"CHAS"
Only one thing troubled Joe, which was that he couldn't have Zephaniah
with him. Faculty strongly disapproved of dogs, even very young and
very small dogs, in the dormitories. So he made arrangements with a
good-hearted stableman to look after the puppy and himself rigged up a
home for it in an unused stall behind a litter of brooms and old harness
and buckets. Puppy biscuit, which Merriman sternly decreed was to be
its only food, was laid in lavishly, a china drinking bowl was supplied
and Zephaniah, very unhappy at parting from his brothers and sisters
and mother, was duly _installed_. The pun is not mine, but Myron's. Joe
visited the stable at least once a day and was to be seen stalking along
the streets accompanied by a silly, frisking little atom at the end of
a magnificent leather leash. Once away from the busy thoroughfares, the
puppy was set free and had a glorious time. Frequently Myron went along
on these excursions and the two boys often laughed themselves sick over
the ridiculous antics of Zephaniah Q. Dobbins. Several times Merriman
also joined them and took along Tess and her two remaining offspring,
and at such times life was chock full of excitement and merriment. The
weather was wonderful that autumn and those strolls about the outskirts
of the town were events that remained in Myron's memory long afterwards.
They led to an ever-increasing intimacy between the three boys and Myron
began to find existence at Parkinson really enjoyable. No one could fail
to like Joe Dobbins or to admire his big-heartedness and sturdy honesty
of purpose and deed, and Myron least of all. He saw now the kindness
that had underlaid the indignity Joe had practised on him when he had
been forcibly kept from meeting Paul Eldredge, and was grateful. He saw
many other thoughtful and kindly acts as well. Joe's rough ways, or
ways that had seemed rough at first, were now only things to smile at.
Myron was learning that there were many things less to be desired in
a friend and room-mate than uncouthness. New clothes, too, had made a
difference in Joe. Under Myron's guiding hand he had purchased two plain
but well-fitting suits--as well as the extra pair of trousers that Myron
had advised and that Joe was now so proud of--and, in a way, he was
living up to those suits. He had been good-naturedly guyed by many of
his friends and acquaintances, of which he had dozens a week after the
beginning of school, for the change wrought in his appearance had been
well-nigh startling, but he hadn't minded a bit: it took more than that
to upset Joe's equanimity. It was about the time that he first appeared
in classroom in his new clothes that some fellow fell on the quite
obvious nickname of "Whoa," to which Joe was already accustomed, and
from that time on he was "Whoa" Dobbins to the whole school. Only Myron
and Andrew Merriman stuck to "Joe."
Merriman required more knowing than Joe Dobbins. Although Myron had
liked him at first acquaintance and grew to like him more as time went
on, he never felt that he knew him as thoroughly as he knew the other.
"Merry Andrew" at first meeting seemed perfectly understandable. At the
second meeting you realised that most of him was below the surface. At
subsequent meetings you despaired of ever knowing him thoroughly. He
was the happiest, cheerfulest fellow Myron had ever encountered, and no
one would have suspected that there was such a thing as a care in his
life. And perhaps there weren't many, either, for a care doesn't become
a care until you let it, and Merriman's policy was not to let it. Of
friends, at least close friends, beyond Joe and Andrew, Myron had none
so far. He knew various fellows, most of them football chaps, but only
casually. He didn't make friends easily. It is only fair to acknowledge
that there was something in Myron's attitude, although he didn't realise
it, that warned fellows away. Popularity such as Joe might attain would
never fall to his share.
So a fortnight passed and Parkinson played her second football game
and began to find her stride. Cumner High School proved less of an
adversary than expected and went down to defeat, 12 to 0. Myron didn't
get into action: didn't expect to, for that matter: and neither did Joe.
Joe, however, expected to, and was a little disappointed and decidedly
restive while he and Myron watched from the bench. Inaction didn't
suit Joe a bit. Garrison, who had played the position last season on
the scrub eleven, stayed in at right guard until the last quarter and
then Mills, a recent discovery of Coach Driscoll's, was given a chance.
Mills, a big, yellow-haired infant of seventeen, proved willing and
hard-working, but he was woefully inexperienced, and only the fact that
Cumner had already shot her bolt and was playing a strictly defensive
game kept him in until the final whistle.
