy boots to the First Form locker-rooms, and don’t brag
here. Swat him, Tony, if he gets fresh.”
Kit burst into a ripple of delicious, infectious laughter. “Oh, that’s
the ticket! Well, Tony, my darling, will you condescend to dip your
lily fingers in this humble basin? The attar of roses unfortunately is
‘all,’ as the excellent Ebenezer Roylston has been known to put it.
Permit me to offer you a towel.” With the words he deftly extracted
Jimmie’s handkerchief, and thrust it at Deering. There was a laugh
and scuffle between the two boys, quickly over as a distant bell
sounded; they grabbed their coats, and fled unwashed toward the great
dining-hall, which occupied the same relation to the Old School on the
east as the Chapel did on the west.
“Can you play football?” asked Kit, as they ran along the terrace.
“I don’t know—” began Tony.
“Well, come out this afternoon, and find out. Report to me in football
togs at three, and I’ll give you a chance on the Third Form squad.”
“Thanks awfully.”
“Cut that out! Scoot now after Jimmie, or you’ll be late. Good-boy Bill
hates a laggard, and you’re at his table.”
Then had come the first bewildering dinner, with the myriads of
strange faces about him. Already he thought of Jimmie Lawrence, next
whom he sat, as an old friend. In the afternoon he was carried off
to the Store and fitted out with football clothes, and then led off
to the playing-field back of the quadrangle to be tried out. The
game was strange to him, and he felt an awkward muff at it. But as a
matter of fact he was quick and fleet and intelligent, and at the end
of the afternoon, Kit deigned to pat him on the shoulder and to bid
him reappear on the morrow. “You are not half bad, you know; for a
land-lubber, so to speak. Mind you’re regular, and don’t eat toffy, and
keep clear of the pie-house!”
At 5 o’clock Tony found himself excused from afternoon school by the
Doctor’s command, and went in to tea at the Rectory and was introduced
to Mrs. Forester—a sweet, motherly, middle-aged woman; and to two or
three masters, the sarcastic Mr. Gray amongst them; and to four or
five members of the noble Sixth, who were discussing the new football
material. Tony spent a pleasant half-hour there, and after a talk with,
or rather from, the Doctor about Kingsbridge and Deal in the olden
time, he was sent back to the schoolroom and to afternoon recitations.
At 9 o’clock he was dismissed from evening school, and the attentive
Lawrence steered him over to Standerland Hall, where Mr. Morris showed
him the rooms he was to share with a Fourth Former. This was a pleasant
little apartment, consisting of a study and two bedrooms, which looked
eastward, over Lovel’s Woods and the Strathsey River.
“You can unpack to-morrow,” said Mr. Morris, “but you may take
half-an-hour now to get acquainted with your room-mate.”
As they entered the room a tall, lanky youth had arisen from a Morris
chair. He had rather fair, well-moulded features, a cool gray eye, a
quiet but somewhat patronizing manner, a drawl to his speech, and a
general air of distinction, not unmingled with conceit.
“This is Tony Deering, Carroll. Tony, allow me to present you to your
room-mate, Mr. Reginald Carter Westover Carroll, of Virginia.”
“Awh, thanks, Mr. Morris, for getting it all in,” drawled Carroll.
“How-de-do, Deering; pray don’t hesitate to make yourself at home.”
He languidly extended his hand, and allowed Tony to shake it. “Won’t
you honor us, Mr. Morris?” he asked, waving his hand gracefully in the
direction of the deep easy chair.
“No, thank you; not to-night, Reginald. Be good enough to explain to
Deering the simple rules that theoretically will govern his behaviour.
Lights are to be out at nine-thirty. Good-night.”
He shook hands with the boys cordially, and left them alone together.
Deering looked curiously about him, a hundred questions on the tip of
his tongue; which however he refrained from asking, as he saw Carroll
sink back into the Morris chair, extract the novel that he had slipped
under it when he had heard the knock, and resume reading.
Tony stood for a moment, a trifle disconcerted. He was a little at loss
to know what might be the etiquette of such an occasion. “I say,” he
blurted out at last, “I think you might put that book down and tell a
fellow a thing or two.”
Carroll placed the book on the table at his side, with an air of mild
surprise. “Dear child,” he murmured indulgently, “shall we adopt the
Socratic method?”
Tony flushed. “What is the Socratic method?”
“You ask questions; I answer—a few of them.”
“I don’t know that I have any particular questions to ask. I supposed
we might find something to say if we tried hard enough. However, if
you will tell me in which room I am to sleep, and at what hour we are
expected to get up, I think I can get on without troubling you any
further.”
“As to the first of your enquiries,” the long languid youth replied,
“as I happen to have the advantage of being in the Fourth, and to
have arrived a day earlier than you upon the scene of action, I have
chosen the larger one to the right, which is protected from the early
morning sun by a trifling angle of the exterior wall. A murderous bell
will assassinate your innocent sleep at seven in the morning. The time
that you arise will be determined by the length of time it takes you
to dress and your estimate of the value of late marks. Breakfast, my
Socrates, is at half-past seven. Are the problems too much for you?”
Tony smiled. “I reckon I can figure them out.”
“You are both tautological and verbose. The single word ‘reckon’ would
have expressed your meaning quite as accurately and not less elegantly.”
“Oh, I don’t go in for elegance.”
Carroll lifted his eyebrows with an air of feigned surprise, and
surveyed Tony for a moment or so with languid interest. When it
appeared that his new acquaintance had nothing further to say, the
older boy leaned his head wearily back upon his chair, and took up his
book again, holding it open with an air of heroic patience.
“I think I’ll turn in,” said Tony at last.
“Ah!” murmured Carroll, “in that case, I may bid you good-night.”
Poor Tony was a little chilled by his reception, and he flung himself
somewhat petulantly out of the study and into his bedroom. He turned on
the light, undressed quickly, and got into bed. For a long time he lay
thinking; first of Carroll, the elegant, languid, supercilious Carroll,
and rebelled with passionate inner protest at his fate in being
cast to room with him. Why had it not been Jimmie Lawrence—clever,
handsome, jolly Jimmie, of the sparkling eyes, and the good-natured
banter? or the likable self-important Kit, or any one of a dozen or
more good fellows he had run against that day? But the memories of
them appeased him. He felt himself lucky to have hit it off so well
with such as they; and certainly there was much about the school that
he was going to like; and it was fine to have a room to himself, a
privilege that he had learned was exceptionable with Third formers and
was supposed to be due to a “pull” his people had with the Doctor; and
it was good luck to be under such a master as Bill Morris, whom he had
already decided was to be his favorite. What a horrible fate it would
have been to have sat next at table or roomed in the house of Mr.
Roylston—“Gumshoe Ebenezer,” as the boys called him! or to have had
to submit to Mr. Gray’s sarcasm too often! All things considered, he
felt he was very lucky; and so he stifled a queer feeling of loneliness
and homesickness, and turned over and tried to go to sleep.
He had heard Carroll moving about for awhile, and then, as he thought
at half-past nine, he had heard the click of the electric light as
it was turned off, the closing of a study door, and he supposed that
Carroll had also gone to bed.
It was perhaps an hour later that he heard a soft tapping, repeated
once or twice; then presently a movement in the study, and the creaking
of a door being opened and closed; then the sound of whispering in
the room without. Tony sat up in bed, wide awake now, and listened
intently. In a moment his bedroom door opened. “Who’s that?” he called.
“Shish! be still! don’t make a sound, or I’ll break your head.”
Somebody fumbled with the switch, turned the current on, and in a
second the bedroom was flooded with light. Four boys, dressed in
crimson and white jersies and old trousers, with red caps pulled down
over their eyes, crowded into the room.
“What’s the matter?” cried Tony in a whisper, springing out of bed.
“Excellent pupil!” drawled Carroll, at this moment thrusting his head
through the doorway, “even in the moment of excitement he preserves the
Socratic method.”
“What do you want?” Tony repeated, backing up against his wall, a
pathetic but sturdy figure in his white pajamas.
“Get into your clothes, and come along,” said a big fellow, with the
air, real or assumed, of a bully.
“Where?”
“Where you’re bid.”
“I’ll be hanged if I will.”
“You’ll be hanged if you won’t,” the other rejoined, advancing toward
him menacingly.
“Careful, Chapin!” whispered one of the others, “the kid’ll squeal in a
moment, and we’ll have Bill in on us.”
“To heck with Bill! I’ll have that kid, or I’ll know the reason why!”
“Gently, Arthur dear,” murmured Carroll. “Never resort to force until
persuasion is exhausted. Dear Socrates, we desire the pleasure of your
company for a walk abroad. The hour is unusual, but therefore the
greater is the compliment. My friend Chapin is impetuous and slightly
rude, but I counsel you to accept his invitation.”
“What do you want with me?” asked Tony, stubbornly.
“Don’t ask me to repeat, I beg of you. Time presses, and the patience
of my friends is on the ebb.”
“Hang your friends’ patience!” exclaimed Tony. “I won’t—”
“It will hang them, my child, if you do not come. The effort to remove
you by force will cost them no end of a hanging.”
Tony saw that whatever resistance he might make, the kind that would
save him was tabooed. He had only to make a noise, of course, and the
master of the house would come to his rescue. Intuition told him that
this was impossible, as impossible as also he felt it would be to
submit placidly to hazing. Being southern, Tony had his prejudices.
An objection to interference with his liberty even in the easy-going
fashion of school-life was one of them. He decided at once that his
protest, however, must be made out of doors, when all chance of
attracting the attention of the masters was over. All this went through
his mind a great deal more quickly than it can be told. As he made his
decision, he pulled on his trousers and a jersey over the shirt of his
pajamas, slipped his feet into “sneakers,” and professed to be ready.
“Mumm’s the word, through the corridor,” whispered Chapin, as they
slipped out into the dark passage-way, and cautiously felt their way
towards the stairs. Carroll had condescended to take Tony’s hand,
partly that he might guide him in the dark, partly to make sure that
the boy did not give him the slip.
At last they emerged upon the campus. It was dark and still. A late
moon was casting its waning light over the hills beyond Strathsey Neck.
The boys, still speaking in whispers, led Tony quickly across the
ghostly campus, and into a field below the chapel, which sloped down
toward the curving beach and sea. As they evidently meant to take him
farther still, Deering pulled back here, and wrenched his arm free of
Carroll’s grasp.
“I have gone far enough,” he said. “Tell me what you want of me, here.”
“Biff him, Kid,” exclaimed one of his captors, in a voice in which the
note of brutality sounded painfully real.
“Nay, nay, gently,” interposed Carroll. “Let me deal with Socrates....
We would lead you to the beach, my friend, where the little lobsters
and the mermaids play, and there have you sing us songs and make us
merry with your quips and jests; while we, from the recesses of a
certain cave well known to us, extract certain delightful viands, and
feast.”
Tony listened patiently to this speech, with an expression of contempt
upon his face that it was fortunate his captors could not see.
“Oh, all right, Carroll,” he said in reply, “go ahead, if you want to.
I tell you frankly, the four of you may be able to beat me into a pulp,
but you are not going to haze me.”
“No?” with an air of incredulity.
“No.”
The irritable member of the party poked Tony in the ribs at this
point, and for his pains got a stinging blow on the ear. This youth,
whose name was Chapin, was exceedingly angry at this, and Tony’s
fate doubtless would have been settled then and there, had not the
other three interposed, and restrained Chapin’s efforts to enforce an
immediate punishment, protesting if there was a fight now he would
spoil the fun. After an exciting altercation, which nearly resulted in
the hazing party itself engaging in a civil war, peace was restored and
the five proceeded toward the beach.
They walked some distance along the sands, which the ebbing tide had
left damp and firm, to a point a little on the nether side of a deep
stream, perhaps twenty yards wide, which divided the beach from a
rocky bit of coast on the farther side. There was a rocky formation
along the shores of this stream in the shelter of which Chapin soon
indicated the mouth of a natural cave by thrusting his arms deep into
the crevice, and then bringing forth one after another several large
tin boxes and armfuls of fuel.
One boy quickly started a fire in the lee of a rock, the flame of which
was shielded from the view of the school by the neighboring dunes. The
other three, leaving Tony for the moment to his own devices, though
they kept a watch on him, made preparations for a feast. From the
tin boxes they produced various canned stuffs, biscuits, sweets, and
the like, while the others began to fry some sausages in a skillet
over the fire. It was probably near midnight, and so thrilling and so
interesting were these proceedings, that for the moment Tony forgot
that he too was not one of them out for a lark and began to enjoy
himself hugely. Suddenly Chapin took a seat on a rock, and calling to
him sharply, reminded him on what a different status he was there—a
despised new boy to be hazed for freshness. He wondered, not without
some alarm, what they proposed to do to him.
At length, just as Carroll handed up to Chapin a nicely done sausage,
Tony’s principal tormentor turned to him. “Well, Deering, suppose you
get up on that rock there, and give us a sample of your beautiful
southern voice. We’ll have ‘Louisiana Lou,’ if you please.”
Tony felt a cold shiver run down his back, but nevertheless he braced
himself against the rock, instead of mounting it, and faced Chapin.
Thorndyke and Marsh drew near, and Carroll looked up from where he was
kneeling at the fire.
“Come along.... Nah!” he snarled, in answer to some remark of
Carroll’s, “I am going to haze this kid to the limit. Come, step lively
there, Deering; what’s the matter with you? Crawl up on that rock, or
I’ll biff you over the head.”
Tony backed off a little. “I supposed you knew,” he said, “that I
didn’t intend to be hazed when you brought me down here.”
“Didn’t intend to be hazed!” cried Thorndyke, a strapping big chap.
“Well, I’ll be——What did you think we asked you to—a party?
“No,” Tony answered. “But I came because I didn’t want to raise a
rumpus up near the School, where you might think I was scared and
trying to squeal out of it.”
“So you ain’t trying to squeal now, eh?” asked Thorndyke.
“Not a bit, but I don’t intend to be hazed all the same.”
“Why, Socrates, my love, do you expect us to fight you in rotation so
as to convince you of the fact that you _are_ going to be hazed?” asked
Carroll, in tones of sarcasm.
“Oh, biff him!” cried Chapin.
Tony backed a little. “I don’t expect you to fight me, no,” he
answered; then like a flash he kicked off his sneakers, slipped off his
coat, and cast it full into Chapin’s face, with his hands behind it,
sending him sprawling over Carroll, and upsetting their fire. With a
cry, he leaped upon the rocks above. “You’ve got to catch me first.”
There was a chorus of startled exclamations, and then all four started
after him, leaping upon the rocks. Tony ran lightly to the farther
side, and then just as Thorndyke’s face appeared over the ledge behind,
he sprang into the air, off the rocks, and disappeared beneath the
waters of Beaver Creek.
“Wait till the little devil comes up,” cried Marsh, standing on the
brink of the rock and looking at the bubbling water. “He’ll swim
across, but he can’t get back to the school without coming this way.
Two of you go round by the bridge. Reggie and I’ll wait here.”
Chapin and Marsh started on a run for the bridge, which spanned the
creek along a dune road about a hundred yards from the beach. Carroll
and Thorndyke watched for the reappearance of Tony on the surface of
the creek, but no Tony reappeared. The seconds lengthened into minutes;
they heard their two companions stamping across the bridge, but not a
ripple disturbed the dark waters of the creek.
“Good heavens! what’s become of him?” whispered Thorndyke.
“Nothing!” Carroll responded irritably. “Watch the opposite bank.”
In a moment more Chapin and Marsh were on the other side. “Have you
seen him?” they called.
“He hasn’t come up yet,” Chapin answered, in an agitated voice.
“Hasn’t come up yet! Then I’m going in after him!” and with the words
Marsh plunged into the stream. He floundered about for a moment or so,
diving here and there, but in four or five minutes crawled to shore
exhausted. The others had investigated the bank to the bridge.
[Illustration: LIKE A FLASH HE SLIPPED OFF HIS COAT AND CAST IT FULL IN
CHAPIN’S FACE]
“He must have swum up stream,” suggested Marsh.
“He hasn’t come up to the surface, you ass!” said Carroll. “Do you
think he can swim a hundred yards under water?”
“What then do you think we are going to do?” he asked, in ghastly tones.
“Why two of us are going up to Doctor Forester, and two are going to
stay here and keep watch.”
“You don’t think....”
“What, in heaven’s name, can we think?”
Carroll and Marsh started on a run up the beach, leaving their two
companions crouched on the rocks, peering down fearsomely into the
stream. The night seemed to them to grow colder, darker, more dismal.
The moon in fact had set.
“By Jove, this is rum!” Thorndyke choked, in a grisly effort to seem at
ease.
“It’s ghastly, Harry,” whispered Chapin, as he put his hand on the
other boy’s arm.
CHAPTER III
“PAX”
It is not to be supposed that we share the fright of the four hazers.
Tony of course was not drowned, nor indeed at any time had he been in
danger. He had not lived on a Mississippi bayou for the greater part of
his life in vain. He was an excellent swimmer, and he had the knack to
an unusual degree of swimming under water a long distance.
When Chapin had first advanced upon him, he had intended to fight, but
he realized at once that such a course would be foolish, for he would
inevitably be conquered, and forced in the long run to go through the
“stunts” even in a more unpleasant fashion than if he submitted at
once. He had, however, no intention of submitting so long as he saw
any possibility of a way out of the situation. Suddenly it occurred
to him that by jumping into the creek and swimming for some distance
under water, he might get a start in the way of escape that it would be
difficult for his pursuers to make up. In this way the hazing might be
avoided for the night at least, and on the morrow he could take counsel
as to the future with some of his new-found allies.
No sooner did he think of this stratagem than he acted upon it. As we
have seen, it proved even more successful than he had expected or
hoped. The creek was quite deep enough for him to swim a considerable
distance beneath the surface. He headed up stream, and kept under water
to the limit of his endurance. Then, instead of coming to the surface
in the splashing, sputtering fashion of the amateur, he came so far up
as to thrust only his face above the waters for breath. So careful were
his movements that the anxious watchers did not detect him even at this
moment. A second time he went below, swimming beneath the surface for
some yards, until he emerged again, this time within a short distance
of the bridge. A few strokes brought him to this hiding-place, and he
had scarcely ensconced himself there, clinging to one of the heavy
wooden supports, when he heard Chapin and Marsh rushing across the
planks above his head. He could tell by their tones of alarm, as they
talked farther down the bank, that they thought he had drowned. He
heard one of them jump into the creek and splash vainly about for some
moments, and at last he heard two of them depart, and saw the shadowy
outlines of the other two, as they returned disconsolate to wait by the
rocks.
In about five minutes Tony crawled out from his hiding-place beneath
the bridge. He was shivering with the cold, but otherwise not the
worse for his long immersion. He ran softly along the dune road, about
a hundred yards or so behind Carroll and Marsh on their way to the
school. He followed them at a safe distance across the meadows and the
campus, and watched them as they rang the bell of the Head Master’s
house. Then he hurried off to his own room in Standerland, slipped off
his wet clothes, and got into bed. A little alarm as to his safety on
the part of his would-be tormentors, he thought, would be a just bit of
revenge, particularly against the supercilious Carroll.
While Deering lay comfortably in bed, rapidly recovering in body
and spirit, the two conspirators had a mournful few minutes as they
explained matters to Doctor Forester, who had thrust his head and his
pyjama’d shoulders out of an upper window.
The Head Master listened to their frightened explanations. “Very well,”
he said at length, “I will dress at once. In the meantime, one of you
go quickly over to Standerland and see if by any chance he has returned
there. It is possible that there has been a serious accident, but I
think it much more likely that he has simply outwitted you. I trust
that is the case. Report to me immediately.” And with that the Doctor
closed his window sash with a bang.
