FRANK’S FOREBODINGS.
It was astonishing how soon the news that Merriwell had been seen arm
in arm with Hooker on the campus became circulated. In some way, also,
the report got around that Merry had taken the outcast to his room,
but that his set had refused to have anything to do with the student
whose father was said to be a crook. Hodge heard all about it, and he
was “steaming” when he found Merry alone in his room the next day.
“Look here, Merriwell,” said Bart, confronting Frank, “I’ve got to say
something to you.”
“All right,” smiled Merry, closing the book he had been studying, and
putting it aside; “say ahead.”
“You’re making an ass of yourself!” exploded Bart roughly.
Frank elevated his eyebrows.
“I must say you are outspoken and far from complimentary,” he quietly
observed.
“I don’t talk to you like this often.”
“That’s right. If you did, I’m afraid we might not be such good
friends.”
“But I must talk straight now, for I feel it my duty.”
“Always do your duty, my boy. Drive ahead. What sort of a call-down
are you going to give me?”
“You’ve been associating with that fellow Hooker.”
“I thought that was what you were driving at. What of it?”
“What of it? Great Scott! Do you know the fellow’s father has done
time for larceny?”
“I’ve heard so,” was the calm answer.
“You’ve heard so, and still you walk across the campus arm in arm with
him?”
“Hooker cannot be held responsible for the actions of his father.”
“A fellow with such a father is pretty sure to be shady himself.”
“There’s nothing certain about it. He seems like an unfortunate
fellow, and I pity him.”
Hodge made an impatient gesture.
“That’s like you, Merriwell; but you can’t afford to associate with
him as a friend.”
“Why?”
“Because it will queer you.”
“With whom?”
“Everybody.”
“Then I’m afraid I shall be queered.”
“Hang it all! You don’t mean to say you are willing to give up your
best friends for this fellow?”
“I shall not give them up. If there is any giving up, they will give
me up.”
“Why, they say you brought him here to your room――you tried to
introduce him to some of the fellows!”
Frank rose to his feet, and his manner of speaking showed how deeply
in earnest he was.
“That is true,” he said, “and I was astonished to find my friends
acted like a lot of cads. I fancied I knew them better, but I was
mistaken. I had thought they were above such things, but I found I was
wrong.”
“You had no right to attempt to introduce a fellow like Hooker without
finding out who was willing to know him!”
“Hadn’t I? Let’s see. It was in this room――my own room――wasn’t it?”
“Yes, but――――”
“Hooker came here with me at my invitation.”
“Well?”
“When we entered, we found a number of fellows here, making themselves
at home, as I wish my friends to do.”
“What of that?”
“Do you think I was going to bring Hooker, a student at this college,
in here and not introduce him to those who were present? What sort of
a way would that be to treat him? Under the circumstances, there was
but one thing for me to do. I attempted to do it, and the fellows I
have called my friends insulted Hooker――yes, they insulted me, and by
the Lord Harry, they’ll have to apologize to both of us for it before
I have anything more to do with them!”
Now, Bart Hodge knew that when Merriwell was aroused in this manner he
felt strongly on the subject, and it would be no easy matter to turn
his mind. Hodge was taken aback. He had intended to go at Merry hammer
and tongs and quickly convince him that he was making a mistake in
having anything at all to do with Jim Hooker, but now he realized that
he had a mighty task before him.
“What?” gasped Bart. “You don’t mean――――”
“I mean just what I have said.”
“And you will continue to associate with Hooker, for all of his
disreputable father?”
“I shall continue to associate with him till I am convinced that he is
not worthy of my friendship.”
Hodge gasped at that.
“You know there are some bad stories afloat concerning him,” he
quickly said.
“What sort of stories?”
“They say he is following in the tracks of his father.”
“’they say! They say!’” impatiently exclaimed Frank. “’they say’ has
ruined many a fair reputation. It is in the mouth of every lying,
malicious gossip. It’s a manner of shunning responsibility for
slander. Don’t tell me that ’they say.’ Who says? Just what do they
say?”
“Why,” said Bart, floundering a little, “it――it’s the――the report that
he’s light-fingered.”
“The proof?”
“Why, things have been missed from a number of different rooms.”
“Is that so?” cried Frank, with fine scorn. “I don’t suppose such a
thing ever happened before Jim Hooker came to college!”