Joe's hero on the team was Leighton Keith, who played right tackle. Joe
expatiated for whole minutes at a time on Keith's work and rather bored
Myron. "Honest, Joe," he protested, "I think he plays perfectly good
ball and all that, but I don't see where he has anything on Mellen, or
even Flay."
Joe shook his head. "You aren't watching him, Myron. You've got to know
the position, too. I've played tackle, kiddo, and I know what a guy's up
against. I'll tell you about Keith and Mellen. Mellen's a fair, average
tackle, a heap better on attack than defence, I guess, but Keith's more
than that. He--look here, it's like this. Know those dollar 'turnips'?
Well, they keep right good time, don't they?"
"Some of them," agreed Myron.
"Most of them, Brother. Well, Mellen's like a dollar watch. Looks good
outside and works all right inside. Dependable and all that. All right!
Now did you ever cast your eye over a nice hundred and fifty dollar
watch all dotted over inside with jewels and all glisteny with little
wheels and dudads? Sure! That's Keith. He works just like the innards
of that watch, kiddo. Every move's exact. He never misses a tick.
He's smooth-running and guaranteed. He--he's an artist! I'd just as
lief see Keith play tackle as see old Josh Reynolds paint one of his
million-dollar portraits."
"Reynolds is dead," laughed Myron.
"All the more reason then," replied Joe calmly. "Keith isn't!"
"All right," said Myron, "you cheer for Keith. To my mind the best
player in that brown bunch is Cater."
"Yeah, he's good, too," owned Joe. "I call him a nice little quarter.
Nice fellow, too, Cater. So's Steve Kearns. Know him?"
"Playing full-back? No, only to nod to. I don't think he's as good a
full-back as Williams, though."
"Both of them will stand improving," said Joe drily. "Gee, I wish
Driscoll would let me in on this!"
But, as has been said, he didn't, and when the game was over Joe and
Myron trotted back to the gymnasium with a host of others equally
unfortunate. After showers and a return to citizen's clothing they took
Zephaniah Q. Dobbins for a walk. Or, it would be more exact to say, a
romp.
The Latin coaching ended the last of the next week, by which time
Andrew Merriman declared Myron up with the class. Myron wasn't so
certain of it and would have continued the tutoring if Andrew hadn't
refused. "You're discharged," said Andrew. "You know about as much as
Old Addie himself now, and a lot more than I. All you have got to do is
study."
"Is that all?" asked Myron ironically. "It isn't anything if you say it
quick, is it?"
But Andrew proved right about it, and Myron found that as much work
applied to Latin as to other studies kept him on good terms with Old
Addie.
There was one thorn in Myron's side at this time, and its name was
Charles Cummins. Cummins was a riddle to Myron. Ever since the time
he had spent that unpleasant half-hour in Cummins' awkward squad the
freckle-faced, shock-haired giant had never let an opportunity pass to
accost him. There was no harm in that, of course; the trouble was that
Cummins always made himself so disagreeable! It seemed to Myron that the
chap deliberately sought him out in order to rile him. And it wasn't so
much what Cummins said as the way he said it. It got so that Myron only
had to see the other approaching to feel huffy. Long before Cummins got
within speaking distance Myron had his back up, and Cummins, knowing
it, seemed to take delight in it.
Cummins was generally known as "Chas," from his habit of signing himself
"Chas. L. Cummins." He declared that Charles was far too long to spell
out. He played left guard and played it well if erratically. In a way,
he was difficult to get along with, for he considered himself a law
unto himself, and it was no unusual thing for him to veto a coach's
instructions, which, up to a certain point, the coach stood for. The
others were at outs with him half the time, but liked him through all.
Oddly enough, even the timidest youngster he ever bullied and brow-beat
in practice was strong for him afterwards. It was no secret that he
was holding his position on the first team by little more than an
eyelash, for Brodhead was hot on his trail and Coach Driscoll had put up
with more of Cummins' calm insurrection than was agreeable to him. In
appearance "Chas" was a broad, heavily-built giant with much red-brown
hair that never was known to lie straight, eyes that nearly matched the
hair and a round, freckled face that was seldom neutral. It was either
scowling savagely or grinning broadly. For his part, Myron preferred
Cummins' scowls to his smiles, for the smiles generally held mischief.