With his heart in his mouth Carroll ran across the quadrangles to
Standerland House, resolving with more passion than he customarily
allowed himself that the Head had shown himself a brute. He felt his
way along the dark corridor, still cautious, although convinced that
it was but a matter of moments when the whole school must be alarmed.
He always recalled that walk upstairs as one of the most disagreeable
quarters of an hour of his life. At last he found his door, entered
his study, and breathed a sigh of relief as he switched on the light.
Then he cautiously opened the door into Tony’s bedroom, and gave a
frightful start as he saw the boy sitting up in bed. But Carroll was
not one to betray more than momentary surprise. He gave Tony a long
curious look, sufficiently assured after the first glance that he was
not a ghost. “So, my Socrates,” he said, “you are back?”
“It would seem so,” answered Tony dryly, and as the older boy thought,
impertinently.
“One wondered, you know,” Carroll remarked quietly, as he turned off
the light and left the room.
In five minutes he was back at the Head Master’s house. “Deering is in
bed, sir,” he reported to the non-committal head at the upper window.
“Good; I thought so. Do you go now after your companions on the beach.
Return at once; get back into bed as quietly as you got out of it, and
the four of you report to me to-morrow morning after prayers. I fancy
that whether or not you become the laughing stock of the school will
depend entirely upon yourselves. Good-night!”
“Good-night, sir.”
Carroll had lost but a trifle of his suavity during this nocturnal
adventure. He hurried off now to the beach, and explained the situation
to Thorndyke and Chapin, who were so rejoiced to learn that they had
not been the cause of an involuntary suicide that they forgot to be
annoyed with Tony for outwitting them. It was a cold and dejected trio
of boys that stowed away the remains of the unenjoyed feast, and then
betook themselves up the hill, crept silently into their dormitories,
and went to bed.
On the morrow they were excused from first study and reported to the
Head Master. To their surprise Doctor Forester had very little to say
to them. “I had intended to give you a lecture,” he said, looking up
from his writing and without laying down his pen, “and probably a
severe punishment, but I fancy you have learned a lesson.... You can
see, at least, to what the hazing of a high-spirited boy might lead....
I understand your ideas about hazing. I do not share them. I believe
that you will not disappoint me when I say that I expect the practice
to stop from this day.”
“Quite so, sir,” said Thorndyke.
“And that is all,” added the Doctor, giving them a nod of dismissal.
“Phew!” exclaimed Chapin, as they entered the corridor, “that’s sliding
out easy.”
“Rather,” answered Thorndyke, “unless we have the whole school howling
at us when the kid squeals.”
“Which he’s sure to do,” suggested Marsh.
Carroll withered them with a glance. “I rather fancy not,” he drawled.
“He’s a southerner and a gentleman.”
“Well, let’s hope not,” interposed Thorndyke.... “There, don’t get
huffy, Harry, you can’t help coming from Chicago.”
“Who wants to help it, you big cow?” cried Marsh, giving his chum
Thorndyke a good-natured push against the wall. “But if I thought, as
Carroll does, that there were not any gentlemen north of Mason and
Dixon’s line, I wouldn’t come to a northern school.”
“Rot!” vouchsafed Carroll. “Let’s whoop her up for Gumshoe, and avoid
any daffy questions about being quizzled by the Head.”
* * * * *
Tony found it difficult the next day not to take Jimmie Lawrence or
Kit Wilson into his confidence, and tell them of his adventure of the
night before. But he conquered the temptation, for he was singularly
incapable of enjoying himself at the expense of any one’s else
discomfiture. Tony was not without his faults, as we shall see, but he
genuinely disliked to make other people uncomfortable. Perhaps this
was an inheritance from a long line of ancestors who had had rather
nice ideas about what constitutes a gentleman. At any rate, he was born
that way, and did not deserve any special credit for it. He realized
that if he told his story he might easily make his three captors the
butts of the school, but that was not a form of revenge that appealed
to him. Accordingly he held his peace, and if it had depended on him
the story never would have been told. But we may say in passing, that
eventually Carroll told the tale himself: it entered into the body of
Deal tradition, and is frequently told by old Deal boys when hazing is
a subject of conversation.
Tony felt almost familiar with the schoolroom as he entered after
prayers the next morning. A score of faces were now known to him,
and so many had seemed friendly as he looked into them, that the
homesick feeling and the alarm of the night before rapidly passed away.
Occasionally he noticed Mr. Morris’s glance resting upon him, as he sat
at his books during the day, in a particularly interested and friendly
way. There was something in Morris’s face—an attractiveness, perhaps
one would call it, for he was not precisely handsome—a winningness
in the directness of his glance, that more than once had won boys at
almost first sight. Morris had the genius of inspiring enthusiasms, and
he was to inspire one in Tony. The master was soon to hear from Carroll
the inwardness of Tony’s exploits, and marvel with him at the boy’s
“whiteness” in not talking. Mr. Morris was the occasional recipient
of the intimate confidences of the supercilious Virginian, for even
Carroll had moments of weakness when he felt the need of unburdening
himself and receiving sympathy—moments, as he would have said, when he
was not himself.
As the day wore on Tony was inclined to forget his unpleasant adventure
of the night before. The afternoon found him again on the football
field, absorbed in learning the game, and winning encomiums in the
eyes of Kit, who until Thanksgiving would have few thoughts aside from
football. Kit was captain of his form eleven, and his interest in its
success was equaled only by the readiness with which he would sacrifice
his best players to the school team or even to the scrub if they were
needed. He was delighted with Deering’s advent, as he had felt he was
weak in ends, and Tony’s fleetness promised much in that direction.
The likelihood of his securing a position on his form team gave Deering
a prestige that stood him in good stead as a new boy; and as he was
lively, good-natured and appreciative, it seemed that on the whole he
would have an agreeable time.
There was, however, a rift in the lute—which Tony detected the second
day of his school life. As he would pass Chapin in the Schoolhouse
corridors or on the campus, he could see by the expression on his face
that he had taken the result of their adventures of the night before
in bad part. They exchanged no words on the subject, but Chapin’s
behavior was in such contrast to that of Thorndyke and Marsh, or even
of Carroll, all of whom had smiled good-naturedly when they had met
him, that he put it down that in Chapin he had made an enemy. At the
time this troubled him very little. He wondered of course if he should
be hazed again, but surmised correctly that if he were it would not be
by the same crowd.
The spirit with which he went into things, his success on the form
team, and the powerful friends that he had made in Wilson and Lawrence,
the leaders of the Third, soon secured him an immunity from hazing in
any form. The Sixth frowned on the custom, so that none but adventurous
spirits were apt to attempt it.
Tony was tired out that night, and as soon as he was dismissed from the
schoolroom at nine o’clock, he ran over to Standerland and got into
bed, scarcely noticing Carroll, who had the privilege of working in
their common study. Hardly, however, was he in bed, than the door was
opened, his light switched on, and again Carroll appeared, but this
time there was a friendly grin on his face, and a box of biscuit and a
jar of jam tucked under his arm.
“Don’t jump, my philosopher!” he exclaimed, “I am alone and unarmed.”
Then he advanced to the bed, and held out his hand. “Shall we make it
‘pax’?”
“With all my heart,” laughed Tony, and gave Carroll’s hand a friendly
shake.
“Suppose then we smoke a pipe of peace,” and Carroll extracted from the
recesses of his pocket two brierwood pipes.
“Hang it!” said Tony, “I don’t smoke, you know. Aren’t you afraid of
getting caught?”
“Oh, yes, somewhat,” answered Carroll, as he nonchalantly lighted a
match. “But what will you have? School bores me to extinction. I find
myself within two days craving nefarious excitement. You are fortunate
to possess a calmer temperament. Here, help yourself to the jam and
biscuit.”
“You seem calm enough,” commented Tony.
“I assume that, little one, for amusement, I am in reality excitable to
a degree. Now take that incident last night—”
“Oh, let’s drop that,” said Tony.
“On the contrary, I should like to discuss it. I was rather a beast to
go in for it, you know, when you had been, as it were, put in my tender
care. It was the fun of doing something that one knew would get one
into trouble if one were caught. You behaved in a singular fashion, I
must confess, and lamentably upset our little calculations. Somehow,
after blowing the business to the Head the joy of the affair was gone.
I felt like a sick cat when I crawled into bed at one A. M.”
“What happened?” asked Tony.
Carroll took a deep pull at his pipe, and blew the smoke out of the
window. “Old Hawk laughed at us, and sent us to bed as though we were
First Formers. Say, it was rather decent of you, you know, not to peach
to the fellows.”
“How do you know I didn’t?”
“Well, we’ve escaped the jolly horsing we’d have got if you had, that’s
all.... Do you know, I approve of that,—well, to a degree. Confound
it! there’s curfew. Lie still, I’ll souse the light. I guess we’re
safe enough. Bill saw us both in, and he isn’t one to nose about after
lights unless there’s a beastly noise. Bill is such a gentleman that
one hates to take advantage of his considerateness,—like this!” And he
blew a puff of smoke into Tony’s face.
“Why do you do it then?”
Carroll got up and turned out the light; then resumed his seat on
Tony’s bed.
“Why do I? Hang it, Deering, I sometimes wonder why I do a number of
things. I’ve a great notion to chuck it.”
Tony had the good sense to make no reply to this remark, but to munch
instead with rather unctious enjoyment on his biscuit and jam. Carroll
seemed to meditate for the moment in the dark, then knocked his ashes
out on the window-sill, and leaned over, feeling for the jar. “Where
the deuce is the biscuit? That jam is the real article, you know.
There is a great gulf between the jam I use and what one gets in the
refectory. Would that in that gulf we might souse the housekeeper, eh?”
And so they talked the shop and jargon, the boyish confidences, and
experiences, and plans, that have been the theme of nocturnal talks
ever since schools were invented. It was quite late before Carroll
returned to his bedroom, and Tony immediately dropped to sleep, feeling
that after all he had misjudged him upon first appearances. His next
conscious thought was as he leaped to his feet in answer to the
strident tones of the rising bell.
CHAPTER IV
MICHAELMAS TERM
This late talk with Carroll did more toward putting Tony at his ease in
the school than perhaps anything that happened to him. From that time
on he became very friendly with his room-mate—all the better friends
doubtless because they always maintained toward each other a certain
reserve, due rather to Carroll’s involuntary elaborateness of manner
than to any deliberate effort on their part. All the better also was it
that real as was their mutual regard for each other neither had that
enthusiastic affection that school boys so frequently experience, and
of which Tony was already aware in another direction. For just such a
friendship quickly developed between him and Jimmie Lawrence.
He has missed one of the purest joys of life who has not known the
delights of an enthusiastic boyish friendship. It has its sweetnesses,
its fears and scruples, as has every other love; but there is a
cloudless carelessness about its happy days as about no other period of
life. For Tony, in that first Indian summer at Deal to wander off from
the common fields with Jimmie Lawrence, into unfamiliar haunts, into
the enchanted region of Lovel’s Woods, or along the rocky kelp-strewn
shores of the Strathsey River or the tawny beaches of the Neck, was a
joy pure and unalloyed.
Among others Carroll watched the development of this friendship with
interest. Carroll was not the sort to give his affection quickly in
such whole-hearted fashion, though he cared deeply enough about things,
he thought. He neither approved nor disapproved of his room-mate’s
devotion to Jimmie, certainly was not jealous of it. If such things
must be—he had a way of smiling with his assumed air of cynicism
when friendship was mentioned—why he supposed Jimmie Lawrence was as
worthy of Tony’s devotion as the next boy. Carroll never spoke of this
friendship to Tony, but tactfully began to welcome Jimmie as a visitor
to their rooms during that fall term. To his own form-mates he referred
to his study as “the kindergarten.” He did, however, speak unusually
frankly to Tony of another friendship which that youth appeared to have
made. They had wandered toward the beach one evening. Football practice
was just over; Tony had had his bath and was glowing a beautiful pink
and white in the soft air of the Indian summer twilight.
“Do you know,” said Carroll, flecking at the pebbles in the sands, as
they stopped at the creek, “that you have made a great hit with our
beloved Bill?”
Tony laughed. “Bill’s made a great hit with me, I may say. But
doubtless that’s plain enough.”
“Oh, perfectly,” answered Carroll who was used to boys liking
Mr. Morris, “but it has never been evident before that Bill has
particularly cared for one of us rather than for another; he has been
extraordinarily decent to everyone with whom he has to do, just as
Gumshoe has been extraordinarily odious. For myself, I have always
disliked intensely the attitude that most school masters think it
expedient to assume—to wit, a sort of official consciousness of a
universal _in loco parentis_, a grim determination to make people think
every boy is liked just in the same way, which we know is impossible,
and as undesirable as it is unreal. Witness, Gumshoe really makes me
grateful to him, despite his native hideousness, because he never
addresses me without a sarcastic snarl or an odious grin as though I
were amusing him. One understands that amusement.”
“Oh, quite,” said Tony, absently.
Reggie did not like these little interjections in his monologue. “Don’t
assume to be paying attention,” he commented now. “I know of course
that you are not until I get back to you. Don’t think it necessary to
assent. I am accustomed to talking without being listened to.”
“Oh, dry up, Reggie, go on with Bill—what about him?”
“Ah, I thought our curiosity had been aroused. This, little one; he had
succeeded better than most people in liking a good many fellows, with
the result of course that the fellows really like him. But, for you,
his liking is more patent than usual. I congratulate you—not to say, I
envy you.”
“Nonsense,” began Tony.
“Cultivate him, my boy.”
“Oh, I mean to do that,” Deering answered. “Tell me, do you like Mr.
Morris, Reggie; you’re such a—”
“I, oh I adore him,—in my way; but even so much is between you and
me. He is a demi-god, the superman. As for me, I amuse him, interest
him, baffle him a little, I hope; but he will never be fond of me. It
will be a relief to Bill when I get out of his house.”
“Don’t you think it’s just that he’s never been sure whether or not he
could trust you?” asked Tony.
Carroll for once started. “Trust me? Good heavens, Deering, I imagine
the man takes me for a gentleman.”
“Oh, of course, that—I meant rather in other ways; if he counts on you
to help out....”
“Oh!” Carroll exclaimed, with a tone of relief, “I dare say not.... I
dare say not....” And for a while he seemed to think rather seriously.
Tony wondered to himself how he had happened to stumble on what
doubtless was a sore spot with his room-mate in his relation to the
house-master. As for Carroll’s talk about Mr. Morris’s good opinion,
Tony only took that half seriously. He hoped it was true, of course.
Tony liked to be liked, as perhaps most people do.
Those were really golden days for him, which he was always to recall
with a peculiar sense of pleasure. He was consciously happier than he
had ever been before, because often at home there had been certain
family shadows that dimmed the day. Life went well with him that
first fall term. He seemed to catch the spirit of the school almost
by intuition; indeed, as he said to himself one afternoon as he stood
on the terrace in front of the Old School, looking down across the
sloping meadows, past the ochre-colored beach, out upon Deigr Rock and
a quivering ocean, it was in his blood: it was his inheritance and
tradition to be a part of and to love Deal School.
He was quick and sensible enough to keep his classroom work up to the
average, and though he did not distinguish himself as a scholar, he
suffered very little from detention or pensums, those popular devices
for the torture of the dull and the lazy. He had his long afternoons
free, save for football. And football in that day, under what Tony
ever felt was a wise dispensation of the Head’s, was never allowed to
absorb more than an hour, except when a game was on. As it was, he
always had a good hour or so of daylight in which with a congenial
companion,—Jimmie, or Kit, or Carroll, often,—he could explore the
surrounding country. And this for Tony soon became the most fascinating
way of spending his time. Before the Michaelmas term was over he had
got to know every path and by-way for five miles roundabout. To a boy
who had eyes as well as wits there was a plenty to interest him in
the region about Deal;—the bold and varied shore, with its rocks and
beaches, its coves and caves, its points and necks, the abode of wild
fowl of the sea; the rolling fertile country to the north; Lovel’s
Woods; the quiet waters of Deal Great Pond; the quaint streets of the
old town of Monday Port, with its rotting wharves and empty harbor.
This strange old town, despite everywhere the lingering touch of the
summer invasion, with its suggestion of a vanished trade, in the winter
was bereft of all save its memories of a bygone order of things; and
with these memories, to an imaginative boy, the town seemed heavy.
It required a special permission and a good excuse for any of the
schoolboys, except the Sixth, to get the freedom of its streets. Tony
was especially keen for such excuses and such freedom. His first walk
there had been with Mr. Morris, who seemed to know the intimate stories
of its houses, to be familiar with all its little secrets. In less
conventional conversations Tony planned escapades for that direction;
but as yet nothing very definite suggested itself. The penalties for
being caught in Monday Port without the good excuse were considered
excessive and usually not worth the risk. Mr. Morris had a glorious
tale of the days when he was a schoolboy at Deal, of the actual
exodus from the school by night of the whole Fifth, the boarding of a
schooner that had lain dreaming in the sleepy harbor for a day or so, a
thrilling sail into the open, and the overhauling of the pirate crew by
the Head in a steam-launch. Those were the good old days of birching,
and yes, Mr. Morris had caught it. He had smiled at the memory as if it
were a pleasant one.
Golden days that more and more took the aspect of holidays as midst
school strain and throbbing excitement, they drew near the day of the
“great game” with Boxford, the rival school across the Smoke mountains.
It had seemed possible for some time that Tony might make end on the
School team. Mr. Stenton, the athletic director, though he had a
vigorous way of finding fault, forever threatening the boys with defeat
and the benches and fines, secretly regarded Deering as a “find.” He
had watched his play for a week or two on Kit Wilson’s Third Form
team; saw that he was green but teachable, and judged that he was one
of the swiftest runners that had ever come to Deal. The end of the
first month found Tony a member of the School squad.
To the old boys it seemed almost “fresh” that a newcomer should be
able to play football so much better than they, and to be a greenhorn
at that! But Jack Stenton knew his business; he was an old Kingsbridge
man, and he had played on the Kingsbridge eleven in the very earliest
days of American football, when it was a very different game indeed.
And Stenton made up his mind that Tony eventually should make the
Kingsbridge eleven. Deal boys had not been taking many places on
Kingsbridge teams of recent years, which was a matter of real grief to
the faithful coach. Stenton, however, was the last man in the world
to give a boy a good opinion of himself, so that he pretended to hold
out to Tony but the smallest hope. “You may squeeze into shape,” he
would say, “but I doubt it.” And in truth he was averse to playing a
new boy in a big game; so that up to the eve of the Boxford game the
line-up was in doubt. Tony had a vigorous rival for his position, in
Henry Marsh, one of the members of the hazing-bee of the first few
nights at Deal. Marsh was quick; Tony was quicker; but Marsh had the
advantage of knowing the game, and clever as Tony was proving himself,
he nevertheless was a greenhorn.
His promotion to the school squad did a great deal for Deering in the
way of increasing his popularity. Kit Wilson no longer patronized him;
on the other hand he was rather proud of Tony’s friendship, and took a
good deal of credit to himself for having discovered him. He proposed
Deering for membership in the Dealonian, a semi-secret society that
took a great deal of credit to itself for the smooth and successful
running of the School. Membership in it was an honor, which a new boy
rarely achieved. It was enough to have turned our friend’s head, but
he was singularly not a self-conscious youth, and to this it was due
that his quick success aroused so little jealousy. Tony had the quality
of lovableness to a marked degree, which is after all a quality; it
was what won him at college in later years the nickname of “Sunshine,”
a famous nickname in the annals of Kingsbridge, as Kingsbridgeans
know—but that’s another story.
