A NOCTURNAL MYSTERY
FOR weeks Phil sat on the bench, a perpetual substitute, getting plenty
of practice on practice days in all sorts of positions where he was
useful, but always seeing others go into the game. The fielders that
year were a remarkably healthy lot; they played game after game without
accident or illness. Taylor, whose position at left-field Phil coveted,
was playing his second year on the team, and felt his importance as a
veteran who had already been tested under fire in a Hillbury game. He
had the name of being a great hitter, and though his work during the
season so far had not borne out this reputation, he occasionally made
long drives that delighted the great mass of student supporters whose
admiration is as intense as it is fitful. He was a safe catch on flies,
and now and then did spectacular feats that had the same effect on the
spectators as the occasional three-baggers. He had also acquired a
striking way of opening his hands for the ball, which his admirers
called an “awfully graceful catch”; and he took much apparent
satisfaction in his general bearing and clothes. The other fielders,
Vincent at right and Sudbury at centre, were steady, hard-working
fellows, who did their duty at bat and in the field to the best of their
ability, and did not know or care whether any one looked at them or not.
Curtis sat watching the play one Saturday afternoon, with Marks on the
seat beside him emitting deep gulps of cigarette smoke and the usual
unbroken stream of baseball chatter. It was a game with a team from one
of the smaller colleges, which had defeated Hillbury eight to four and
was now threatening to shut Seaton out altogether.
“What a fool that Taylor is!” said Curtis. “He’s just struck out again,
and now pretends the umpire is unfair! That’s to save his face. I wonder
why Sands doesn’t try some other man.”
“Some other man!” cried Marks, for a brief instant speechless with
astonishment. “Why, he made a home run in the Colby game, and he’s about
the prettiest fielder on the team.”
“Oh, yes; he’s pretty enough,” returned Curtis, “and knows it, too, but
I’d have some other quality than prettiness on the field if the team
were mine.”
“Well, he gets the balls,—that’s the main thing,” said Marks. “You’ll
find few errors against his name.”
“Do you know why?” returned Curtis. “He never tries for a ball unless
he’s sure he can get it. It’s easy enough to get a fielding record when
you never take any hard chances.”
“But he does,” insisted Marks. “Don’t you remember the long running
catch he made in the Musgrove School game?”
“Yes, I do,” replied Curtis; “and he held the ball, admiring himself,
for four seconds afterward and let the man on third walk home.”
“You’re down on him,” said Marks, not knowing what else to reply.
Curtis sniffed. “Down on him! Well, perhaps I am. Perhaps it would be
better if he were down on himself. When I see him try hard for balls
that he can’t get, or make some good long throws right when they’re
needed, or slide hard to bases, or make a good sacrifice hit, then I’ll
change my opinion.”
“Tompkins has improved, hasn’t he?” said Marks, suddenly changing to a
fresh subject. John Curtis was not an agreeable person to argue with,
for he held his opinions tenaciously and had unpleasant things to say to
those who held opposing views; and Marks, who argued on athletics in a
very fluent and confident style when he had laymen like himself to deal
with, felt a little shy before a real athlete, even though the sport
under discussion was not that in which the athlete excelled.
“That’s right,” replied Curtis, “no great genius with curves, I judge,
but he has good control and uses his head. The difficulty with him is
that he’s a fool, too.”
Marks looked curiously into the football player’s face.
“Apparently every one’s a fool to-day,—every one, I suppose, but John
Curtis.”
“We’ll except present company,—for the sake of politeness,” responded
Curtis, with a malicious smile hovering about his lips. Marks always
bored him. “Tompkins is a fool, but not of the silly, show-off kind like
Taylor. He’s got the stuff in him to make a good pitcher and a chance to
distinguish himself by winning the Hillbury game; but he doesn’t care a
rap whether he pitches or not, and he doesn’t behave himself as he
ought.”
“I don’t understand that. He seems very regular in his training and
practice. He always works hard out here, I’m sure.”
“Oh, I don’t mean that,” Curtis made haste to reply. “Tommy is straight;
he’ll do what he agrees to,—a good deal better than your friend Taylor.