Usually the two encountered each other only on the playfield in the
afternoon, but one morning a few days after the Cumner game Myron,
walking back to the room after a chemistry class, sighted Cummins coming
out of Goss Hall.
"Gee, there's that pest!" he muttered, and, contrary to school
regulations, started on a short cut across the grass in the hope of
avoiding him. But it was not to be. Cummins had sighted his prey.
"O Foster!" he called.
Myron nodded and kept on.
"Tarry, I prithee! I wouldst a word with thee, fair youth!"
"Go to thunder!" murmured Myron. But Cummins headed him off without
difficulty.
"S'pose you know," he said, "that we can both be shot at sunrise for
walking cross-lots like this. Where do you room?"
"Sohmer," answered Myron briefly.
"Ho, with the swells, eh? Lead on, Reginald! I would visit thy fair
abode in yon palace!"
"Not receiving today, thanks," said Myron. "I've got some work to do."
"Work? Didn't suppose you silk-stocking bunch in Sohmer ever had to
work! Thought you had slaves to do that sort of thing. How little one
half the school knows how t'other half lives! To think of you soiling
your lily-white hands and getting calloused with labour! What sort of
work are you going to do? Clip coupons?"
"Oh, dry up!" exploded Myron. "I'm sick to death of your chatter! And
I'm sick of being guyed all the time, too! Lay off, can't you?"
To his surprise, "Chas" chuckled and thumped him on the back. "A-a-ay!"
he applauded. "That's the stuff, old chap! I was beginning to think you
didn't have any pep in you. There's always hope for a fellow who can get
mad!"
"That isn't hard when you're around," answered Myron, unappeased. "Don't
bang me on the back, either. I don't like it."
"All right," answered Chas, sobering. "I'll behave. Mind if I come up
for a few minutes?"
Myron looked at him suspiciously, but for once Cummins was neither
scowling nor grinning. "I guess not," he answered ungraciously.
"Fine! But don't embarrass me with your welcome, old chap," chuckled
Chas as they mounted the steps. "Some dive this, isn't it? Don't believe
I ever hoped to get in here." Joe was not in and when Chas had looked
around the study--a trifle disappointedly, Myron thought--and seen the
view from the window he seated himself on the window-seat, took one knee
into his hands and viewed his host reflectively. Myron, at the table,
fussed with his books and fumed inwardly and wished Cummins would get
out. Finally the latter said: "Foster, you and I ought to be great pals."
Myron looked every bit of the astonishment he felt, and his guest
chuckled again. "Because we're as unlike as three peas, and the only
things that can be more unlike than three peas is four peas. You've got
coin and I'm the poor but proud scion of a fine old chap who made his
living laying bricks. You're a swell and I'm a--well, I'm not. You're
a sort of touch-me-not and I'd make friends with any one. Probably we
don't think alike on any two subjects under the sun. So we ought to hit
it off great. Get the idea?"
"I'm afraid I don't," owned the other, interested and puzzled.
"It's the old law of the attraction of opposites, or whatever it's
called. Now I took a shine to you right off"--Myron sniffed, but Chas
only smiled and went on--"Oh, I don't always hug a chap I take a fancy
to. That's not my way. I try 'em out first. I tried you out, Foster, old
chap."
"Did you? Well, much obliged, but----"
"You'd rather I minded my own business, you mean? That's what I like
about you, Foster, that stand-offishness. I like the way you sort of
turn your nose up and look haughty. You see, I'm not like that. If a
stranger says 'Howdy' to me I either say 'Glad to know you' or I biff
him one and pass on. I couldn't freeze him with a glance as you can to
save my precious life."
"I didn't know I was as bad as that," said Myron, a trifle
uncomfortable. "I don't think I mean to be."
"Course you don't. That's the beauty of it. It comes natural to you,
just like liking artichokes and olives. I'll bet you anything you were
eating olives when you were four, and I haven't got to really like the
pesky things yet!"
"You talk a lot of nonsense," said Myron, smiling in spite of himself.
"Just what are you getting at?"