In all the unexpected happiness of the term there was for Tony
nevertheless the inevitable rift in the lute. Chapin was still sulky
toward him; and he could see beneath a rather elaborate courtesy, that
Henry Marsh, Chapin’s particular crony, was anything but friendly.
This lack of friendliness became so noticeable to Carroll that despite
his intimacy with the two, he began to draw somewhat away from them.
Carroll thought that they had singularly failed to appreciate Tony’s
“whiteness” in saving them all from an unmerciful horsing. Even the
Head Master had called their attention to that in his brief discourse
to them on that unpleasant morning afterwards.
Carroll met the two coming out of Thornton Hall—the refectory—one
evening after supper, and joined them as they walked around the
terrace in the moonlight.
“I say, you fellows,” he began, plunging _in medias res_—Carroll
always took the unexpected line—“why the deuce do you keep so sour on
young Deering?”
Chapin looked up quickly, his eyes glinting unpleasantly in the
moonlight. “Hang it, Carroll!” he exclaimed, “what’s that to you? We’ve
no obligation to take up with every little southern beggar that comes
to school, as you seem to have.”
“No, assuredly,” Carroll replied, suavely, “but it occurs to me that
when a chap has behaved as uncommonly decently to us as Deering has,
you might show a little—well, appreciation.”
“Rot! Deering has had a swelled head ever since the night of the
hazing-bee, and if Jack Stenton sticks him on the team for the Boxford
game there’ll be no holding him. We will be for sending him up to
Kingsbridge instanter.”
“You are uttering unspeakable nonsense, my dear Arthur, and you know
it. Give the lad a show; play fair. What’s the matter with you, Harry?”
he added, turning to Marsh, “it is only lately that you have taken to
snubbing him.”
Marsh gave an uneasy laugh. “Oh, Arty and me hang together,” he said
lamely.
“Well, that is more than you can say for your English,” remarked
Carroll, with a contemptuous smile, and turned away.
Chapin followed him up, and laid an arm upon his shoulder. “Look here,
Reggie,” he exclaimed, “don’t let’s bicker about this kid. I don’t like
him, but what difference need that make between us? We have stuck
pretty close these four years. Come on now, let’s slip down to the
cave, hit the pipe, and talk things over.”
“No, thank you,” replied Carroll briefly.
“Come on, Reggie, do,” put in Marsh, “we’ve bagged a bottle of wine
to-day, and we’ll bust it to-night in your honor.”
“Thanks, no; seductive as your offering is, I rather fancy you may
count me out of your little meetings in the future.” And with the words
Carroll went on his way.
The two boys looked after him a moment, until he entered the Old
School, when Chapin exclaimed, with an oath, “Let him go, Harry; we’ll
count him out all right; but we’ll get even with his cub.”
Marsh murmured an assent, but hung back a little when Chapin renewed
the proposal to visit the cave on the beach. “Don’t let us go to-night,
Art; remember you’re in training.”
“The deuce with training. What’s the use of banging your head against a
football for a month if a greenhorn like that is to be shoved into the
front row at the last moment. I’m going to have some fun nights, and
you’ll see, I shall be as fit as a fiddle in the morning anyway.” And
as he spoke, he drew Marsh’s arm within his, and together they started
for the beach.
From that day Carroll avoided them, a circumstance that did not
increase their friendliness toward Tony. It had been comparatively
easy at the time for Reginald to take the course he did, but as the
days came and went, he began to miss the companionship of Chapin and
Marsh more than he cared to acknowledge. Although naturally there was
little in common between them, for so long a time he had identified
himself with them and their crowd,—attracted by their willingness
to engage upon any lark however wild and their keenness to avoid
school rules, a process to which his own languid existence had been
secretly dedicated,—that he keenly missed the nefarious exploits their
companionship afforded. To be sure he had stopped smoking, he was
bracing up a bit and helping Mr. Morris out with the discipline of the
house, but beyond that he craved as ardently as ever the excitement and
adventure of his more careless days.
At that moment he was ripe to have entered into a closer intimacy with
Tony, or even with Mr. Morris. But Deering was absorbed in the life
of his form, and except at night he and Carroll had no opportunity of
being together, and then Tony was so tired out with football practice
that by “lights” he was ready to tumble into bed. And so they fell
quite out of the way of having nocturnal talks. Mr. Morris had a great
liking for Carroll, despite his obvious faults, but he had long since
given up the hope of knowing him better, of getting beyond Carroll’s
supercilious reserve and too-elaborate courtesy. The consequence was
that he detected no change now in the boy’s attitude and failed to
make the advances that Carroll would have responded to so readily. For
the first time Carroll became seriously dissatisfied with his life at
school. He was really bored, as he had always pretended to be, and
also lonely, which of course he did not acknowledge, even to himself.
He was a little inclined to think in his heart that his half-conscious
efforts at reform were not worth while. However he decided to stick
it out for the year at any rate, and settled down to the monotonous
routine with an air of indifference, and kept steadily away from his
old companions.
CHAPTER V
THE BOXFORD GAME
The first cold snap gave way again to Indian summer with just enough
northwest wind to make good football weather. The practice went on
diligently. Lesser rivals came week by week to Deal and literally and
metaphorically bit the dust ere the great Boxford game drew near. The
school was a-quiver with excitement. The form leaders marshalled the
boys onto the field in the bright clear afternoons and stimulated them
to cheer until they were hoarse. The _pros_ and _cons_ of winning were
the principal theme of conversation during recreation times, and hours
and minutes were counted as the great day came nearer and nearer.
The day before the game a mass meeting was held in the Gymnasium,
and the Head and Mr. Stenton and such other masters as had athletic
proclivities were called upon for speeches, while the boys cheered
everything enthusiastically without discrimination. Sandy Maclaren, the
doughty captain of the eleven, mounted the rostrum amongst others, and
delivered his sentiments in a terse series of twelve stammering words,
“Boys, we’ve got to win; and that’s all I have to say,” which was
greeted with an applause that more skilled orators seldom evoke. The
form games were over, and the form teams had disbanded; all effort was
concentrated now upon the chief game of the year.
Tony, from his place amongst the scrub players, heard it all
with tingling ears and beating heart, absorbing that intangible
energy—school spirit—as air into his lungs. This unexpected and
vehement stirring of his emotions bewildered him. He thought he was
just beginning to understand what love of school might mean. Then they
sang “Here’s to good old Deal” and “There’s a wind that blows o’er the
sea-girt isle” in a fashion that brought the heart to the throat and
tears of exquisite happiness to the eyes. And at last Doctor Forester
dismissed them with a few encouraging words that sounded very much like
a blessing.
Jimmie Lawrence sought Tony’s side, as the boys poured out of the
Gymnasium. “Hey, Tony, ain’t it grand?” he exclaimed, as he twined his
arms around his friend’s neck. “Oh, say, boy, we’ve _got_ to win.”
Tony gave a little gulp and squeezed Jimmie’s hand. “Oh, Jimmie, I
never felt so great in all my life.”
The night before the game they were in Jimmie’s rooms in Standerland
and a crowd of Third Formers came trooping in. “No school to-night,”
cried Kit Wilson, “there’s to be a P-rade around the campus at
eight-thirty sharp. Tony, you lucky dog, don’t it feel good even to be
a despised scrub?”
Tony laughed. “Say, fellows, you don’t know how it all strikes a
greenhorn like me. Why, it makes me feel bully to be alive.” And as
he stood there in the center of the room, with smiling friendly faces
about him, health and excitement glowing in his cheeks and a happy
smile playing on his boyish lips, there was an unconscious feeling
within them all that it was bully for him to be alive.
Rush Merton, an irrepressible, black eyed, black haired youth, proposed
a fresh song and started to bellow it forth, but the boys were keen
for talk and promptly smothered him with sofa pillows—an assault that
was resented so violently that in much less time than it takes to tell
Jimmie’s attractive rooms were in that sad condition, technically
known as “rough-house.” In the midst of the hubbub a stentorian voice
made itself heard, “Here stop this nonsense!” And Jack Stenton, the
hardy popular athletic director, came in. “Don’t make nuisances of
yourselves, children. Pick up those sofa pillows, compose yourselves,
and listen to words of wisdom from an older and wiser man.”
“Hear, hear!” came in boisterous good-nature from a dozen throats.
Rush gathered himself together from the pile of cushions, made an
absurd bow, and indicated Mr. Stenton with a pompous wave of the
hand. “Gentlemen, I yield the center of attention (and the center of
gravity,” he added _sotto voce_) “to our beloved athletic director. Mr.
Athletic Director, we are all ears.”
“Good! You are all Third Formers, eh?” said Stenton, with a smile, as
he looked them over good-naturedly. “I fancied that I might find you
congregated in this den of iniquity. Well, I have come up here to tell
you fellows how much I appreciate Kit Wilson’s spirit in cheerfully
giving his best form players to the scrub. He has set an example to
the other forms that is bound to be a fine thing for the athletics
of the school. And I want to tell you also that the form, this time,
is going to get something out of it—an honor that I don’t think has
fallen to the Third Form previous to this in the history of Deal
School. After due consideration Captain Maclaren and I have decided to
play Deering at left end in to-morrow’s game.”
For a moment there was silence, due to the overwhelming surprise, for
they had hardly dared hope that Tony would be given a chance except
as a substitute; and this meant that he had won out against Marsh who
had played on the team last year. Deering himself looked in helpless
amazement, first at Stenton, then at his form mates. Jimmie broke the
stillness at last by exclaiming in a shrill voice, “Come to my arms, my
frabjous boy,” and clasped Tony wildly about the waist. Then the cheers
rang forth, despite Stenton’s protest, until Mr. Morris came running
out of his study to find out what the racket was.
“Come, come,” Mr. Stenton cried at last, “cut this now; and you, young
‘un, get to bed and don’t celebrate any more to-night. Hello, Mr.
Morris, we have decided to put Deering in the game to-morrow—hence
this bedlam.”
“That’s fine!” exclaimed Morris heartily, as he shook Tony’s hand.
“But you boys had better get out now and join the procession; they are
meeting before the Chapel.”
[Illustration: AFTER DUE CONSIDERATION CAPTAIN MACLAREN AND I HAVE
DECIDED TO PLAY DEERING AT LEFT END IN TO-MORROW’S GAME.]
At last they were gone, having wrung Tony’s hand two or three times
each, and Deering and Lawrence were left alone. For a moment neither
boy spoke, but stood looking at each other, their eyes glistening with
friendliness that had been heightened by the excitement and the common
joy. Jimmie was as unaffectedly glad as if the honor had come to him.
Then Tony slipped into a chair by the window, and putting his head upon
his hands stared out upon the campus, which was beginning to be covered
with groups of boys, converging toward the Chapel. “I wish old Jack had
let me go out and help celebrate,” he said, with a little laugh. “I
can’t sleep if I do go to bed.”
Jimmie sat down on the chair, and slipped his arm about Tony’s neck.
“You must, dear old boy, all the same; ‘cause you’ve got to win for us.”
Tony laughed, and clasping Jimmie’s hand, he looked up at him with a
sudden seriousness that in after days Jimmie was to recall as having
been profoundly significant. “Jim,” he said, “I know that Sandy and
Larry Cummings and Chapin and the rest of ‘em can play football a
thousand times better than I will ever do, but just the same there’s
something that kind of tells me that I am going to have my chance
to-morrow in a special way. I must do something to prove to Jack and
Sandy that they aren’t making a mistake. Oh, Jim, you don’t know how I
feel—awfully puffed up and absurdly small. I wish it were you.”
“You’re all right, old boy; and Sandy and Jack know their business a
blame sight better than we do. Now cut it for bed, and I’ll go out and
help make the night hideous.”
In his own rooms, where Tony went as soon as Jimmie left him, he found
Carroll deep in a Morris chair and the pages of a French novel. “Hello,
Reggie,” he cried, “aren’t you going to p-rade?”
“Not I, kiddo,” answered Carroll, indifferently. “I fancy I’ve reached
that patriarchal age, in spirit if not in the flesh, when one puts away
childish things. I am mildly moved, however, to go and tell Stenton and
Maclaren that I approve of them, but I’ll content myself with saying
that to you. It is worth while to have swift-moving pedalities, isn’t
it?”
“So it seems,” Tony muttered, a little disappointed by the coolness of
his friend’s tone. “Well, good-night,” he added, “I am going to turn
in.”
Carroll had not meant to be supercilious, and for a moment after Tony
left him, avoiding his glance as he had, he laid down his novel and
started toward Deering’s bedroom. His hand was almost on the knob, the
generous hearty words on his lips, but he hesitated, and at last turned
back and took up his book. The study door was open, and at that moment
Mr. Morris paused at it, evidently on his way to the campus.
“Not celebrating, Reginald?” he enquired.
“No, Mr. Morris,” answered Carroll, rising.
A momentary wave of anger swept over Morris’s strong kindly face. “Is
it that your school spirit is so slack or that your French novel is so
absorbing?”
Carroll bowed with an icy politeness. “I am afraid, Mr. Morris,” he
said at last, with compressed lips, “that whichever explanation I gave
would mean the same to you.”
“I am afraid it would, Reginald,” said Mr. Morris, as he turned away,
with something like a sigh. “Good-night.”
“Good-night, sir.”
Carroll sat for a long time without reading, listening to the shouts
upon the campus. At length he picked up his novel, went into his
bedroom, and undressed. Before getting into bed, he darkened his
transom, lighted a small electric night-lamp, and laid a pad and pencil
on the table by his bedside. For an hour or more, long after the
excitement had ebbed without and the boys had got back and gone noisily
to bed, long after he had heard the watchman make his stealthy midnight
rounds, Carroll sat there in bed, gazing dreamily out of his window
upon the moonlit sea and the misty outlines of Lovel’s Woods and at the
ruby intermittent glow of Deigr Light, and now and then he jotted down
a line or word upon the pad. This was what he wrote:
The pure stars shine above the flowing sea,
The strand is gleaming in the moon’s soft light,
The south wind blows across the murky lea,
The lamps of Monday glimmer in the night.
The moon sags slowly in the violet west,
A yellow crescent, cloud-hung all about,
As though in weariness it sinks to rest,
And one by one the glowing lamps go out.
So flutter all the little weary souls
In trembling dreams a moment and are still;
The school is wrapped in darkness; on the shoals
The tide turns; night enfolds the silent hill.
* * * * *
The day of the game turned out bright and fair, after a dull gray
morning, with ozone and freshness in the nippy air of early November.
Recitations of a sort were held in the morning, though to be sure most
of the masters fell into reminiscent vein and àpropos of nothing at
all told their classes stories of the bygone heroes of the School—of
Nifty Turner’s mighty kick and Pard’s immortal run from the enemy’s
ten-yard line. Mr. Roylston alone had the ability and the temerity
to hold his form down to an unrelieved discussion of the sequence of
tenses in _Cæsar_ and mercilessly put Kit Wilson into detention for
misconstruing an obvious Imperfect with the remark, “I guess to-day it
is an Historical Present.” Kit served his detention and passed into
history.
The team, including Tony in a brand-new red sweater with a gorgeous
black “D” across the breast, were excused from school at noon, and had
dinner in the Refectory with the Boxfordians, who had coached across
the hills in the morning. By two o’clock the teams were on the field,
passing footballs, catching punts and kicking goals in regulation
fashion.
The boys poured out of the Schoolhouse after two o’clock call-over,
and crowded the side lines, while the faculty and their wives and
distinguished visitors from Boxford and Monday Port filled the line of
wooden bleachers which had been run up the day before.
Doctor Forester and the Head Master of Boxford walked up and down
within the lines, repeating the same amiable courtesies and remarks
about the weather and the view and the condition of the teams that
they had made for years, as though this were the first instead of the
twentieth struggle in which Deal and Boxford had been engaged. It was a
specially important game, as the score in games between the two schools
was a tie.
The present scribe, who was not a football player, cannot undertake to
describe that eventful game in technical language. The intricacies of
formation and mass play were beyond his humble abilities at school, as
he has no doubt they are to the majority of people who nevertheless
follow the game with as keen interest as if they knew it. That is
to say, it is inconceivable to him, that anything could be quite as
exciting to a Deal boy or a Kingsbridge man as to see his school or
college team pressing nearer and nearer the coveted goal, or to watch
a fleet-footed boy dodge through a broken field, sprint as though the
fate of empires hung upon his fleetness, and sprawl gloriously at last
behind the enemy’s line on top of the ball. The technically curious are
referred to Vol. LX, No. 2 of the _Deal Literary Magazine_, where they
will find a more accurate account than they certainly will find in the
pages of this chronicle. They will miss there, however, an incident,
which impresses the scribe as having been the most important of the
game.
Suffice it, the ball was kicked off at three o’clock by the Boxford
center, and went sailing down the field into the arms of Sandy Maclaren
on the ten-yard line, and eleven blue-garbed Boxfordians went chasing
after it lipity-cut. Here one described a graceful parabola as his
knees encountered the hardy back of Arthur Chapin, another went flying
off involuntarily in a reverse direction as he caught Deering’s hand
in his ribs, but one, surer than the rest, dived for a tackle and
laid Sandy low just as he was crossing the thirty-yard line. Cheers
rang out indiscriminately from both sides of the field, until the
scattered teams had run together, and, kneeling face to face, with
hands clenched, faces grimly set, the muscles a-quiver, waited while
Kid Drayton, Deal’s little quarter-back, gave the signals in his high
shrill voice, “Forty-nine, eleven, sixteen.” Then the ball was snapped,
and Chapin, the half-back, was hurled through a hole in Boxford’s line
for a gain of seven yards. Once, twice, thrice, the Deal boys made
their distance to the indescribable joy of their supporters. Then the
Boxford team, recovering from the unexpected strength of the first
onslaught, stiffened and became as a stone wall, and held Deal for
three downs, so that Thorndyke, the full-back, dropped behind for a
kick. The oval went spinning through the air, Tony speeding away almost
under it, dodging the player who tried to intercept him, so that as
the Boxford half leaned back to catch the ball, he downed him in his
tracks. For the first time Tony heard the _Sis_, _Boom_, _Ah!_ of the
rippling cheer ring out with his own name tacked on to the end of it.
Back and forth, now tucked tight under the arm of a red or a blue
sweater, now sailing luxuriously in the air, the ball was worked over
the field; near Boxford’s goal, near Deal’s; or worried like a rat by
a pack of terriers in the middle of the gridiron. The two teams were
almost equally matched, and the first half ended without a score.
“You are doing well, young ‘un,” said Stenton to Tony, as he stood in
the center of the Deal team in the locker-rooms under the Gymnasium
between the halves. “Give him a chance, Drayton, and send him around
right end. I think it will work.”
“All right, sir,” the little quarter-back squeaked. “I’ve been counting
on Chapin mostly, but toward the end he seemed to be completely
tuckered.”
Chapin looked up from the bench where he was sitting. “You were so
blame winded yourself that you could hardly give the signals,” he
snarled.
“Drop that kind of talk!” exclaimed Stenton. “You have been playing
like a tackling dummy for the last ten minutes. If you want to lose the
game for us keep that up.”
“I am playing the best game I know,” Chapin answered surlily. “If you
don’t like it,” he muttered, though Stenton did not hear him, “go get
another of your Third Form pets. You chucked Marsh, one of your best
players.”
The second half opened, and each team seemed to come back fresher to
the fray. With a few trifling exceptions there had been no injuries.