The trouble with Tommy is that he’s always trying fool tricks, like a
small boy in a grammar school. Some day he’ll go too far, and then
there’ll be an end of Tommy. Sands ought to sit on him.”
“Sands tries to, but it doesn’t do any good,” replied Marks. “He doesn’t
care for Sands.”
“Isn’t there some one he does care for?” asked Curtis.
“The only fellow he seems to think anything of is Melvin, the truly
good,” answered Marks, with a sneer. “No one else has any influence over
him, and I doubt if Melvin can make any impression on him. Tommy is
altogether too nutty.”
That night Curtis and Sands appeared at Melvin’s room with serious
faces. Dick heard their tale in silence.
“I’ll tell you what I should do,” he said at length. “I’d give him a
good warning and then I’d fill his place, pitcher or no pitcher. If he
can’t keep out of scrapes, he’s bound to go sooner or later; and if he’s
surely going, the longer you wait the worse it will be. No fellow who
won’t take responsibility or won’t keep training belongs on a Seaton
team, anyway.”
Sands shook his head dolefully. “That’s all very well in theory, but you
can’t make pitchers to order, and Tommy is our only good one. He works
hard, too, uses his head well and improves right along. If he could only
be kept out of mischief, I couldn’t ask for a better man.”
“And we thought you might have some influence with him,” said Curtis,
coming in his usual fashion directly to the point. “Won’t you tackle
him, and see if you can’t get some sense into his head?”
“I’ll see what I can do,” replied Melvin, “but I don’t think it pays to
plead with people. It gives them the swelled head.”
The two visitors departed and Melvin buried himself in his books. Soon,
however, he was interrupted again, this time by a very faint and timid
knock.
“Hello, Littlefield,” he called to the slender, pale-faced boy, a year
or two younger than Phil, who slipped in and closed the door carefully
behind him. “Anything wrong?”
“They were at it again last night,” said the boy, with a look in which
shame and fear were curiously blended. “They couldn’t get in because I
had fixed the window so it couldn’t be opened enough to let any one in;
but they banged something against the outside that frightened me pretty
badly for a few minutes.”
“Did you go to sleep again?”
“Yes, after a while. I heard the clock strike two and three.”
“That’s better than you did the first time you were disturbed.”
“Oh, yes; the time the fellow stuck his head in at midnight and gave
that unearthly yell, I had a terrible shock. I don’t think I slept a
wink that night.”
“I wish we knew when these visitors were likely to appear again,” said
Dick, thoughtfully. “We might have some fun ourselves.”
“I think they are coming to-night,” said Littlefield.
“What makes you think so?”
“The stick I fixed to lock my window is gone; it held the sashes just
the right distance apart. That’s not much of a reason, I know, but I
have a feeling that they will come to-night.”
“What makes you think it is ‘they’?” asked the senior.
“I don’t. I say ‘they,’ but it may be only one.”
“I’m inclined to think it’s one. Whoever it is, he comes on that
projecting ledge, and there’s barely room on it for one. Don’t you want
to swap rooms with me to-night? You take my bed, and I’ll try yours.”
A look of delight flashed suddenly upon the boy’s face. “And let them
find you instead of me! They won’t like that! What shall you do if they
come?”
“I’ll wait and see,” said Melvin.
“Perhaps you won’t mind it,” said the boy, with the worried expression
coming back into his eyes. “If I were stronger, I suppose I shouldn’t.
But it isn’t pleasant to wake up suddenly and hear some one trying to
open your window, or feel in the darkness that there may be a person in
the room. It spoils your sleep, and makes you so nervous you can’t do
any good work. And yet I know it’s a kind of a joke, and I ought not to
let it worry me.”
“A mighty poor joke!” said Phil, who had come in during the
conversation. “A good ducking in Salt River would be the proper price
for such fun! Why don’t you set a steel trap and catch him like any
other rat?”
“Let’s try my scheme first,” said Melvin. “When you’re ready,
Littlefield, come in and take my bed. I shan’t turn in for an hour yet.”
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[Illustration: The Academy through the trees.]
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