"Well, I'm not after a loan, anyway," laughed Chas. "I was telling you
that I tried you out. So I did. 'He looks like he was a nice sort under
the shell,' says I to me. 'A terrapin isn't awfully jolly and friendly
when he sticks his head out at you and hisses, but they tell me that
when you get under the shell he's mighty good eating.' So, thinks I----"
"The idea being that I've got to be dead to be nice?" asked Myron drily.
"No, not a bit. The--the simile was unfortunate. No, but I thought I'd
get a peek under the shell and see what you were really like. So I set
out to make you mad. If a fellow can't get mad he's no good. Anyway,
he's no good to me. And he's no good for football. I was just about
giving you up, old chap. You frowned and grumbled and sputtered once or
twice and looked haughty as anything, but you wouldn't get your dander
up. Not until today."
"Well," said Myron, "now that I have got mad, what's the big idea?"
"Why, now we can be pals," answered Chas unhesitatingly. "How does that
strike you?"
"Why--why, I don't know!" Myron faltered. "It sounds like some sort of a
silly joke to me, Cummins."
"No joke at all." Chas unclasped his hands and leaned back, his big,
freckled face wreathed in smiles. "No hurry, though. Think it over.
Anyway, there's something more important just now. I've watched you on
the field, Foster, ever since they dumped you on me that day. I've seen
you play and I can tell you what I think of you, if you like."
It's human to like flattery in moderation, and so Myron said "Go ahead,"
and prepared to look modest.
"I think you're rotten," said Chas.
"Wh-what?" gasped Myron.
"Rotten, with a large capital R, Foster."
"Thanks!"
"Don't get huffy, old chap. I don't say you can't play good football.
I think you can. But you're not doing it now. If I didn't think you
could play the game according to the Old Masters I wouldn't be talking
about it to you. You play like a fellow who doesn't care. You don't try
hard enough. You don't deliver the goods. You're soldiering. Ever see a
man laying a shingle roof? Well, he could do the whole thing in a day,
maybe, if he worked hard. But he belongs to the union and the union
won't let him lay more than just so many shingles. So he has to slow
down. That's like you. Say, what union do you belong to?"
"I guess the trouble is that I _don't_ belong," said Myron. "I'm an
outsider, and so I don't get a chance."
"Tell that to the Marines! Look here, old chap, you can make a real
football player of yourself if you want to. I've watched you and I know.
I've seen what you could have done lots of times when you didn't do it.
Now, just what is the row?"
So Myron told him his version of it and Chas listened silently and even
sympathetically. But at the end he shook his head. "You're all wrong,
Foster," he said. "I've been here two years now and I know how things
go. The trouble with you, I guess, is that you came here with the idea
that folks were going to fall all over themselves to shake hands with
you and pull you into the football team. Isn't that pretty near so?"
It was, and Myron for the first time realised it, but he couldn't quite
get himself to acknowledge it to Cummins. He tried to look hurt and made
no answer.
"Sure!" said Chas. "And when the coach and the captain didn't give a
dinner in your honour and ask you to accept a place on the team and
give them the benefit of your advice as to running same you got peeved.
That's just what I'd have done if I'd been you, you see, so I know. If
it was me I'd have either gone to the coach and made a big kick and
told him how good I was or else I'd have gone out and played so hard
that they'd have either had to take me on or chuck me to save the lives
of the others! But you, being Haughty Harold, just froze them with a
glance--which same they didn't happen to see--and went your way. And
it's a rotten way, too. Because it won't get you anywhere. Driscoll
won't fall for you until you show something and you won't show anything
until Driscoll pats you on the back. Say, I'm talking a whole lot! What
time is it? And you've got some digging to do! I'll beat it. Think over
my words of wisdom, Foster, and drop around tonight and hear more.
I've got a plan, old chap. I'm in 16 Goss; first floor, on the right.
Bye-bye!"
And before Myron could agree or refuse the invitation Cummins had
hurried to the door and was clattering downstairs. Myron went to the
window and, in somewhat of a daze, watched Cummins emerge below and
disappear under the trees. Then he sat himself down on the window-seat,
plunged both hands into trousers pockets and frowned intently at his
shoes. He didn't get much studying done that hour.