Chapin seemed the only boy on whom the strain was telling, and Stenton
correctly surmised that that was because he had not been keeping
training. And as a matter of fact at a fatal moment his form told. The
ball had been worked down well toward Deal’s goal line, and each time
through Chapin. Suddenly the Boxford full-back dropped back for a kick:
the center sent the ball spinning to him, and a second later he made a
drop kick that sent the ball like a great bird sailing majestically
between the Deal goal posts. And the score was 4 to 0 in favor of
Boxford.
Pandemonium broke loose on the visitors’ side-lines, while the home
boys were still with apprehension and disappointment. Soon the ball
was back in the center of the field in Deal’s possession, and was
being pushed, inevitably it appeared, toward Boxford’s goal, and the
strident cries of “Touchdown, touchdown, touchdown!” rang across the
campus from the throats of three hundred Deal boys. “How much time?”
cried Sandy. “Three minutes to play!” called the time-keeper, and his
ominous words were taken up and repeated by the referee. Tony felt as
if his heart would break. Why, why, why, he wondered, did not Drayton
give him a chance? And Jack Stenton, anxiously pacing the side-lines,
wondered too. And then suddenly Tony heard Kid’s squeaky voice ring
out, “Sixteen, twenty-two, one,”—his signal! And bracing nerves and
sinews, he waited breathlessly as the left half received the ball,
and, dodging the arms of the Boxford player who had broken through,
thrust the smooth little pigskin into Tony’s arms. Away he dashed,
with Chapin, Maclaren, and Thorndyke interfering, round right end. He
thrust his hand into the shoulder of the opposing tackle, successfully
dodged a heavy Boxford boy who had dived to tackle, and with Chapin
by his side, went tearing down the field, which was perfectly open
save for the frantic quarter-back of the Boxford team, who was dashing
forward to intercept him. Thirty yards more and the game was won! but
the quarter-back was almost upon him. “Keep ahead! keep ahead!” he
screamed at Chapin, who seemed for the instant to be lagging behind.
Twenty yards!—and he could see the Boxford quarter dashing diagonally
across the field toward him, and almost feel his arms pinioning his
legs. An instantaneous glance—yes, yes, he could make it if Chapin
would only keep up with him and ward off that quarter as he made his
lunge. Then, just as the Deal boys rose to a man, with a frantic
cheer, the supreme moment was come. The line was reached, but suddenly
Deering felt a jolt; the quarter’s arms were about his waist, as they
went sprawling toward the goal-line; but another arm clothed in a
_red_ sweater had thrust itself next Tony’s body and given the ball a
terrific shove. In an agony of horror, as he fell heavily to earth, he
saw the football fall out of his arms, bound to the ground in front of
them, and Chapin and the Boxford quarter lunge together, as they all
went down in the mêlée. But the Boxford boy was on the ball and had
scored a touchback!
There was a shrill whistle, and the crowd of players were about them,
the Deal boys uttering harsh cries of anger and disappointment; the
Boxford boys cheering in delirious joy, and above it all a hoarse voice
screaming “Time! time!” Tony pulled himself together. “What’s that?”
he exclaimed in bewildered fashion. “Deal this way,” yelled Sandy
Maclaren; and then to him in a contemptuous aside, “The game’s over,
you fool; get up and cheer.”
Suddenly he realized the whole situation, realized much more than
any one else did at that strenuous moment, for he remembered the
red-clothed arm that was responsible for the catastrophe of his losing
the ball, and he gave a long look full into Chapin’s face, but held
his tongue. With a sudden overwhelming bitterness he realized that
Chapin had had his revenge.
As soon as the cheer was over he ran across the field toward the
Gymnasium, passing Jack Stenton on the way, who gave him a glance of
unmitigated disgust. “Couldn’t you have kept from fumbling for one
second when the game was in your hands?” he hissed at him, forgetting
himself in his bitter disappointment. Tony bent his head and ran
on—not back to the lockers, but to his own room in Standerland, where
he locked himself in. He refused to open even to Jimmie Lawrence, who
came knocking there presently, loyal despite his grief, anxious only to
commiserate his friend, whom he knew was suffering more keenly than any
of the rest of them.
CHAPTER VI
AFTERMATH
The outcome of the game for several days cast a deep gloom over the
school. No one apparently had seen Chapin’s dastardly play, so that the
cause of the defeat was very generally ascribed to Tony’s fumbling. The
Boxford boys had driven off in great glee, Deal joining good-spiritedly
in their cheers; but the bells remained silent; the bon-fires were
not lighted, and the school settled down to a doleful Saturday night.
Little groups of boys gathered here and there after supper, and
discussed the incidents of the day. Sandy Maclaren and Stenton were
universally blamed for having risked the experiment of playing a green
boy in a big game, but with boys’ native generosity they showed no
animosity toward Deering. He had lost the game—the consciousness of
that, they realized, was bitter enough punishment for him. Even his own
form mates thought it natural that he should prefer to keep to himself
that evening, and showed little sympathy for Jimmie Lawrence’s anxiety
on his behalf. Jimmie had tried again and again to get into Tony’s
room, but could get no response to his repeated knockings.
Had he known all that was going on in Tony’s mind and heart, he would
have understood. For shut in his bedroom, flat upon his face on the
bed, Deering was struggling with the keenest temptation he had ever
faced. He realized acutely the opprobrium, the unjust opprobrium, that
he would meet with, perhaps not crediting his schoolmates for as much
generosity as they had; and though he would not have feared to face the
boys had the fault been his own, he could not trust himself yet to meet
them, see their disappointment in him, receive their tolerant sympathy,
when he knew that a word from him might free himself from ignominy and
cast the blame where it belonged. And as he lay there, great waves of
hate for Chapin swept over him. He clenched his fists and drove them
into the pillows, longing that his fingers were about Chapin’s throat
and that he might choke out of him a confession of his dastardly
betrayal. To his overwrought mind his future in the school looked dark
and unattractive. The two months that he had spent there had been so
bright and happy; he had made such warm friends and won for himself, it
seemed, such a promising place in the regard of the school; and now,
he felt, all must change, and his fool’s paradise go tumbling down. To
have been given his chance, and failed through the willful meanness of
another, and failing, to have cost his school the victory! For a moment
he felt that he would pack his trunk, go down and tell Stenton the
truth, and then take the first train out of Monday Port and leave the
school to settle the wrangle how it would.
And then he remembered his grandfather’s parting words, as the old
general had stood in the portico of the white-pillar’d house on the
far-away bayou, “Never repay a meanness by a meanness, my boy; and you
will make a good sort of Christian.” And now, would not telling, truth
though it were, be repaying a meanness by a meanness? Yes; but with the
acknowledgment, wrung from his conscience, he burst into tears, tears
of helpless disappointment and chagrin. Telling on another, especially
in his own defense, Tony had always instinctively felt the most
exquisite form of meanness.
After a time he slipped from the bed, and fell on his knees by the
bedside, obeying an unconscious need, in response to the suggestion of
an unbroken habit of putting his boyish trust in an unseen power that
knew and understood. “Oh, God,” he cried, “don’t let me be mean.” And
after a time, though as a matter of fact he prayed very little more
while he knelt there, he rose up, removed his soiled football clothes,
washed and dressed, and slipped out quietly upon the campus. He avoided
meeting the wandering boys, took himself to the beach, and with wind
whistling and waves roaring in his ears, in tune with his mood, he
walked the four miles out to the extreme point of Strathsey Neck. It
was a grim walk, but not an unhappy one, for he had won his battle and
had definitely made up his mind to be silent about the game as he had
been silent about the hazing.
* * * * *
But Tony was not the only person who had witnessed the game that day
and knew who in reality was responsible for the defeat. Mr. Morris,
who chanced to be standing on the side near the Boxford goal-line,
had seen with perfect distinctness all that took place during that
exciting moment of the game. And though several of the boys standing
near him had exclaimed, “It looks as if Chapin had knocked the ball
out of Deering’s arms himself,” with his accustomed reserve, he held
his peace and made no comment. The incredibility of such an act on
Chapin’s part had speedily driven from the boys’ minds the momentary
impression. Morris, observing at the time of the game that Reggie
Carroll was standing near him, had moved over to join him. But at that
instant time had been called, and immediately the field was a scene
of indescribable confusion. The house master pondered over the matter
during the evening, but could not make up his mind as to the proper
course of action.
Just before lights that night he strolled into Carroll’s and Deering’s
study, where he found Reggie as usual at his ease in a Morris chair
with a novel in his hands. Carroll affected French novels, largely
because he could plead the excuse when he was caught reading them that
it was for the sake of his languages.
“Come in, do, Mr. Morris,” exclaimed Carroll, with a trace less than
his wonted coolness. The master entered, closing the door behind him.
“Where is Deering?” he asked, as he seated himself on the couch, and
taking up a paper-cutter from the table, began to play with it.
“He has just come back from a long walk, and turned in, sir. Would you
like to speak with him?”
“No, no, thank you,” Morris answered. “But I will sit for a moment, if
you like, and talk with you. That was an unfortunate game to-day, was
it not?” And as Morris asked the question he looked at Reggie closely.
“Very,” the boy answered, laconically.
“Particularly for our friend Deering,” persisted the master.
“Yes, I wish they had not played him; it was a poor experiment.”
“Had you supposed him a careless player?”
Carroll looked up languidly, but there was a keen glance in his eyes,
and a note of significance in his voice, as he answered, “No, sir, I
don’t think him a careless player, Mr. Morris.”
“And yet he fumbled at a most inopportune time,” suggested Morris,
musingly.
Carroll flung his book a little impatiently on the table, and looked
the older man frankly in the eyes. “Mr. Morris,” he exclaimed, with
every trace of indifference gone, “I am going to tell you in strict
confidence what I know about the game. It is scarcely a decent thing
for me to tell it, but then I saw it.”
“Yes, yes,” Morris murmured, encouragingly.
“I saw Arthur Chapin knock the ball out of Tony’s arms just as they
crossed the line and the Boxford quarter tackled him. I believe he did
it on purpose. Now, I know,” he went on quickly, “that it is a terrible
accusation to make against a fellow even in confidence to you; but
that’s what happened, and I don’t know what I ought to do about it.
It’s incredible, but I saw it.” And springing from his chair, Reggie
began to pace excitedly up and down the room.
“Yes,” said Mr. Morris, quietly, “it is incredible, but I saw it too.”
“What!” exclaimed Reggie. “You saw it, Mr. Morris?”
“Yes, just as you describe it. It is due to the fact that I supposed
you also had seen it that I came in to talk it over with you to-night.
I am afraid Chapin is capable of that sort of thing.”
“Well, then——”—Reggie stopped—”Well, then,” he repeated, “I suppose
it is up to us to tell the Head.”
Morris appeared to be lost in thought. “Of course,” he said, after a
moment, “that is the right course to think of; but I am not sure, my
dear fellow, that I think it best for us to do that just yet. I want to
wait a bit, I think, and see what Deering might wish us to do. You can
be sure he knows it.”
“Oh, yes, I am sure he knows,—he couldn’t help knowing.”
“Well, personally I can’t see what good will come by going to the Head
right away. I am quite sure that if it is brought officially to Dr.
Forester’s notice that he will feel obliged to make it known to the
school, both as a punishment to Chapin and in justice to Deering.”
“But ought that not to be done?” asked Carroll.
“Well, in one sense, yes; but do you know, Reggie,—though it may seem
unwise in me, I have an extraordinary faith in Deering’s judgment about
this matter. I want to know how he takes it before we do anything.”
“I don’t think _he will_ want us to do anything. But, sir, think of
what his not telling will mean to him; think of the way the school will
treat him for a while!”
“Yes, but only for a while. There are possibilities in the situation,
Reginald, that I think we were wiser not to spoil by acting upon snap
judgments.”
Carroll reflected. “Right, O wise man!” he exclaimed in a moment.
“Shall we sound Tony, then?”
“Rather not, I should say. Let us see the line that Tony takes himself.
A few days will not make any difference, and we can set things
straight, you know.”
“But, Mr. Morris, the school is going to lose the credit of victory.”
“Ah! it must do that in any case. _One_ of our men fumbled, you know,
whether accidentally or not; it makes no difference in the result
of the game:—Boxford won. What’s really at stake, my boy, is the
character of those two fellows, and that’s everything—_everything_,
Reggie!”
“By Jove, Mr. Morris,” exclaimed the boy impetuously, “if anyone will
ever make me believe that, you and Deering will.” And he shook the
master’s hand more heartily than he had ever done before.
Deering appeared the next day at his usual place in school, and faced
the ordeal bravely enough. It was an ordeal despite a general effort
on the part of a majority of the boys to avoid discussion of the game
in his presence. Here and there, to be sure, he met with the veiled
glance of contempt or unfriendliness. Hardest of all, however, he found
it to receive Sandy Maclaren’s and Mr. Stenton’s kindly sympathy. The
Great Sandy, as the boys affectionately called him, from his pinnacle
as the Head of the School, was a hero to Tony. Sandy’s confidence and
friendliness had been one of the chief factors in what he regarded as
his success. The friendliness was still there, but Tony sadly feared
the confidence was shattered.
Stenton took him by the arm as the boys were pouring out of morning
Chapel the next day, where they had heard a sermon in which the Doctor
had obviously taken his illustrations from the defeat of the day
before. Stenton drew Tony along with him toward the Old School.
“I want to apologize to you, Deering,” he began, “for the way I spoke
to you yesterday afternoon. I was horribly upset by the unexpectedness
of things, and simply lost my temper. I know you did your best, and I
know too that no one is proof against accident in football or anything
else.”
Tony bit his lip and set his teeth. “Thanks, Mr. Stenton,” he said
briefly. “I appreciate your speaking to me in this way.”
“It was poor interference, anyway,” went on the master, “Chapin
might have saved the day if he had been a bit faster. He had no wind
yesterday.”
Tony kept silent, and there was an awkward pause in the conversation,
during which they came to the steps of the Old School. “Well,” said
Stenton, turning off, “I only wanted to tell you that I am sorry I
spoke irritably. I want you to have your chance next year again, and
show that you are the player I think you are.”
“Thank you very much, Mr. Stenton,” said Tony again, and turned away.
That night after Chapel Tony had his first talk with Carroll since
the game. It was desultory enough, until Reggie spoke out frankly and
expressed his sympathy. Then Deering was immediately alert, his face
flushed quickly, and he spoke with rather a tone of irritation. “Don’t
let’s talk about the game, Reggie. It was a bad business, and I have
made up my mind that the less said about it the better. Matters can’t
be changed, and all I can hope to do is to make good next year. Stenton
has as much as promised that I shall have the chance. I want to forget
yesterday’s game as quickly as possible.”
“Right!” said Carroll. “I promise you, you shall hear no more of it
from me.”
A little later, after Tony had gone to bed, Carroll went in to see Mr.
Morris, and repeated the substance of this conversation.
“It’s as I thought,” he said in conclusion, “we shall hear no more of
it from Tony. Do you still think, sir, that we should hold our tongues?”
“For the present, yes,” answered Morris. “If you don’t mind, Reggie, I
want to manage this myself. In the course of time, I shall see Chapin,
if he takes no action to clear Deering. It will be infinitely better if
he confesses of his own accord. The truth will be known some time, and
in the meanwhile I don’t think Deering will really suffer in popular
estimation. The boys like him, and they will forgive what they think is
his carelessness. If the confession comes from Chapin both boys will
get some good out of it. I feel sure that the Doctor would approve of
this, though I feel equally sure that if the matter were brought to his
attention now he would feel obliged to act as Head Master at once.”
“Very good, sir: I shall say no more about it, until you give me
leave.”
Morris was right. Tony did not suffer very greatly, and in the course
of a few weeks the game was practically forgotten. Chapin certainly
showed no inclination to right the wrong he had done, and for the time
being, Morris was content to let matters drift.
Within a month the school broke up for the three weeks’ Christmas
recess. Tony did not make the long trip south for a visit home, but
instead went with Jimmie to the Lawrences’ country-place on Long
Island, where the boys spent a happy holiday, riding and shooting,
and being plied with good things by Jimmie’s indulgent parents. Tony
made a good impression on Mr. and Mrs. Lawrence, and this visit to
his friend’s home, served to deepen and strengthen the happy intimacy
between the two boys. Early in January they were back at Deal for the
long winter term, which Tony was promised would be exceedingly dull.
He rather welcomed the relief from football practice, however, and
sensibly made up his mind to make the term count in his form work. For
so far, Tony’s reputation as a scholar had scarcely kept pace with his
popularity as a genial companion and a good athlete.
CHAPTER VII
LOVEL’S WOODS
“Ough, school again!” exclaimed Jimmie Lawrence, with a grunt, as
he jumped off the platform of the little way-train at Monday Port
one bright cold afternoon the following January. “I say, Tony,” he
continued, linking his arm in that of his companion, and fishing in his
pockets with his disengaged hand for his luggage checks, “this term it
is school and no mistake! An unspeakable odor of gumshoe pervades the
premises; Pussie Gray hurls math. lessons at your head a yard long, and
the masters generally shriek exhortations at you as though you were
deaf as well as dumb.”
“Nonsense, Jimmo! I am right glad to get back.” And Tony drew in a deep
breath of the cold pure air, and his eyes glistened as he looked out
across the snow-clad landscape—the white town clinging to its hills,
the frozen pond, the troubled blue waters of the bay. “I’ve never seen
any snow to speak of, you know; think of the sliding down Deal Hill!
Mind, old boy, we’re to pack over to Lovel’s Woods this afternoon and
see to a cave.”
“Gemini crickets! Deering, you’ll get enough of the Woods before the
winter’s over. Me for the form-room and a heart to heart talk with my
loving schoolmates.”
“Be an old woman if you like,” interrupted Kit Wilson, who joined them
at this moment. “Tony and I will find the cave, and you’ve got to pony
up the first supply of grub.”
“Oh, very well,” said Jimmie, with a grand air, as the three boys
climbed into a fly. “If you will direct the coachman of this equipage
to stop at the Pie-house, I will give Mrs. Wadmer a _carte blanche_
order for the proper supplies; and we’ll have a feed to-morrow
afternoon. At present, I’m perished with cold.”
By this time the driver had applied the whip to his poor horse, and the
dilapidated fly was crawling up the cobblestones of Montgomery street.
Once the top of the hill was gained, it moved along more rapidly, and
soon Monday Port was left behind, the icy shores of Deal Water had been
skirted, and the long hill that led up to the school was being climbed.
The school “barge,” filled with a shouting, laughing crowd of small
boys, was lumbering along ahead of them, and a dozen or so more cabs
such as our friends had chartered dotted the white road. They passed a
few of these, and noisy greetings were exchanged.
“There’s a trifling pleasure in seeing the kids once more,” said
Jimmie, settling back after they had passed the barge, and assuming
a _blasé_ expression. “It would be rather jolly to be a prefect and
boss ‘em all about.... Whoa-up! here’s the Pie-house and there’s
Mother Wadmer in the doorway with a smile of welcome as broad as her
pocketbook is deep. Hello, Mrs. Wadmer,” he cried, as the cab drew up
before a small frame house by the roadside, on the portico of which
stood a tall angular Cæsarean dame, with a calico apron drawn over her
head.
“How de do, Master Lawrence; howdy, boys. Come right in, and I’ll give
you a glass of the best cider you’ve ever tasted. ‘Tis Mister Wadmer’s
own brew, and a fine thing to begin the term on.”
The three boys piled out of the fly, and in a moment were merrily
greeting the crowd of youngsters who already had established themselves
about the long deal table in Mrs. Wadmer’s hospitable kitchen. “Hello,
Jim!” “Hello, Kit!” “Hello, Tony,” and a dozen other names, nicknames
or parts of names, rang out. The boys shook hands, exchanged rapid
notes of vacation experiences, gulped down several glasses of cider,
and consumed a score or so of luscious tarts.