“But circumstantial evidence――――”
“Has hanged many an innocent man.”
“Everything has seemed to point to Hooker as the thief,” asserted
Hodge desperately.
“By ‘everything’ you mean what? Is there any absolute proof?”
“Why, no, there is no positive proof. If there were, Hooker would have
been forced to get out of Yale long ago.”
“Exactly,” nodded Frank. “Suspicion has been turned on him because of
his father. That is the plain truth. If it had not been known that his
father had done a dishonest thing, no one might have suspected him. Am
I right?”
“Perhaps so,” confessed Bart reluctantly.
“Don’t you know I’m right?”
“No, I don’t know it.”
“Well, don’t you think so?”
“I suppose there is something in it.”
Frank laughed shortly.
“You squirm in order to avoid giving me a direct answer, but you must
confess that I have you cornered. Now, I want to say something more
about Jim Hooker. I have picked him up because my heart was touched
with pity by his forlorn and disconsolate appearance. I talked with
him, and I found the poor fellow felt his situation keenly. I liked
his face. I was sorry for him. I saw that a chap who was struggling
hard to get an education and become an honored and respected man might
be ruined and driven to the dogs at the very outset by being shunned
and scorned. He must have a strong determination to have withstood the
strain thus far. He may be tottering on the brink even now, and it is
possible that all he needs is the helping hand of a true friend to
keep him from going over. My hand has been held out to him, and once
Frank Merriwell has offered his hand to another he never withdraws it
till that person has proved himself thoroughly and utterly unworthy.”
Bart knew this was true, and he felt like applauding Frank. Then came
another thought.
“They say he associates with tough characters in the lowest dives of
the city.”
“Again it is ’they say!’” exclaimed Frank. “Where is the proof?”
“Well, I’ve been told that he visits the tough quarter every Saturday
night. He might be followed. Say, Merry, I dare you to follow him with
me!”
“What! play the spy?”
“If you have so much confidence in him, you should not hesitate. You
might be able to prove to me that he’s all right.”
Frank seemed to meditate a moment, and then he said:
“That’s right, Bart.”
“And you’ll do it――you’ll follow him to-morrow night?”
“If I am in condition after the football game――yes.”
“It’s settled then! We’ll see where he goes, and whom he meets.”
Saturday was a day of triumph for Yale, for she won an easy victory on
the gridiron against one of the smaller college teams. In the game
twenty-one men were used by Yale, in order to give all the better
candidates a trial, and Bart Hodge found his opportunity to show what
he could do. Hodge improved the opportunity by showing himself a
perfect tiger in the rush-line, and thus it happened that, for once,
he was in pretty good spirits when he came to Frank’s room early in
the evening. To Bart’s astonishment, he found Merry in a “grouch.”
“What is the matter with you, Frank?” he cried. “Don’t think I ever
saw you looking this way before.”
“I’m not feeling well,” confessed Frank.
“You’re not looking well. What’s hit you this way? You ought to be
jolly after to-day’s work. It can’t be you are depressed because of
the game?”
“Not exactly, and yet, to a certain extent, I am.”
Hodge was still more surprised.
“How is that? Everybody else is more than satisfied. It was a walkover
for Old Eli.”
“As it should have been. This victory to-day means absolutely
nothing.”
“We were not scored against.”
“Nobody expected we would be.”
“And I got a chance for a trial.”
“I congratulate you.”
“But you don’t seem very pleased over it,” said Bart, feeling keen
disappointment. “You have been urging me to make a try for the eleven.
But for you, I should not have done it.”
“Believe me,” said Merry, “I am pleased. I was glad to see you tear
through their line as you did. More than that, I was glad that your
work was noticed.”
“Was it?” eagerly.
“Sure thing. It’s being discussed in every quarter of the campus now.
I know Birch took particular note of it, and you will stand a big show
of playing right along as a regular after this.”
Bart’s face glowed.
“There was a time,” he confessed, “when I fancied I did not care a rap
to play on the eleven.”
“I know that,” nodded Frank.
“You changed that.”
“Did I?”
“Yes.”
“Well, I’m glad of it.”
“You talked to me――you told me it was my duty to play if I could. You
told me it was my duty to do everything I could this year to help Old
Eli to victory.”
“Do you doubt it now?”