“When did you get back, Tack?” Kit enquired of a large, ungainly,
rosy-cheeked boy who came from Maine.
“This morning,” answered Turner. “I came down on the boat last night
to New York—scrumptious time. Say, Kit, have you heard the latest at
school?”
“No, we just got in, crawled across the flats from Coventry. What’s up?”
“What’s up? why, some meddlesome jackanapes in the Sixth got wise
to something irregular last winter and has gone to the Doctor with
a doleful tale about the wickedness that’s supposed to go on in the
Woods; so the fiat has gone forth: no caves for boys below the Fourth.”
“No caves!” shouted a dozen boys. A storm of protests and exclamations
arose. “Well,” said Jimmie, as the hubbub ceased, “school will be a
jolly old jumping-off place then.”
“No caves for boys below the Fourth,” echoed Kit. “Well, I announce my
promotion then. Come on, Tony; come on, Jim; let’s get up to school and
get the facts.”
They stalked out amidst howls of derision, and re-entered their
chariot. Jimmie had taken care, however, to direct Mrs. Wadmer to
stack it well with such provisions as were in customary requisition in
Lovel’s Woods. The worthy landlady of the Pie-house was officially deaf
to all rules that emanated from the Head unless they were presented
to her in writing. She owed, it may be said in parenthesis, her long
career under the shadow of Deal School to the admirable loyalty of many
generations of Deal boys.
As luck would have it, to Tony’s amusement as he watched Jimmie’s
expression, the first person they met in the Old School whither they
went at once to report, was Mr. Roylston, who held a roll-call in his
hands and wore on his face a look of patient suffering and in his eyes
an expression of latent indignation. Our friends, thanks to their
digression at the Pie-house, were ten minutes late.
“How do you do, Mr. Roylston?” exclaimed Kit, offering his hand, and
receiving three of the master’s lifeless fingers. A pencil occupied
the other two. “Ah!” he murmured,—Kit afterwards declared, with
satisfaction,—“Lawrence, Wilson, Deering—ten minutes late. I
congratulate you on the punctual way in which you begin the new year.”
“Oh, sir, we were beguiled by the way,” protested the irrepressible
Kit. “The woman beguiled me, sir, and I did eat.”
“Faugh!” exclaimed Mr. Roylston. “Spare me your coarse irreverence. You
are redolent of the unpleasant odors of the Pie-house. I will give you
five marks apiece.”
“Oh, sir!”
“Please, sir!”
“I beg of you, sir. Pray divide ‘em, sir.”
“Silence, Wilson; you are impertinent as well as irreverent. If you
linger longer with this futile protesting, I shall double your marks.
Kindly go at once and unpack your trunks.”
“Please, sir; we always do that in the evening, sir; and I hope you
will allow us to go to the form-room, sir.”
“Don’t ‘sir’ me so. Write out for me before to-morrow’s school fifty
lines of the Æneid, and go at once.”
“Very good, sir!” And lest they all get a similar dose of “pensum,”
as such punishments were called, they hurried off to the Third Form
common-room. There they found a crowd of newly-arrived boys, engaged in
a vociferous denunciation of the Doctor’s new rule against caves in the
Woods. The news had evidently been announced by the prefects.
“What a gloomy old piece of rubber the Gumshoe is!” muttered Kit, as
they were entering. “Fancy soaking me a pensum two minutes after I’m
back at school. Hey, you fellows!” he cried, “what’s this racket?”
A dozen boys started to explain together, so that from their noisy
chatter nothing could be gathered, except “Woods,” “caves” and
execrations on the Head and the Sixth, with Kit’s lament on the gloomy
Mr. Roylston rising above it all like a dismal howl.
A Fourth Form boy,—Barney Clayton, by name,—thrust a red head through
the open doorway. “Oh, fy!” he yelled, “what a precious howl you kids
are letting out! What’s the matter? does the prohibition against caves
rile your independent spirits?”
“Get out, you red-head!” rose in angry chorus; and one boy shied
a dog-eared Latin book at the fiery shock in the doorway. In a
second a shower of missiles,—ink-stands, books, chairs, waste-paper
basket,—went flying through the doorway and out into the corridor.
Barney ducked his head and fled, shouting back derisive taunts. The
commotion attracted the attention of Mr. Roylston at his post in the
main hall, and he came flying to quell the disturbance. And, alas!
he arrived just at a moment to receive full in the face the contents
of a waste-paper basket, which Kit had flung. The débris descended
upon him in comical fashion. The poor gentleman was speechless with
indignation; but the situation was too much for the boys; despite his
angry countenance, his blazing black eyes, they greeted his appearance
with shouts of laughter.
He waited, inarticulate with rage, until the commotion ceased, finally
quelling them to a spell-bound silence by the sheer force of his
anger, and a little also, by the righteousness of his cause.
“In the whole course of my career as a schoolmaster,” the master said
at last, with a nervous jerk to each phrase, but pronouncing each word
with the deadly precision of a judge uttering a capital sentence, “I
have never been met with such gratuitous insult. Every member of this
form will consider himself on bounds until further notice. As for
you, Wilson, you shall be reported immediately to the Head, and if my
recommendation can effect it, you will receive the caning you deserve.”
“We were not throwing at you—we didn’t know you were coming—” began
Kit.
“Silence! do not add hypocrisy to insolence. You had been told to go to
your rooms.... Disperse now at once, and do not show yourselves before
supper. You Wilson, Lawrence and Deering, remain behind and clean up
this disgusting mess. It is not surprising, I may say, that the Head
feels himself unable to trust this form in the Woods this winter.” And
with this parting shot, Mr. Roylston turned and walked away, with what
dignity he could command.
The boys, somewhat subdued by the dispiriting announcement of bounds,
marched off gloomily, and our three friends stayed behind and began to
clear up the débris.
“Well,” said Kit at last, turning a half-merry, half-rueful countenance
to his companions, as he seated himself upon a broken chair, “what
a gloomy ass it is! But, oh my dears, did you observe his beautiful
pea-green, Nile blue, ultramarine phiz as the contents of the
waste-basket descended upon his lean and hairless chops? Oh, my! what a
home-coming! what a sweet heart to heart talk we’ve all had together!”
“And a jolly good caning you’ll get, Kitty, when Gumshoe has had his
talk with the Doctor.”
“Jolly good,” replied Kit, rubbing his legs with a wry face. “But in
the meantime, mes enfants,” he continued, “since I am to be swished, it
shall not be that I suffer unjustly; we are going to make the swishing
worth while. We are off to the Woods this minute. We’ll take the stuff
over, stow it in the cave, put up a notice, and be back by supper. I’ll
be hanged if I’ll pay any attention to Gumshoe’s twaddle about bounds
or to the Doctor’s nonsense about caves. Are you with me, Jimmie, old
boy?”
“Well, rather,” Jimmie replied. “The experience of the last quarter of
an hour has quite discouraged me with regard to the peace and quiet and
healthy conversation us nice boys ought to have in form common-room.”
Tony had kept silent. “Well, are you going to cut for a quitter?” asked
Kit, turning upon him with an indignant glare.
“Not I,” said Tony quickly.
“Then help stow this truck. We’ve an hour and a half till supper, and
the Gumshoe will undoubtedly think we have _disperrssed_ to our rooms.”
And he gave an absurd imitation of Mr. Roylston’s manner of speaking.
Ten minutes later they were running down the slope of Deal Hill, under
the cover of the stone walls; then tearing across the frozen marshes,
and clambering up the steep banks and crags that bounded the west
side of Lovel’s Woods. The sun was sinking in the west, and its rich
mellow golden light fell athwart the snow-clad woodland, flooding it
with glory, save where the great masses of pine and cedar cast broad
splotches of shadow. The splendid loveliness of the dying afternoon,
the biting cold of the wind, the thrill of doing the forbidden, filled
Tony with a delicious sense of happiness and adventure.
Each boy had his arms full of cooking utensils, food, boxes—the varied
paraphernalia of a cave. It had been an ancient custom at Deal during
the winter for boys to have caves in Lovel’s Woods, where they cooked
weird messes during the afternoons when there was no skating. This year
the Doctor, owing to certain abuses reported by the prefects the year
before, had decided to restrict the use of caves to the three upper
forms.
Kit had a particular cave in mind, far away on the remote side of
what was known as the Third Ridge, a cave that he and Jimmie and
Teddy Lansing had had together the year before as Second Formers.
This desirable spot was a natural formation in the rocky side of the
farther of the three ridges of which Lovel’s Woods consisted. It was
practically inaccessible from below, and the entrance above, well
concealed by a clump of low cedars, was a narrow cleft in the rocks, at
the extreme edge of which the initiated might descend to the cave by a
series of dangerous steps which the boys had fashioned in the side of
the precipitous cliff.
Tony and Kit climbed down into the cave, while Jimmie, lying flat
on the ledge above, handed down to them the supply of stores. These
were safely stowed in a strong box, which had lasted out the previous
season, and made secure. When the boys had clambered up again, they
discovered that the sun had set and the darkness was gathering swiftly.
The clear crescent of the new moon hung in the western sky a band of
gold, and the evening star was rising over the ocean.
“Twenty minutes to supper: we can just make it,” exclaimed Kit, looking
at his watch. “Heave ahead, my hearties, and let’s run for it.”
And run they did, at breakneck speed along the mazy paths, through the
tangled undergrowth, over the slippery crags, across the frozen marsh.
Kit, the imprudent, was impudently singing at the top of his shrill
voice the verses of one of the School songs.
“Out of the briny east,
Out of the frosty north,
Over the school-topp’d hill,
Whistle the shrill winds forth.
“Over the waves a-quiver,
Over the salt sedge grass,
Over the beaches tawny,
The bright wind spirits pass.”
And the other two boys took up the ringing refrain,
“Grapple them e’er they go,
Grapple them e’er they go.”
Luck was with them. They reached the school as the great bell in the
Chapel struck six. Five minutes later, after a hasty wash and brush-up
in their rooms, they were in the great library, shaking hands with the
Doctor and Mrs. Forester and with masters and boys.
The three, more closely united than ever by their sense of sharing
a dangerous secret, kept together during chapel, and directly after
were for making off to Jimmie’s room, when Sandy Maclaren, looking
wonderfully handsome and “swagger” in his town clothes, laid a heavy
hand on Kit’s shoulder. “Not so fast, boy. The Doctor wants to see you
instanter at the Rectory.”
Kit heaved a sigh in mock heroics. “Hail, blithe spirits,” he lamented,
murdering his quotation, “hail and farewell.”
The boys pressed his hands heartily. “Is it a caning, Sandy?” they
asked.
“Well, I rather think so,” answered Maclaren, with a smile. “You
weren’t very keen not to distinguish between Barney Clayton and Mr.
Roylston.”
“They were both butting in,” protested Kit.
“Well, cut along now. And you two report to Bill, he’s looking for you.”
Kit found the Doctor in his comfortable study at the Rectory, standing
before a glowing log fire, with his swallow-tails spread to the blaze.
“Ah, Christopher,” the Head Master exclaimed, shaking hands with the
culprit, “I’m glad to see you.”
“Thank you, sir. Maclaren said you wanted to see me particularly?”
“I do, most particularly. Take off your coat.”
Kit backed a little. “But, sir——”
“Yes, my boy, I dare say you have full and ample explanations, but
I am quite sure they will not impress me. I know that you were but
one of many in this fracas, and that it is your misfortune—shall
I say?—rather than your fault that your particular missile took
unfortunate effect. But we must all suffer at times for our mistakes,
perhaps a little unjustly. The moment has struck when you must suffer
too. The sooner we get at this business the sooner it will be over.”
“Very good, sir,” said Kit, and silently removed his coat. And then the
Doctor took a familiar implement of stout old hickory from a corner,
and swished him soundly. Those were the happy days when debts against
school discipline were so quickly and effectively liquidated.
Kit bore no grudge to the Doctor, and comparatively little to
Mr. Roylston. “It was worth it,” he confessed to Jimmie and Tony
afterwards, “and I rather think this lets me out, conscientiously lets
me out, you know, from paying attention to his futile announcement of
bounds.”
It goes without saying that the Doctor’s prohibition against Lovel’s
Woods was about as unpopular a rule as had ever been promulgated.
Combined with the fact that the Third Form were bounded for a month,
as a consequence of their trouble with Mr. Roylston, the Lower School
began the term in a bad mood. The Third Formers were particularly
disgruntled with the prefects, who had assumed the responsibility of
keeping Lovel’s Woods in order. It appeared that smoking had been
indulged in the year before quite extensively by some of the younger
boys, and gambling was suspected on the part of a few of the older
ones. The Doctor’s rule had been more in the nature of a preventive
than a punishment.
But the effort to keep the rule effective was more of an undertaking
than the prefects had realized; for they felt themselves required
practically to police the forbidden district, a task, the novelty of
which soon wore off. With the older boys caves were not particularly
popular. Chapin and Marsh started one together, and moved into it
the paraphernalia that they had hitherto kept stored in the cave on
the beach by Beaver Creek. All of the prefects, acting on Maclaren’s
advice, gave up their caves in order to set an example; with the result
that there were hardly more than a dozen in official operation.
For the first few weeks of the term the prefects were so zealous in
their police duties that few boys cared to run the risk of “skipping”
to the Woods. Even our three friends, despite their firm resolution to
evade the rule, for the time being felt it the part of wisdom to lie
low. Accordingly they avoided the Woods as if it were plague stricken
and industriously played hockey every afternoon on Deal Great Pond,
which was fully two miles away. But toward the end of January a thaw
set in, the skating was spoiled, a heavy snow came, and their usual
sports were interrupted; consequently the temptation to visit the
cave _sub rosa_ grew stronger than ever. Gradually also the inclement
weather dampened the ardor of the prefects and they began to relax
their vigilance over the forbidden territory. And we may say in passing
that Tony and Jimmie and Kit spent several delightful afternoons in
their hiding-place, and the parts of one or two wildly thrilling nights
after lights.
Despite his nefarious proceedings in contravention of the rules, be it
said to his credit, Tony was making good his resolution of “poling”
at his books, and felt confident of taking a good stand in the school
when the ranks were read at the beginning of February. The football
game, so far as his part in it was concerned, as Morris had predicted,
seemed forgotten. He avoided Chapin as much as he could, and when they
inevitably met he treated him with a courteous indifference which the
older boy doubtless understood and was thankful to accept.
Carroll, after a vacation spent in New York where he had seen all of
the plays and dined at the best restaurants and gone to many more
dances than were good for his health, returned to the school more than
ever dissatisfied and disgruntled with the life he led in it. The talk
with Mr. Morris about Tony, the consciousness that they possessed an
important secret in common, served a little to make his relations with
his house master easier, but he was still unable to give his friendship
in the easy way he longed to give it. Neither, to his deepening chagrin
and regret, was he making progress in his friendship with Deering, for
Tony was more than ever absorbed in the life of his form, and spent
all his free time with Wilson and Lawrence. He seemed unconscious of
the affection he had won from Carroll and this, with Carroll’s intense
consciousness of how completely his affection was going out, served to
make their relations anything but free and spontaneous. So far as Tony
thought about his room-mate that term it was as of an older fellow with
whom he was not very congenial, and of whose laziness and indifferent
attitude toward the school he did not approve. He thought Carroll to be
wasting his time both at his books and in the school life, in either
of which he could have counted immensely. Had Tony been less absorbed
in his younger friends, he would probably have found a good deal in
Reggie to like and value, as earlier in the year he had begun to feel
he should.
From his cozy den in the midst of Standerland Hall, surrounded by his
well-loved books, his few but carefully chosen pictures, Mr. Morris
watched the life throbbing about him with sympathetic insight and
keen interest. He was not one of those fortunate schoolmasters who do
not allow their profession to engage their affections. Morris, with
a surrender that was effectually a sacrifice, for he had gifts and
opportunities that might have won him a finer place in the world,
gave his life completely to the school. He had loved it as a boy, he
had looked back upon it during college with fond recollection and
yearning, and after three years or so at a professional school, having
taken his examinations for the bar, he had gone back to accept Dr.
Forester’s offer of a mastership. For half-a-dozen years he had been
there now, and each year the place and the boys got a deeper hold upon
his heart and his interest. He was scrupulously fair and evenly kind;
therefore deservedly popular; but despite this he had his favorite
boys, not usually known as such by the school at large, to whom he
gave a special affection and a deeper interest. From the first day,
when Deering, with his sparkling eyes and bright, clear-cut, eager
face, had come to him for a seat in the schoolroom, he had felt for
him that keen attraction which, as he grew to know the boy’s high
spirits, lively sense of honor, and sunshiny nature, had deepened to a
real affection. In Carroll also he had always felt a special interest,
and had been glad when Tony was put to room with him. He saw Reggie’s
growing devotion to Deering, and was sorry that Tony did not respond
to a greater extent. Morris felt that Carroll needed the strengthening
influence of a strong unselfish friendship with the right sort of boy
to help make a man of him. Occasionally Morris had the two boys with
others in his rooms for tea or on Saturday nights for a rarebit and a
bit of supper, but otherwise occasions did not present themselves for
his getting to know them better. He was sorry for this, but saw no very
satisfactory way of making them. By the end of January it seemed to
him that Reggie was in quite the worst attitude that he had ever been,
thoroughly indifferent to the work and life of the school.
CHAPTER VIII
A MIDNIGHT LARK
That winter proved to be a hard one, with frequent snows and violent
winds, which put an end to the skating within a few weeks after
Christmas, and left the majority of the boys with no very satisfactory
pastime in the free afternoons. There was sliding down Deal Hill a good
part of the time, and to Tony, who never before had experienced the
pleasures of a northern winter, this was great fun; but after a time it
palled upon his two cronies, Jimmie and Kit, and at their suggestion
surreptitious visits to the cave in Lovel’s Woods became more frequent.
Perhaps that this was a forbidden pleasure added a keener zest than
they otherwise would have taken in it, and that several boys had
recently been caught in the Woods and punished severely gave an element
of danger to their visits that made them even more fascinating. Aside
from the disobedience that these visits involved, they were innocent
enough. The boys, having reported at call-over for a walk, would skirt
the beaches and enter the Woods from the east, completely out of range
of the school and comparatively safe from detection unless they chanced
to encounter prefects or masters walking in the Woods themselves. The
indefatigable Mr. Gray often bent his steps in that direction, but to
the school’s intense delight, without noticeable result. The snows were
so heavy and the walking consequently so difficult that the vigilance
of masters and prefects at last completely relaxed. From that time
on the boys who cared for the trouble had a fairly clear field. Our
friends were fortunate in having a cave on the extreme eastern edge
of the woods, so that the approach from the beach was easy. Once this
was gained, they made a fire, cooked sausages, fried pan-cakes of an
extremely leathery quality, and made coffee that certainly they would
not have drunk in any other place.
Tony had told Carroll of their exploits, and had even invited him to
pay them a visit and partake of their “feed,” an invitation that was
decisively declined. “It is certainly not worth while,” he replied,
with a smile, “to run the risk of getting the Doctor quite sour on me
for the pleasure of partaking of the results of your culinary skill.”
“A great deal better for you,” Tony retorted, “than moping in doors
half the time over sickly French novels.”
“Possibly; but French novels are not the only alternative to the
Woods,” Reggie answered, “and as a matter of fact I have begun to go in
for tremendous tramps.”
“You must take ‘em mostly at night, then.”
“I do frequently,” was the somewhat tart reply, “the night air has
always had a fascination for me.”
In truth Tony was aware that Reggie had resumed his old custom of
disappearing from their rooms after lights, paying visits, he
incuriously supposed, upon some of his friends. The fact gave him
little thought.
One afternoon the three boys were in their cave. Tony was turning
pan-cakes in a skillet, while Jimmie was laboring with a dark mixture
that they euphemistically called coffee. Kit sat on the branch of a
tree, with his head over the ledge, on the look-out for any wandering
prefects.
“Hurry up, you frabjous duffers,” he called down, midst a stream of
amiable chaffing; “it’s close upon four, and we’ll have to bolt the
grub in order to get back to Gumshoe’s five o’clock.”
“Why don’t you get down and work a bit, then? Nobody’s coming along
this late. Get the plates out, and pour some syrup out of the jug. No
work: no eat.”
“Too many cooks spoil the broth,” he laughed.... “Shish!” he exclaimed
suddenly, and ducked his head below the ledge.
The three kept a tense silence for a moment. They heard footsteps
crunching in the snow above and passing on. Kit cautiously peeped over
the ledge. “By Jove,” he whispered, “it’s Reggie Carroll and Arty
Chapin. I thought it was a couple of prefects.”
He slid down from the tree, and began to gobble up one of Tony’s
pan-cakes. “By the by, Tony, I thought the elegant Reginald Carter
Westover Carroll had severed his friendship with that specimen of
common Chapin clay.”
“So he had,” answered Tony, musingly. “I didn’t know they had taken up
with each other again.”
“What a queer duck Reggie is,” said Jimmie, as he poured out three cups
of coffee. “Have you ever made him out, Tony?”
“Not I. We hit it off well enough after the first few days—for a time.
But this term I have hardly seen anything of him. I am sorry he is in
with Chapin again.”
“And I. I’ve always liked Reggie despite his supercilious disdain, but
Arty’s a beast, and always was,” said Kit, drinking his coffee at a
gulp. “Here, let’s stow these things, and cut around to the north and
take a peep as to what that precious pair are up to. Evidently no five
o’clock for them.”
“What’s the difference where they are going?” said Tony. “I have no
mind to spy on them.”
“Well, I have a consuming curiosity,” Kit rejoined. “They’re up to
mischief, I’ll be bound.”
“Light out then,” said Tony, “for Jim and I are going back over the
ridges.”
“And leave your precious footprints in the snow,” protested Kit. “La!
la! stow the stuff, will you then? I’ll report if there’s anything
doing.”
And despite his companions’ adjurations Kit clambered off over the
rocks and started out in the direction indicated by Carroll’s and
Chapin’s footsteps in the snow.
The boys got safely back without being detected, but Kit was a quarter
of an hour late, and created a sad disturbance when he entered in the
midst of Mr. Roylston’s Third Latin recitation.
“The incorrigible Wilson,” remarked Mr. Roylston, without turning his
beady black eyes in his direction, “will kindly take a pensum of one
hundred lines for being late and disturbing the class.”
“Very well, sir,” said Kit.
“Spare me your comments, pray. Continue your recitation, Turner; Book
Four, Chapter Fourteen, line twenty. Proceed. Cæsar—”
“Oh, yes, sir.... Qui omnibus rebus subito perterriti—” Tack spelled
it out painfully, and fell mercilessly upon it, “Who to all quickly
having been thoroughly terrified. Et celeritati nostri et discessu
suorum.... And with quickness to us both a descent....”
Mr. Roylston transfixed the floundering youth with a withering glance,
and there was a moment of awful silence. “With quickness to you, I may
suggest, Turner,” he said at last in scathing tones, “descent into your
seat and a zero in my mark-book.”
He turned to Kit. “Wilson, let us see if you can cast light upon the
darkness into which Turner has led us.”
“I am afraid I can’t, sir.”
“No?” murmured the master. “Well, I was not hopeful,” and he quietly
recorded a zero in his mark-book. “Now, Deering—”
Tony took up the passage, and got through it correctly enough, but not
without being harassed by Mr. Roylston’s interruptions and glances
of incredulity at his rendering of the Latin. The Latin recitations
at Deal under the famous Ebenezer Roylston—he was the editor of an
edition of Cicero that was classic in its day—were periods of agony
and boredom. But at last this particular recitation came to an end,
and immediately afterward, Kit threw his arms about the necks of his
two friends, and drew them into a vacant classroom.
“Well?”
“What’s up?”
“Oh, you frabjous kiddos! I tracked ‘em for a mile—’twas a mucker
trick, I’ll admit, but I’ve got it in for Chapin. And what do you
think, those two blooming jays are playing poker with their crowd in a
shanty back of the Third Ridge. If it weren’t for Reggie, I swear I’d
peach on Chapin.”
“I swear you’d do nothing of the sort,” said Tony.
“Well, perhaps not,” assented Kit, temporarily crestfallen. “But I must
say that’s a crummy thing of them to do. Fine school spirit, eh!”
“Well, we have been skipping bounds pretty regularly this fall, if I
remember correctly.”
“My dear child,” remarked Kit paternally, “when will you learn wisdom?
The Doctor carefully distinguishes between moral offenses and offenses
against school discipline. Now, bounds are obviously disciplinary and
not moral; hence we are mere wandering angels, while those poker fiends
are equally hence of the lower regions.”
“Rot!” was the courteous rejoinder. “It is obvious to any but a
bonehead like yourself that the Doctor imposed bounds this year for
moral reasons, because he had wind that just that sort of thing was
going on.”
“Ah!” resumed Kit sarcastically. “I perceive the glimmerings of a
conscience. You are getting the remorse for your own sins?”
“Not particularly. I am only objecting to the complacent way in which
you shove Carroll and Chapin outside the pale of decency.”
“Well, I’m easy, old boy; I certainly won’t be damned for making
pan-cakes in Lovel’s Woods; but I can readily see that Reggie might for
playing poker there. But it isn’t so much the poker I object to, as his
beastly taste in companions.”
“Thunder and blazes, Kit, what’s it to you who Reggie goes with?”
“Nothing much. But of a kindness warn your room-mate against Arty; he
is an awful bounder and always was.”
“Well,” answered Tony, “Reggie knows him better than we do; and it is
certainly not my business to give him advice. Come on; let’s quit this
jaw, and go in to supper.”
Disposed as Tony had been openly to defend Carroll against this
criticism, he condemned him yet the more severely in his heart. He knew
that Reggie realized the defects of Chapin’s character; that he was
spoiling his chances of a prefectship the next year by his association
with him, and that he was running the risk of public expulsion if it
should be discovered that he was playing poker. After a good deal of
hesitation he made up his mind to speak to Reggie on the subject.
Accordingly he waited that night until after lights, and then slipped
over to Reggie’s room, hoping to please him by this suggestion of
renewing their nightly talks. But to his disappointment Carroll was not
there. Tony turned back into the study, and stood for a moment at the
window looking out upon the white campus, flooded now with the light of
a full moon.
Suddenly he heard the latch of his door turn and some one slip into the
room.
“Hello, Reggie,” he whispered, “is that you?”
“Shish! no—it’s me—Kit,” came the soft reply. “Jimmie is
outside—we’re going to the Woods. Get into your clothes and come
along.”
“Oh, hang the Woods!” exclaimed Tony. “I am sleepy and want to go to
bed.”
“Don’t be a quitter. Jim’s got a box from home; we’ll have a bully
good time, and we can get back by midnight. Where’s your precious
room-mate—gone to the shanty?”
“I don’t know—I suppose so.”
“Well, perhaps we’ll meet him; come on.”
The lark proved too strong a temptation, and after a little more
persuasion, Tony yielded. He slipped on his trousers and a sweater,
his stockings and boots, and a coat, and was ready. The two boys crept
silently down the corridor, past the door of Mr. Morris’s room, over
the transom of which a bright light was shining, and down the stairs.
Once Kit tripped, and they sank down below the head of the stairs, just
as Mr. Morris opened his door and stood at it for a moment listening.
Then the master closed his door again, and the boys went out into the
cold frosty moonlight night, and joined Jimmie, who was waiting for
them at the fives-court.
Morris, however, was an old hand at his business, and not a clumsy
one. He stepped into his bedroom, which was darkened, and going to the
window stood there watching. Presently he saw the three dark figures,
unrecognizable at the distance, creep along the fives-court, dash
across to the cloister that led from Standerland to the Schoolhouse,
and then disappear behind the clump of trees at the corner. Confident
that he had heard some one leaving his own dormitory, the master then
made his rounds, and surely enough found that Deering, Lawrence and
Wilson were missing. Curiously enough Tony’s happened to be the last
room that he entered, and when he found his bedroom empty, thus being
sure that the three he had seen were accounted for, he neglected to
look into Carroll’s room, and returned to his study to wait for their
return.
About ten o’clock as he sat before his fire, meditating the course
of his action, a rap sounded on the door, and in response to his
invitation, Doctor Forester came in.
“Ah, Morris,” said the Head Master, coming forward and standing with
his back to the fire, “I am sorry to disturb you at this time of night;
but there is mischief afoot, and perhaps you can help me catch the
offenders.”
Morris looked at the Doctor attentively, but for the moment did not
volunteer his information.
“This afternoon,” continued the Head, “Maclaren found an old shanty
back of the Third Ridge, rigged out with the paraphernalia of a poker
game. It has evidently been in use, and from the character of the
débris, he thinks, by some of our boys. Maclaren supposes that some of
your boys have been getting out at nights, and may be the culprits. Is
that possible?”
“Yes,” answered Morris, “quite possible. I should not have said so an
hour ago, for I keep a close watch upon that sort of thing, or at least
I try to; but as a matter of fact three of my boys are missing at this
moment.”
“Who are they?” asked the Doctor sharply.
“Lawrence, Deering and Wilson.”
“What! they are the last boys in the School that I should be inclined
to suspect of that sort of thing, though I regret to say, Maclaren has
some evidence that I fear implicates Deering. Have you any idea that
they are gone to the Woods?”
“I fear they have, sir. I heard a noise in the hallway a half-hour ago,
and slipped out to see what it was. For the moment I supposed I had
been mistaken, but a little later from my bedroom window I saw three
boys disappear back of the Schoolhouse. I did not know who they were
until I had made my rounds, which was just a few minutes ago.”
“Well, they must be found. If they are implicated in this affair at the
Third Ridge shanty I shall deal with them severely. Fine boys, too!
it’s a great shame.... Maclaren and Cummings are waiting in my study; I
will go and give them this clue.”
“If you like, sir, I will go for you, and go with them.”
“I would be obliged if you would. In that case, I will remain here
until your return.”
Morris put on his great coat and boots and started out, while the
Doctor settled himself before the fire with a book. A little later the
master with the two prefects whom he had found at the Rectory, set out
for Lovel’s Woods.
Early in the evening Thorndyke, who was a member of the crowd that
frequented the shanty, had got wind of Maclaren’s discovery through
Lawrence Cumming’s indiscreet confidences, and had hastened to the
rendezvous—the stone bridge by the Red Farm below Deal Hill—and had
warned his companions. They had quietly returned to their dormitories;
indeed, while the Head Master and Morris had been talking in the
latter’s study, Carroll had softly stolen upstairs, slipped into his
room, and quietly got into bed.
Our other friends, following Kit’s ardent but injudicious leadership,
were making a detour to the north on their way to their cave with an
intention of taking a peep at the nefarious doings at the shanty.
It was a long walk, and a cold one. Tony and Jimmie had little heart
for it, but the irrepressible Kit led them gaily on. They skirted
Beaver Pond, threaded their way along the ridges over familiar
paths, and at last debouched upon the little clearing in which the
abandoned shanty was situated. On every side stretched the thick woods,
traversable only by those who knew their devious paths. To the east of
the shanty the ridge ended abruptly, there was a sheer descent, and
over the tops of the trees on the hillside one could get a splendid
view of the distant ocean, the Neck, and Deigr Island beyond the point,
with its light faithfully blinking red and white.
“No one about,” exclaimed Kit, peering in at a dark window; “what a
lark!”
“Now that we’re here,” said Jimmie. “I’m for investigating.”
“By Jove! the window’s unfastened!” cried Kit, already tugging at the
sash. In a moment he had it up, and disappeared over the window-sill.
He struck a match inside and his companions could see him moving about.
Presently he found a candle, lighted it, and set it on the table. “Come
on in,” he called. “Here’s a rummy old pack of cards.” And he kicked
the deck of cards across the room.
Deering and Lawrence climbed in and joined him in an interested
examination of the room. The structure, which contained only this one
room, it may be said, had been built some years before by a gentleman
of the neighborhood, who had literary tastes, and sought the quiet
and seclusion of this spot for their development. Of late it had been
disused, however, for a period of six or seven years. There was an
old table, a few rickety chairs, and a strong-box, such as the boys
used in their caves; aside from these no furniture of any description.
The embers of a wood fire glowed on a great hearth at one side of the
room. In a cupboard the boys found several soiled packs of cards, a
pile of poker chips, and some empty cigarette boxes. “The real dope,
I suppose,” Kit commented “is in the strong box, or hid some place
outside. I reckon we can’t bust into it. What a silly lot of asses; if
the prefects don’t get on to this, I’m a loser. But what a jolly old
joint it is, eh?”
“Rather,” said Jimmie. “There’s a pile of dishes in the sink
yonder—they’ve evidently had a feed here this afternoon. There’s live
coals on the hearth. Hmmm—smell the tobacco!”
“Makes my mouth water,” was Kit’s prompt reply. “Let’s fire up,
and have our feed here, and leave a note thankin’ ‘em for their
hospitality. It isn’t likely that anybody will turn up this time o’
night. Get the bundle, Tony; and you, Jim, lend a hand while we start
the fire.”
The two began industriously to lay a fresh fire on the great andirons,
while Tony made for the window. As he reached it there rose before him
what seemed a monstrous head and body. He gave a cry of alarm. “Great
heavens! who is it?” he screamed.
“Don’t have a fit, Deering; it’s only Maclaren.”
Tony immediately recovered his equilibrium. “Only Maclaren!” he
repeated, in a voice of despair. “It’s all up, kiddos.” And he turned a
white face to his amazed companions in the shanty.
“Only Maclaren!” wailed Kit, as he threw his bundle of faggots on the
hearth. “You poor fool, there’s Mr. Morris too.”
It was a sorry procession that wound its way back to Standerland that
cold January night. The Doctor was waiting for them in Mr. Morris’s
study, grown a little impatient at the long delay. The clock had struck
eleven before he heard the footsteps on the stairs.
Mr. Morris had rather deprecated explanations on the way back,
preferring to let the Head deal with the case himself; nor were the
boys much inclined to talk. Upon their arrival at Standerland, Mr.
Morris gave a succinct account of their capture, while the Doctor
listened, a cloud gathering upon his brow.
“Well,” he said sternly, as Morris finished, “what were you doing in
Lovel’s Woods at this time of night? Lawrence, you may answer for the
three.”
“We skipped out just for the lark, sir.”
“You have been in the habit of paying these visits to the Woods?”
“Yes, sir—once in a while, sir,” Jimmie answered, in rather a doleful
tone.
“What have you done there?”
“Simply fooled about in our cave, sir.”
“Do you call that shanty your cave?”
“No, sir—our cave is on the east side on the Third Ridge.”
“Well, what were you doing at the shanty?”
“We were investigating it, sir; we had never been there before.”
“None of you?”
“None, sir.”
“Is that true of you, Wilson?”
“I?” exclaimed Kit. “No, sir; that is, sir, I have been there once
before, but only on the outside and looked in at the windows.”
“And you, Deering?”
“No, sir, I have never been there before.”
Dr. Forester had turned on Tony like a flash. “How then do you account
for the fact that a letter addressed to you was found there this
afternoon?”
“A letter addressed to me found there!” exclaimed Tony, in surprise. “I
can’t account for it. I do not know how it got there.”
“Do you know of other boys being there?”
“I believe other boys have been there; yes, sir.”
“Do you know what boys have been there?”
“I really can’t say, sir.”
Tony was growing restless and ill at ease under this severe
cross-examination. It suddenly dawned upon him, that the Doctor did
not appear to accept his replies as he gave them.... In his quick
passionate southern way he fired with resentment. His face flushed,
he stammered in giving his replies, and once or twice inadvertently
contradicted himself. Jimmie and Kit looked at him in amazement; for a
moment the suspicion crossed their minds that Tony had perhaps after
all been going to the shanty with Carroll. Even Morris, who had been
serenely confident that the boys would clear themselves of the charge
of gambling, showed a troubled countenance as the cross-examination
went on.
“Come, come,” said the Doctor, “I would like you to suggest some
explanation as to how a letter addressed to you was found in that
shanty this afternoon.”
“I don’t account for it,” Tony replied. “I know nothing about it. I
know nothing about the shanty; I never saw it until to-night.”
“That statement,” commented the Doctor mercilessly, “conflicts with
what you implied a few moments ago. You allowed me to infer that you do
know what boys go there.”
“Suppose I do,” exclaimed Tony passionately. “Suppose I do—I shan’t
tell anything about it. I have never been there, and I have nothing to
do with it.”
“Well, sir, there is still another bit of evidence that inevitably
suggests to me the suspicion that you must know more than you admit.
The strong-box in that shanty was rifled this afternoon by the Head
Prefect under my direction. In it were found several packs of playing
cards, a quantity of poker chips, and a memorandum-book.”
“Well, sir?”
“Do you know anything about that memorandum-book?”
“I do not.”
The Doctor drew it from his pocket as he spoke, and opened it. “I find
here various entries, evidently sums of money owing to certain persons.
I find here the entry ‘A. D. to R. C.—$5.’ Between these pages is a
check on the First National Bank of New Orleans drawn by you in your
own favor and endorsed on the back. Do you recollect such a check?”
Tony racked his memory, and recalled at last that a week or so before
he had given Reggie such a check in payment of a small loan. “I made
out such a check; yes, sir.”
“To whom did you pay it?”
“I decline to tell you, sir.”
“What did you pay it for?”
“In payment of the sum of five dollars which I had borrowed.”
“The boy to whom you paid this will corroborate your statement?”
“Possibly, sir—I don’t know. I certainly shan’t ask him to. I am
accustomed to tell the truth.”
“You decline then to explain to me how this check came to be found in
this memorandum-book in the strong-box of that shanty?”
“I know nothing about it to explain. I paid the check to a friend. I
don’t know how it came to be in the shanty.”
“Have you ever played poker in this school?”
“No, sir; I have not.”
“Could this check have had anything to do with a poker game?”
“I don’t know—not so far as I am concerned.”
“What do you mean by ‘so far as I am concerned’?”
“I mean that I have never played cards for money, or given that check
in payment for a gambling debt. As to whether other boys have gambled
in the shanty or elsewhere, I do not know. I have nothing to say.”
“You have broken bounds repeatedly this term?”
“Yes, sir.”
“That will do for to-night. You three boys may go to bed now. Report to
me to-morrow morning at the Rectory after Chapel. You will not attend
recitations or take any part in the school activities until this matter
is settled.”
The three culprits silently took up their caps and went off to their
rooms; Jimmie and Kit, distressed and alarmed for themselves, but even
more for Tony; Deering was sullen and angry.
Doctor Forester sank back for a moment in his chair and looked
helplessly at his master and his prefects. “I don’t think for a moment
that that boy is not telling the truth, Morris. But there is the
letter, the check, and the memorandum-book. What do you make of it?”
“I would stake my life on his honor,” exclaimed Morris generously.
“For a moment I doubted him when he was confronted with your evidence;
but there is an explanation for it, I am sure. Perhaps we will find
it out; perhaps not. But whether we do or not, I would take Deering’s
word.”