“No. I have begun to taste your spirit, Merriwell. Once I thought I
hated Yale, but now I know I was mistaken. I have come to feel such
love for her that I am ready to die to carry the blue to victory!”
Frank stepped forward and grasped Bart’s hand, his face lighting up
for a moment.
“That’s the right sort of spirit!” he cried. “It is that feeling in
the hearts of the defenders of the blue that has made Yale victorious
in the past. It is the Yale spirit!”
“Well, I’ve got it now, all right!” Bart almost laughed. “It caught me
hard in the game to-day. I never felt before just as I did then. I was
ready to break bones or neck to advance the ball a yard. I was ready
to die if I could make a touch-down!”
“I haven’t a doubt of it. With such material, Yale should have nothing
but a string of victories marked against her this season.”
“Oh, we’re bound to win from start to finish.”
“I hope we may, but I have my fears.”
Now, this was so unusual for Frank that it was not surprising Bart was
almost dazed.
“Look here!” exclaimed Hodge; “when I used to talk like that, you told
me my liver was out of order.”
“And you feel like telling me so now, eh?”
“I do.”
“I suppose so.”
“What ails you, anyhow?”
“Several things. One thing is that I am not satisfied with the manner
in which the eleven is being handled.”
“You’re not?”
“Not by any means.”
“Why?”
“There is not enough head-work behind it. It takes brains to play
football, as well as brawn. We’ve got the timber, if it can be
properly handled, but no new play has been developed thus far, and
every game has been won by the old tactics of other years. Our fault
last season, as all confess, was slowness in following up after kicks.
Instead of always being under the ball when it dropped, the men who
should have been there were somewhere else.”
“Well, surely the coachers are working to remedy that weakness.”
“They are, and they are neglecting everything else, almost. This year
we’ll be strong where the eleven was weak last season; but it’s big
odds we are weak in some other spot, and that weakness may prove
fatal.”
“Well, something is wrong when you get to looking on the dark side of
things!”
“Besides that, the game we have been playing thus far is one of brute
force, and it has put our best men in hospital. Badger, Quimby, and
Pelling could not play to-day.”
“We can get along without Badger.”
“He’s one of the best men on the team.”
“I don’t understand why you always say that, when he is your enemy.”
“I say it because it is true. Only fools lie about their enemies; wise
men keep silent or speak the truth.”
Bart nodded.
“I guess you’re right about that, though I never thought of it that
way before. But Badger will be all right in a week.”
“Perhaps. He hobbled out to the fence to-night with a cane. Pelling is
flat on his back, and Quimby is not much better.”
“But I believe there are other men just as good. Look how we slashed
through ’em to-day.”
“Twenty-one men were used, and five out of the twenty-one were
injured, more or less. How long will it take at this rate to use up
every football-player in college?”
“Well, they can be used pretty fast.”
“I should say so. While men are injured they cannot be progressing in
practise.”
“But men get injured just the same everywhere. A fellow who is afraid
of being hurt a little has no business playing the game.”
“That’s true enough. What worries me is that we are not getting a team
together and holding it.”
“Well, how about Harvard? She shifts her men around.”
“But not for the purpose of trying a lot of new men.”
“Then what for?”
“To save her old ones. She has very little important new timber on her
eleven this season, but she has all her best men from last year. She
is taking care of them, too. While Yale is shifting about and wavering
with uncertainty, Harvard is pushing straight forward with a fixed
purpose――and that purpose is to drag Old Eli in the dust again this
year.”
“She can’t do it!”
“I hope not.”
“Look at what we did to-day.”
“And look at what Harvard did to-day. She was up against a stronger
team than the one we played, and she piled up a bigger score, without
once having her goal-line in danger.”
“That’s the report, but the papers to-morrow may prove that she didn’t
make such a wonderful showing.”
“We get things pretty straight by wire now. I think we’ll find the
report is true enough.”
“Are you afraid, Merriwell?”
Frank had turned away, but he turned like a flash on Bart.
“Not afraid,” he said, “only worried.”
“Well, come, don’t think any more about it. You know we are going out
to-night.”
Frank started and shrugged his shoulders.
“You have not forgotten?” exclaimed Hodge, not understanding Merry’s
manner. “We’re going to follow Hooker, you know.”
“Old man,” said Frank soberly, “I don’t think I’ll go.”