“Doubtless you are right. His grandfather was the same sort of
hot-headed chivalrous youth, always in trouble, always refusing to
clear himself if there were a shadow of doubt as to involving some one
else. Nevertheless, this business is to be probed to the bottom, and I
shall be inclined to expel the offenders without mercy. Come, boys, get
to bed now; come to see me in the morning. You too, Morris. Good-night.
I don’t know when a case of discipline has given me so much distress.”
When they were gone, Morris crossed over to Deering’s room, and tapped
on the door. Receiving no reply, he opened it and walked in. As he
found no one in the study, he went into the bedroom, and there he
discovered Tony lying on the bed, shaken by a storm of sobs. Carroll
was sitting by his side, with his arms around him, trying to get some
explanation of his distress.
Reggie looked up at the master. “What is the trouble, Mr. Morris? I
can’t get a word from Tony.”
Morris explained in a few sentences what had happened.
“But, sir—he gave his word?”
“I know, I know,” exclaimed the master. “I believe him absolutely, but
I am afraid there is a strong evidence against him that he will have to
explain to the Head.”
“But the Doctor must know that he is telling the truth. I never knew
him to misjudge a boy.”
“Even so—but whether he believes him or not, the Head is forced to
probe the matter. He cannot accept Tony’s refusal to speak, and you
must admit, Reggie, the letter, the check and the memorandum are pretty
strong evidence.”
Carroll paled, but he met the master’s gaze firmly. “I can explain
that, sir. The memorandum was made out to a boy who has the same
initials as Tony. I left the check which Tony had paid me in the
memorandum-book by mistake.”
“You—Reginald!”
“Yes, yes—I have been playing poker there all this term, or at least
for a good part of it. Is it too late to go and tell the Doctor?”
“No, I think not; I believe he would like to know to-night.”
Without a word Carroll rose up and left them.
Morris sat down then on the edge of the bed by Deering’s side, and
tried to calm him, making him understand at last what Reggie had done.
Then he persuaded him to undress; and waited until he had got into bed;
then, with a quiet good-night, he turned out the lights and left him
alone.
The Doctor’s study contained a door which gave directly upon the
campus, so that the boys had easy access to him without the formality
of going to the front door of the Rectory and sending their names in by
a servant. When the Doctor was busy and did not wish to be disturbed,
he placed a little sign in the window to that effect. There was no
such sign as Reggie stood in the snow outside, at the foot of the few
steps that led to the study door. The window-shades were up and Carroll
could see the Doctor standing before the fire—a characteristic
attitude—his brows knit in perplexity. The boy’s heart went to his
throat, for like every Deal boy the Doctor’s good opinion was what
secretly he coveted intensely. But there was only a moment’s hesitation
before he went up boldly and tapped at the door.
The Head Master was surprised to see him at that hour of the night, and
waited a little gravely for his explanation.
Carroll made his confession in a few words, stating the case against
himself baldly and without a word of palliation. “I have to say, sir,”
he concluded, “that I have only come to you to save Deering, who has
had absolutely nothing to do with the affair, and who told you the
entire truth. I could not sleep, sir, if I thought you doubted his
honor. Why, sir——”
“Yes, Reginald, I agree with all that you can say about Deering. I have
persistently believed in the boy despite the seemingly strong evidence
against him. I am glad you have set me right there. As for yourself,
you know that you have behaved badly, and I feel your conduct deeply.
But I think you are atoning for it now in the sacrifice you are making
for your friend. I do not want to know the names of your companions in
this gambling episode, but I want to feel that I may count on you from
this moment to make an effort to have it stopped.... Make no promises,
but give me reason to keep my trust in you from now on.”
He extended his hand. “Good-night now; tell Deering to come to me after
Chapel to-morrow morning.”
“Good-night, sir,” said Carroll with a thick voice, as he grasped the
Doctor’s hand.
CHAPTER IX
AN ENDING
“Well, Sandy,” said the Doctor to his head prefect the next morning,
as he waved the embarrassed Maclaren to a comfortable chair, himself
standing with his back to the fire, “I am afraid I have been near
making a very bad mistake.” And he related in a few words, without
involving Carroll, the revelation that had been made to him the night
before.
“I see, sir,” said Sandy. “I suppose of course, sir, that you can’t
give me the name of your informant. I should like to do a little
investigating on my own responsibility.”
“No, I can’t,” responded the Head decisively. “And for some reasons I
am sorry; but it was such a manly and unselfish course for the boy to
take, that I freely forgave him and promised him immunity. So far as he
is concerned, I have no doubt that is the best course. But there are
others—the ringleaders, I suspect. I want the investigation made, of
course, if you can do it without acting on mere suspicion. If you can
get me evidence in a straightforward way, I shall act on it. Just now,
I wish you would find Deering and ask him to come in here to see me.”
“Yes, sir.”
Maclaren took his leave then, and the Head Master turned to his morning
mail.
Within fifteen minutes Tony stood before him. He had not slept well
and the strain through which he had been passing had told on his
appearance—his freshness was dulled, there were circles under his
eyes, his usually eager manner was unwontedly quiet and subdued.
The Head put the matter very briefly and frankly. “The evidence seemed
very strong against you, my boy,” he concluded; “though I will say in
justice to you that even when things looked darkest I never ceased to
believe in you. I felt the difficulty, but I saw no way out but to push
things on.”
“I understand, sir,” Tony replied. The weight was off his heart now,
but he was still a little constrained and self-conscious. He was
thinking how much he would like to say many things to Reggie and
wondering if he could say them when the opportunity came.
“I must say, taking it all in all,” resumed the Doctor, “that heredity
seems to demonstrate itself afresh in your case with unusual force.
You remind me uncommonly of your grandfather. There was an affair at
Kingsbridge in his sophomore year—a piece of brutal hazing. It was
rather bad, you know, in our day. But Basil had had absolutely nothing
to do with it. He was captured by the proctors under suspicious though
in reality perfectly innocent circumstances, and to save a guilty
friend, he maintained a stubborn silence to the verge of expulsion. The
friend’s confession at last saved him also.”
Tony smiled. “That’s like my grandfather, certainly.”
“I admire the trait, you know,” continued Doctor Forester, “but I think
there are limits to its indulgence. There is a point, as a boy seldom
can realize, at which the authorities must probe very much as the
law probes, with a fine disregard for personal feelings. Things that
deeply concern the moral welfare of the boys here I must sometimes be
inquisitorial about in a way that I little like. I think it well to
suffer for a friend, but not to the extent of permitting untruth to
establish itself in the minds of those who after all are responsible
for your welfare.”
“I am afraid, sir, I don’t know where to draw the line.”
“No, my boy, I am afraid you do not.”
“I think it was pretty fine of Carroll to come to you, sir,” ventured
Tony upon this.
“Yes, yes, so do I. But I think also that it would have been uncommonly
mean if he had not. I have forgiven Reginald, partly because of his
confession, partly too because I feel quite confident that he is not
the ringleader, that he too has been to some extent a victim. I am not
quite sure that he altogether deserves the immunity I have promised
him—the complete immunity was a concession to you.”
“To me, sir?”
“Yes——”
“I don’t see how, sir?”
“No? Well, perhaps some time you will. You may go now. I am sorry for
what has occurred; sorry to have felt it my duty to accuse you, to
probe your replies. You will consider yourself, however, gated until
further notice, and so will your friends, Wilson and Lawrence. I do not
propose to overlook your breaking bounds at midnight. If that happens
again, look out for more serious trouble.”
“Thank you, sir.”
They shook hands then, and Tony left.
How, how, mused the Head, as he looked after the boy, was one to put
pressure upon the keenness of that sense of honor; and should one,
if one could? Sometimes even a head master realizes that there are
limits to his wisdom. One of the indications that the limits of Doctor
Forester’s wisdom were less restricted than is often the case was the
sincerity with which he frequently questioned his own actions.
After dinner Tony found his cronies waiting in the quadrangle back of
the Old School for a report on his interview with the Head. He informed
them briefly of the fact that he had been cleared and discharged on the
several items of the accusations, but also of the penalty of gating
that had been imposed upon the trio.
“Well, that’s all very nice and jolly,” said Kit, as the three sat and
kicked their heels against a bench outside their form common-room, “and
really not much of a soak for the provocation we undoubtedly gave ‘em.
I only hoped in the old gentleman’s excitement about the shanty that
he’d forget our minor sins. Not he! But, on the other hand, considering
that they spoiled the best part of the lark and insulted you uncommonly
by supposing all manner of rotten immoral things, I’m equally torn as
to whether it’s not an awful roast and with wondering how we get off
at all, at all.”
“Say, kiddo, you are all tangled up,” said Tony, feeling Kit’s head for
indications of unsuspected abnormalities.
“I am, I confess it,” that youth blandly responded. “Kindly inform
Jim and me, who’ve been unfeelingly omitted from these interesting
interviews, who was the victim that went so willingly to the sacrifice?”
“Well,” interrupted Jimmie, “not Arty Chapin—”
“No, Chapin’s a bounder.”
“Not Hen Marsh.”
“No, Hen’s a shadow of Arty’s, and a poor measly sort of shadow at
that.”
“Nor Buster Thorndyke.”
“Rather not,” assented Kit; “Buster’s just plain garden variety of no
good.”
“Well, there are other candidates, of course, for the honor; but though
nameless I guess we can count on them failing to qualify—all of which
rather narrows the possibilities to Reginald Carter Westover Carroll.”
“Now look here!” exclaimed Tony. “It’s to Reggie’s credit or I wouldn’t
admit it. Reggie’s a peach. I can’t stand for a word against him. He’s
made everything all right.”
“Oh, Reggie’s all right,” admitted Kit soothingly. “Reggie is certainly
all right. Haven’t I always said so? Haven’t I deplored from the very
beginning that he was in with such a crowd of bounders. This only
proves that he’s too good for them. I only hope,” he added, with mock
gravity, “that this will have taught him a lesson and that in the
future he will model himself upon us.”
Upon this Tony turned and with a powerful swing of his left arm swept
Kit out off the bench onto the snow. But Wilson, in his sudden descent,
reached out instinctively, grabbed Tony by an arm and a leg, and pulled
him down on top of him. Jimmie joyously fell on the heap. For several
blissful moments there was wonderful rough-house. Tony emerged at last,
sent Jimmie sprawling, and established himself for a brief triumphant
moment on Kit’s stomach.
“Swear you’ll never tell any of it, or I’ll stuff your mouth full of
dirty snow. Swear!”
“I swear,” yelled Kit. “Let me up, you white trash! Jim, to the rescue!”
But Tony was up and at bay, and by whirlwind sparring was keeping
Jimmie at his distance. Kit was ludicrously slow, and had a bad thump
on his knee, which he rubbed ruefully as he arose with exaggerated
dignity.
“Cut it,” he bellowed. “Come on, do let’s crawl back in the sun and be
nice and quiet and comfy again.”
The other two quickly desisted and helped the wounded warrior to his
seat. “I’m sorry, kid,” began Tony. “Didn’t mean to hurt you. Does it
hurt _so_ much, old man?” he added, teasingly.
Kit could not resist, but lumbered forward, despite the thumped knee,
and fell afresh on the light-footed Deering.
“Keep off, Jim!” yelled Tony, and again they went crashing to the
ground. “He has got to eat that nice clean white snow.”
“No—! I swear,” protested Kit. But they were in for it, and with
Jimmie standing by, after a few moments of furious wrestling, both
fed the other handfuls of snow, until exhausted with laughter and the
effort, they lay supine and called on Lawrence piteously to help them
up.
“I’m off,” said Jimmie, “call-over bell is ringing, and the Gumshoe’s
on deck.”
“Oh, hang, oh hang the Gumshoe,” pleaded Kit.
They picked themselves up, cheeks glowing, eyes glistening, clothes and
hair tossed.
“Such is life,” said Wilson, ostentatiously rubbing his knee.
At this moment Mr. Roylston emerged from the door of the Old School
and was passing them on his way to the Gymnasium to hold call-over. He
glanced at their disheveled clothes and paused.
“Will you take our names, sir?” asked Lawrence.
“Hm—yes,” replied the master at length. “And may I ask, do you propose
to wallow for the rest of the afternoon in the dirt and snow?”
“Not much else to do, sir,” answered Kit ruefully, “we’re gated.”
“Ah!” murmured Mr. Roylston, not making the pretense of concealing his
satisfaction, “to whom is the credit of having awarded you with your
just deserts? I may ask?”
“Certainly, sir,” responded Kit blithely, “the Head.”
“Ah, indeed. Well, I will note your names.” And with that he passed
quickly on.
“Ain’t he the tender-hearted elder brother?” said Kit, with a not
altogether pleasant glance in the direction of the master’s retreating
figure. “Well, I vote we play fox and geese and keep the amiable
Gumshoe chasin’ us through the houses. ‘Twill be our only means of
getting exercise.”
And fox and geese it was, and Mr. Roylston and they had plenty of
exercise, and that night Deering and Lawrence and Wilson had a good
long rest as they stood outside of Mr. Roylston’s study-door in Howard
House until the clock struck twelve.
The gating, however, did not last many weeks, and before long our
friends were back at their old haunts again.
Sandy Maclaren meanwhile was pursuing his investigation with both ardor
and discretion. He felt certain of his victims, if he only had patience
to watch their doings carefully. Chapin and Marsh were in his house,
so that he could note their absences up to lights without deliberately
spying. After lights Sandy was at a loss, for he did not believe in
going into a boy’s bedroom to see if he were there. Nor on the other
hand was it possible often to visit the shanty. However he gained an
unexpected ally in his house master, Mr. Roylston. The doings at the
shanty in Lovel’s Woods had come to that gentleman’s ears; he also had
his suspicions; and he did not share Sandy’s scruples about quietly
making sure half-an-hour after lights that none of his boys were out of
their rooms.
He came one evening toward the end of the term to Maclaren’s study
about half-past ten. Sandy was almost ready for bed. “Chapin and Marsh
are not in their rooms, Maclaren,” he said.
“What, sir?” exclaimed Sandy, starting to his feet, “how do you know,
sir?”
“That is of no consequence. Chapin and Marsh are out of their rooms.”
“Do you know where they are, sir?”
“I have some reason to suspect that they are playing poker in that
wretched shanty in the Woods.”
“Oh, but we raided that, you know; took all their stuff,—if it was
they.”
“Yes, but a clever criminal goes directly back to commit his crimes
in the same place. After a little time he is nowhere so safe. Most
fools think lightning never strikes in the same place twice. I have
suspected them for some time, but I have not before been sure that
they were missing. I am sorry to ask you to make a journey over to the
Woods at this time of night, but I cannot well leave the House. You
will probably find them, I think; in which case you will direct them to
report to me at once. I will wait up until your return.”
Poor Sandy began to pull on his clothes. He did not like the job,
not merely because it was cold and dark, but because he would have
preferred to have received the information from another master. He was
not adverse to catching Chapin and Marsh, if he was to catch them, but
he felt a little sorry for himself as well as them that it all had to
come on such a night. He routed out Larry Cummings to go with them,
and they started on the dismal journey. After all, duty was duty, they
reflected; and if that gang could be broken up it would be a good thing
for the school.
It was nearly midnight when Sandy, Larry and their victims—Chapin,
Thorndyke and Marsh—returned to Mr. Roylston’s study. The master
received them with a quiet satisfaction. It was a good, and thought
Sandy a little unkindly, an easy night’s work for him.
“You will all retire at once,” he said in grave judicial tones, “and in
the morning you will accompany me to the Rectory.”
It was a clear case for the Head Master on the morrow, though he
singularly failed to congratulate Mr. Roylston on the success of his
detective work. He suspended judgment until he could talk with Mr.
Morris about Reggie Carroll’s connection with the affair.
Morris, when the Head had sent for him, was convinced that Carroll
deserved the leniency; that there were chances for him in the school
of making good that did not exist for Chapin, that were doubtful for
Thorndyke and Marsh. Carroll certainly had improved, markedly improved,
since his confession. He had broken, Morris felt, with his old crowd.
“Besides,” he added, “as for Chapin there is an old score against him
that should perhaps weigh with you in your decision, Doctor Forester.”
“Yes?—what is that?”
Morris told the story of the Boxford game of the year before.
“Ah, I see,” said Doctor Forester, and he did see with an admirable
lucidity. “And Deering held his tongue about that too?”
“About that too,” answered Morris.
“Unusual boy!”
“A very fine boy, sir.”
“Yes, a fine boy. Well, I think that settles it. After Chapin is gone I
shall tell the prefects the whole story, and I think perhaps it will be
well that the school should know it too, at least through them. We can
trust them to do justice to the football episode, anyway.”
“I agree with you, sir,—now; but for a long time I wanted to let
things take their course. It has been good for Deering. It has deepened
his easy-going pleasant nature; or rather it has served to bring out
the deep things that are in his nature.”
“Yes, yes—that was right, I dare say. But that you have told me now
makes my course perfectly clear. I am glad you have done so.”
Chapin was shortly summoned to the Rectory. He had a brief and
uncomfortable interview with Doctor Forester, and an hour later he
boarded a train bound for Coventry, and was heard of at Deal School no
more. Marsh and Thorndyke and one or two others were suspended for the
rest of the term, and after this house-cleaning the school settled down
to its normal life.
One afternoon not long after these events Doctor Forester paused on
the terrace of the Old School and looked over the playing-fields. The
snows had melted, the frost was out of the ground, it was one of the
first warm days of the Spring shortly before the Easter vacation, and
the boys were playing ball for the first time, rushing the season as
they commonly do. Doctor Forester liked baseball, for it gave him less
anxiety than some other games.
Morris had joined him as he stood on the terrace in the pleasant
sunlight. Morris was an Old Boy, and the Head had a special feeling for
him that for the most part he carefully concealed. He welcomed him now
with a sympathetic nod.
Just below them a rod or so away Jimmie Lawrence and Tony Deering were
passing ball.
“Good to see the baseball starting, eh? Who are those two boys just
below us? Deering and Lawrence? I am getting blind, I fancy. I wish
Deering were as good a baseball player as he is a good football player.
Oh, yes, I know you like the other game. Look, how quick he is! I
like that. By the by, I have thought often of what you told me of his
keeping his mouth shut about Chapin’s trick in the Boxford game. It was
like a Deering. His grandfather was just such a chivalrous fool—such
a good Christian, Morris! I like a boy like that here. He will do
something. I wonder what?”
“Who knows, sir? We can count on him, I feel sure of that.”
“And that is much. One muses of these boys now and then—what the
future has for them. Yes—you do, I know. I envy you sometimes knowing
them as you can and do. How much one wants to do for them, eh? That
Deering, now—we must watch him. He will be worth while.”
“Yes, I think so. We shall see, sir, just how.”
“Yes, we shall see.” And still musing, the Doctor turned away.
Morris stayed on for a long time watching the boys on the
playing-fields.
The Head Master had turned as he was about to enter the Old School and
glanced again at his younger colleague, and a smile of quiet affection
and satisfaction stole over his keen kindly face.
CHAPTER X
FINCH
One stormy night in the early autumn, two years after the events
narrated in the last chapter, a group of masters were sitting in their
common-room at Deal School. Supper was just concluded; a cheerful fire
burned on the hearth, and the crackling of the flames was a pleasing
contrast to the roar of the wind and the dashing of the rain without.
Two of the masters were playing chess under the light of a lamp, the
others were sitting before the fire, smoking and talking.
“Well,” remarked Beverly, one of the younger men, noted among his
colleagues for his readiness to express an opinion upon any subject in
the universe, “what do you think of the Head’s latest departure?”
Mr. Roylston pursed his thin close-shaven lips as though he were about
to reply, but before doing so he carefully pressed the tobacco into his
pipe, and struck a match and applied it. “I don’t know,” he muttered,
between the puffs, in rather a high jerky voice, “that it makes very
much difference what we think. But I am inclined to characterize it as
an arrival rather than a departure.”
“It is certainly very much with us,” commented Gray, with an
absent-minded glance into the fire.
“Well, I predict its speedy extinction,” resumed Beverly. “It is
difficult for me to conceive how the Doctor can suppose that Finch will
ever get on here. Upon my word, did you ever see such an object?”
“Upon _my_ word, I did not,” answered Gray. “But here it certainly is,
and in a sense it is bound to get on. I am entrusted with its table
manners, if one may speak of what does not exist.”
“I believe that Morris is to have it in his house,” said Roylston,
looking over at the chess players.
“It? who? Oh, you are talking about Finch, eh? Queer little duffer,
isn’t he?”
“Queer?” murmured Beverly in a tone that spoke volumes of intense pity
for the limits of Morris’s vocabulary. “Perhaps you can really tell us
something about it, Mr. Morris?”
“Nothing much, I’m afraid,” Morris replied. “The Doctor has some
special interest,—he’s a trust, I understand, from a very old friend.
It is very much up to us, I fancy, to help make things easy for the
poor kid. I shall speak to some of the boys in my house about him, and
ask them to go out of their way to be a bit decent.”
“Speedy execution were the more merciful, I should say,” commented Mr.
Roylston, taking a comfortable pull at his pipe.
“Nonsense! he’ll make good,” said Morris, a shade of irritation
crossing his face, “that is, if we give him half a chance.”
“I don’t precisely see why we should be supposed to give him less
or more chance than we give to every boy,” said Beverly, a little
pompously. “I am sure we all——”
“_We_ can’t perhaps,” Roylston rejoined, “but doubtless Mr. Morris, who
has the advantage of certain confidential relations with the boys of
his house which we do not enjoy, probably can.”
“Oh, come, Roylston,” exclaimed Morris, making a bad move in his game
with Stenton. “Of course, I shall use my influence with the boys in my
house to make things easy for poor Finch. Why should I not?”
“Echo answers ‘why,’” replied Mr. Roylston, somewhat annoyed; and then
he added with an air of indulgence, “but be assured, my dear fellow, I
have no intention of criticising your extraordinary theories afresh.”
“Thank you,” said Morris and gave his attention to his game. “Your
move, Stenton, I think.”
Mr. Roylston sent a characteristic glance of patient suffering in the
direction of his colleague, and then held up his hands for the benefit
of the company as though to say, “You see how useless it is to discuss
these things with our friend over there.” He then bade them all a tart
good-night, and went off to keep his duty in the schoolroom.
His way led across the Gymnasium. There, in the center of a crowd
of boys engaged in making his life miserable, stood the new boy,
Finch, who had just been the subject of conversation in the masters’
common-room. He was a sorry specimen of a boy, to be sure; the sorriest
probably that through mistaken kindness had ever found his way to a
great school of wholesome, healthy youngsters. He was thin, he was
pallid, he was ugly. He had the face of a little old man, weak light
eyes, a high dome-like forehead, over which straggled little wisps
of thin yellow hair. His ill-formed mouth was parted now in a snarl
half of rage, half of terror, as he glanced from one jibing boy to
another, like a hunted rat. His clothes were too small for him, and
his thin little legs, which long since should have been concealed by
long trousers, were incased in bright red knitted stockings. These
had acted upon the imagination of his schoolmates like the proverbial
red rag upon a bull, and were the subject of the stream of jibes and
jokes that were being heaped upon him. It was not a representative
crowd of boys that surrounded him, but a miscellaneous crew of lower
schoolers who had followed in the wake of a fat Third Form boy, known
as Ducky Thornton, the self-appointed chief inquisitor of the moment.
The noise was unduly loud, consisting for the most part of catcalls and
strange and weird squeaks from the throats of a dozen excited small
boys. It was the sort of commotion that under ordinary circumstances
Mr. Roylston would have promptly checked and rewarded with a liberal
distribution of pensums. Such indeed had been his immediate impulse,
but as he started to carry out his purpose, he had caught sight of
Finch and there had flashed into his mind the irritating exchange
of words about him in the common-room. He checked the feeling of
compassion for the new boy and his annoyance at the disturbance, and
passed quickly into the cloister that led into the schoolroom.
Fortunately for Finch a more resolute champion now appeared upon the
scene. It was Kit Wilson—on his way across the Gymnasium. Quick as a
flash he took in the situation, and, crossing the room with a leap and
a stride, he landed in the midst of the party of “horsers.” He grabbed
one small boy by the collar of his coat and sent him spinning out into
the middle of the Gymnasium, another he pushed out of his way with
something of his football manner, and ended by applying a kick to Ducky
Thornton that even that well-cushioned individual was apt to remember.
“Here, you infernal cads!” he cried, “cut this out! what the deuce do
you think you’re up to?” The crowd of small boys scattered instantly,
leaving poor Ducky, with rueful face and painful limp, to hobble away
by himself, pursued by a volley of Kit’s variegated vocabulary that was
more picturesque than elegant.
Finch stood still where Kit had found him as if transfixed. He was
relieved, thankful for the rescue, but incapable of saying so. His face
looked hideous in the bright glare of the electric light, drawn as it
was by anguish and blazing with what seemed like superhuman hate. Kit
stared at him a moment, amazed by the passion of the boy’s face; almost
shocked by its weird uncanny venom. Conquering the instinctive feeling
of revulsion, he put his hand on the boy’s shoulder. “You poor little
duffer,” he said, “I’m sorry for you. Don’t take it too hard. They’re a
crowd of little curs, but their bark is worse than their bite.”
“I hate them,” snarled the boy. “I hate them.” Then his face relaxed,
and the light faded in his little blue eyes, as they suffused with
tears. “Thank you all the same,” he added, his voice still trembling
with passion.
“What’s your name?” asked Kit.
“Jacob Finch.”
“Oh! you’re the new boy, eh? Where do you come from?”
“Coventry. I wish I was back. I can’t stand it here.”
“Rot!” exclaimed Kit, with the easy-going philosophy of popularity and
success. “Cut along to the schoolroom now, and let me know if Ducky
Thornton bothers you again.”
“All right,” Finch murmured, and dropping his head, he stole off
through the cloister, keeping well within the shadow of the wall until
he reached the schoolroom. There he was received by Mr. Roylston, who
showed him a seat, and immediately afterwards called the room to order.
Kit, having watched Finch out of sight, stalked off grandly across the
Gymnasium, dropping a word of warning here and there to the groups of
small boys who had watched the encounter from a safe distance. Ducky
Thornton witnessed his departure from an angle in the wall, whither he
had retired with a few of his satellites. His face, at no time very
attractive, wore now a most repulsive expression of contempt. “By
golly,” was his comment, “he’s the swell head, ain’t he? I wonder if he
hurts?”
“Not as much as you do, Ducky, I guess,” squeaked a premature wit and
got his ears cuffed for his effort.
A few minutes later Wilson dropped into the study of Number Five
Standerland, which Deering and Lawrence were sharing that year, Carroll
having been promoted to the Old School, a privilege of the Sixth. The
two boys were sitting at their desks, books open, it is true, but
rather deeper in football than Virgil. Kit received a characteristic
welcome.
“Hello, old sport, drape yourself on a couch, and listen to this fairy
tale about the pious Æneas. Tony’s boned it out.”
“Oh, chuck the stuff!” growled Kit. “I’ll do it after breakfast with a
trot. I’ve only got ten minutes now for a pow-wow. Have you seen the
new kid?”
“Well, rather,” answered Jimmie, “the Doctor has loaded him onto Bill.
He’s to have Number Three single right across the hall. The little
beast is in the Fifth.”
“Pon honor?” said Kit. “Why, he looks like a sub-First Former. I just
rescued him from a crowd of Lower Schoolers that were putting it to
him particularly nastily. I gave Ducky Thornton, that wallowing white
elephant of the Third, a kick that I reckon’ll make his sitting down
uncomfortable for a week. But Finch is such a gloomy little toad that I
was almost sorry I’d done it.”
Tony smiled. “That must have been good fun. But I am sorry the Doctor
took him here; can’t understand it, in fact. He’ll never do, poor rat!”
“Well, hardly.”
“By the by, kiddo, what——Come in!” he interrupted himself to cry in
response to a knock at the door.
Morris entered and was welcomed by the boys in a manner that bespoke
both familiarity and deference. The master waved them back into their
comfortable chairs. “Thanks, no; I am not going to rob the lot of you
of these precious moments of study. I should like to speak to you,
Tony, for a few minutes in my study.”
“Certainly, sir.” Tony followed the master down the hallway to the
familiar cheerful study—Tony had really got to know his house-master
more intimately the year before.
“Make yourself comfortable,” said Morris, “for I want to talk with you
for a little while—quite seriously.”
Tony sat down upon the couch, leaned back amongst the pillows and put
his hands beneath his head, looking up at Morris who stood on the
hearth rug with his back to the open wood fire. “All right, O wise
man!” he laughed. “I am very comfy, and all attention.”
Morris looked down at the boy and seemed to study him afresh. He liked
Deering very much indeed, better he felt than he had ever liked a boy
before. And as he stood there, he told himself that the reason was,
that beside Tony’s personal charm, the brightness and lovableness of
his sunshiny open nature, there were depths of feeling and purpose
that one ordinarily did not find. “Well, Tony, I want you to do
something—something quite out of the ordinary—something indeed that I
think will be particularly hard and disagreeable.”
“What is it?” asked the boy, “I don’t exactly crave hardship, but
there isn’t a lot I wouldn’t do if you specially asked me.”
“Well, I count on that; that’s partly the reason I am asking you rather
than another. I want you to make a special effort to look out for
Finch.”
“Gee whiz! Mr. Morris,” exclaimed Tony, sitting upright, and assuming
an expression of exaggerated horror. “I’ve seen him! I’ll be decent, of
course. But really, I don’t see how I can possibly stand taking that
little scarecrow under my wing. Why, Jimmie and Kit would——”
“Oh, yes, I know their attitude; but you know as well as I that they
would back you up in the matter. I want you to be more than decent. The
boy is here, and the Head has strong reasons for wanting him to make
good. As you know, all the chances are against his doing so. In truth,
I should say, that the boy has no chance unless an old boy, more or
less of your caliber, will definitely take him up and befriend him.”
“Nobody is going to hurt him,” protested Tony. “Why, Kit just now
rescued him from Ducky Thornton and a crowd of little bullies.”
“That’s good,” answered Morris, “but that is only a drop in the bucket.
That boy’s life will be unbearable unless he makes a friend. And I
do not believe there is a boy in the school who would be his friend,
_really his friend_,—except you.”
“His friend, Mr. Morris?...!”
“Nothing else helps you know—_nothing_.”
Tony grew serious. He thought of what friendship had meant to
him:—Jimmie—his eyes moistened at the thought of him; Carroll;
Morris, the man before him, whose deep kind gray eyes were looking at
him now so confidently. “Mr. Morris,” he said at last, “you do know me,
I reckon; you bank on my being clay in your hands.” Then he laughed,
“What’s the brat’s name?—Pinch?”
“No, Finch, Jacob Finch.”
“Well, all right—Finch.... The dickens fly away with him. Good-night,
maestro.”
“Good-night, my boy.” They clasped hands for a moment, and Tony was
gone.
“I am an ass,” he said, flinging himself on the couch by the side of
Kit, when he returned to Number Five. “I’ve promised Bill to be a
guardian angel to that new kid.”
CHAPTER XI
THE DISCOMFITURE OF DUCKY THORNTON
Fifth Form year in a school like Deal usually marks a decided change
in the boys; they have grown more mature, have become more serious in
various ways, have definitely put away—the most of them—the childish
things of school life, and are to be counted as standing for the most
part on the side of the powers of law and order. They are used to the
ways of the place, are thoroughly imbued with the school spirit and
tradition, and consciously aim at keeping themselves and their fellows
in the good old ways.
Tony’s first year at Deal in the Third Form, as we have seen, had
been a varied one. After the exciting events of the Michaelmas and
Lent terms, his life had pursued a more even tenor of way. Chapin’s
detection and expulsion had served to reinstate Deering in the
confidence of both masters and boys, and his genial sunshiny nature was
winning for him a deserved popularity. He and Carroll, the latter now
a Sixth Former, though they no longer roomed together, were excellent
friends, but his real intimates were Kit Wilson and Jimmie Lawrence,
the latter of whom shared his room in Standerland, while Kit lived but
a few doors down the corridor. With Mr. Morris, the house master, he
was on very good terms indeed. He had made his place in the football
team in Fourth Form year, and had played a good game but he had not
distinguished himself that year. Now again in the Michaelmas term of
the Fifth Form year he was engaged in daily football practice, and was
again looking forward to the exciting contest in November.
It is scarcely necessary to say that Tony’s two friends had not taken
his declaration of making a friend of Finch very seriously, though they
decided with him in a good-natured way to protect the new boy from the
thoughtless or ill-natured hazing he was like to get at the hands of
lower formers.
A night or so after Finch’s arrival at school, Reggie Carroll dropped
in at Number Five Standerland to see his younger friends. Jimmie was
working in the study, but Tony had turned in early. Reggie stuck his
head into the door of Deering’s bedroom and discovered its occupant,
having got ready for bed, just about to turn off the light. “Come in,”
said Tony, “and find something comfortable to sit down on—the bed will
do. Where are you wandering this time of night?”
“Well, it is only nine o’clock,” said Reggie, “and as a matter of fact,
I was wandering over to have a ‘jaw’ with you, as you sometimes so
delicately term a heart to heart talk.”
“Well, fire away,” said Tony, but in tones that did not hint he
expected to find the conversation interesting. He was rather pensive,
unwontedly silent, and looked out of his window over the dark fields.
Reggie essayed several topics of conversation, but without much
success. He was about to take his leave, when something in Tony’s
expression arrested his attention.
“What on earth is the matter with you, boy?” he asked at last, as he
playfully grabbed Tony by the shoulder and began to maul him.
“Let up!” cried Tony. “Can’t you see I’m thinking out the problems of
the universe? You mess me all up and I don’t know where I’m at.”
“Well, compose yourself, and let me offer you advice.”
“Let up then, do! And consider the appropriateness of the figures of
speech, as Gumshoe would say. Bill Morris has been darn white to me——”
“Rather,” commented Reggie, with a smile, “we are all green with envy
at his whiteness.”
“Don’t interrupt; as I was trying to say, Mr. Morris has been
exceedingly white to me; so much so that I have often wondered how I
might show him I appreciate it. Well, the fact is, he has asked me to
do something just lately that I don’t in the least want to do, and I
don’t see how in the deuce I am to get out of it.”
“Knowing Morris,” commented Carroll, lazily, “I don’t in the least
fancy you are going to get out of it. He lays his plans too well. What
does he want?”
“Have you seen Finch, the new boy?”
“Finch?—oh! the kid they call Pinch. Yes, boy, I have seen him; one
look was too much. It’s awful.” Then Reggie’s eyes lighted, and he gave
an exclamation. “By Jove, I see it all—the whole thing—Bill wants you
to be his guardian angel.”
“Precisely,” said Tony, with an expression of infinite disgust.
“And you, my child, fully mean to be.”
“Hang it!” said Tony. “I suppose I do.”
For a moment Carroll was silent and his expression changed from one of
good-natured raillery to one of subtle sadness.
“Poor little devil!” he said at last, “why not?” Tony looked at him to
see if he were joking. “Oh, I know I couldn’t do it,” Reggie went on.
“I haven’t the knack or the grace, or whatever it is called. But old
Bill is right; you have. Why, kiddo, the world’s a hell for a lot of
people just because the rest of us, who have had more of a chance, sit
tight and comfy and don’t care.”
“I suppose it is,” said Tony grimly, “but to tell the truth, I hate to
think about such things—for a while yet, anyway.”
“There is one thing to be said,” Carroll continued, without paying any
attention to Tony’s remark, “if you do it, do it from the bottom up.
Make a good job of it.”
“It’s sheer asininity,” protested Tony. “I can’t do it. Oh, Reggie, I
hate him! he’s a loathsome little reptile.”
“Naturally he is that, or Bill would not be so extraordinary on the
subject. He doesn’t mess with our affairs very often, you know.”
“Yes, I know,” Tony muttered.
“Do you chance to know why the Head took him?”
“Not really—some family obligation, I believe. The kid was left to
him by unspeakable parents who died of disgust at their work.”
Carroll smiled. “Have you begun yet?” he asked.
“No. I have sworn fifty times a day that I’d have nothing to do with
it. And now I am going to get up this blessed minute and go in and have
a talk with him. Talk to Jim a bit, and I’ll be back and tell you about
it.”
“All right,” said Carroll with a smile. Tony jumped out of bed, folded
his blue wrapper about him tragically, struck a dramatic attitude, and
stalked out of the room. Reggie joined Lawrence in the study.
Half an hour later Tony returned.
“How’s Pinch?” exclaimed Lawrence.
“How did it go?” asked Carroll.
Tony flopped down on a couch with an air of exhaustion. “Oh, so, so.
I found him greasing on his confounded Virgil in a blue funk for fear
I’d come to haze him. I made him read me twenty-five lines to give him
a chance to recover himself, while I looked to see if I could find a
redeeming feature. But Nature left that out. After a while I began
firing questions at him, and when he gradually grew accustomed to the
idea that I was only trying to be decent, he thawed a bit, and told me
a little about himself. He’s had a tough time generally since he had
the misfortune to come into the world at all. His father, who was an
old college chum of the Doctor’s, seems to have turned out a sort of a
rotter. He did something or other that disgraced them, and then he died
and left that kid and his mother to face the music alone. She, poor
woman, didn’t last long, and then the Head stepped in, for old time’s
sake, and out of mistaken kindness of his stupid old heart brought
Finch here.... All the spirit has been kicked out of him. He’ll do at
his books—he read the Virgil pretty well—but he hasn’t the spunk to
resent being kicked by a First Former. He seems to live in a perpetual
terror of his own shadow. I suspect Ducky Thornton and his gang have
been ragging him on the quiet, and if I catch that fat loafer at it,
I promise you he’ll be sorry. I think I’ll give him a good kicking
to-morrow on general principles.”
“Do!” said Reggie, “that will be good for him in any case.... It might
be well for you both to keep an eye on Ducky’s whereabouts in the
afternoons. I have a notion that he skulks in the fives court till the
master of the day is out of the way, and then sneaks back into the
house. I have seen him half-a-dozen times inside, and if I had been a
prefect I should have kicked him out myself.”
“Oh, hang being a prefect where kicking Ducky is concerned. To do that
would be good for both our souls.”
Carroll laughed. “Well, at it, boy.” He said good-night then, and left
them.
The next day—a bright fair day in mid-November, only a few days
before the Boxford game, when the first team were laying off from
practice, Tony and Kit, instead of going out early for a walk with
their team-mates, went into the fives court after dinner and began a
game, keeping an eye, however, on the on-lookers. It rejoiced them to
see Thornton’s fat ill-natured face amongst a crowd of loafers on the
benches. The bell rang for call-over, and the boys ran out to report
to the master of the day, who was accustomed to take his stand at
the Gymnasium door. To-day Mr. Roylston happened to be on duty. The
roll call over, most of the boys went off to engage upon some form of
exercise or game for the afternoon; but a few lazy ones, disdaining the
occupations open to them, straggled back into the fives court to watch
the games going on there. Later they would swim in the tank, and then
stand for half-an-hour under a steaming hot shower, unless a vigil
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