A SURPRISE FOR DICK.
In the dressing room there was a jabber of youthful voices as the
players got into their street clothes. Kates was feeling pretty well,
for the fellows who had made errors behind him, one and all, had come
forward and offered congratulations over his work, at the same time
blaming themselves for repeatedly putting him into a bad hole.
Casper Steele, in a motoring suit, appeared and expressed his
appreciation of the hair-lifting game he had witnessed.
“I was really losing interest when you went out of the box, Merriwell,
old man!” laughed Casper. “That finish was a heart-breaker, though. How
long before you and your friends will be ready to start for Meadwold?”
“On my word,” said Dick, “I’d forgotten about your invitation.”
“But you can go?” questioned Steele anxiously. “You said you’d let me
know if you couldn’t get away, and I haven’t heard a word from you.”
“It’s all right, I can go.”
“How about Claxton and Buckhart?”
“They will come along. It’s all fixed.”
“Good! A day off to-morrow will be to the benefit of all of you.”
“How about Tucker?” asked Dick, in a low tone. “I don’t like to go away
and leave him to himself for even a day. I’ve taken the liberty of
asking him if he’ll join us, providing you don’t object.”
“Now, look here, old man,” said Steele, “didn’t I tell you this was to
be your party? Didn’t I tell you to invite any one you wished?”
“Yes, but——”
“I meant it. It’s to be a little housewarming, you know. The gov’nor
will have a party of his own down there next week. Just now he has some
sort of a business deal on that is keeping him mighty busy. I have my
car here, and I’ll take you and your chosen friends to pick up your
dunnage. It’s forty miles to Meadwold, and it will be dark before we get
there, anyhow.”
“It was mighty fine of you to plan this little outing, Steele,” said
Dick.
“Well, I hope you and your friends enjoy yourselves, and I think you
will.”
Meadwold was the name given to a large country estate purchased the
previous year by Peyton Steele, Casper’s father. Steele was a man who
loved the country and country life, and it was his intention to make
this newly acquired property an ideal summer home for his occupancy. The
old farm buildings had been renovated and enlarged. Broad verandas had
been built. A fine stable was put up, and the place was stocked with
blooded horses and choice cattle. A complete corps of servants had been
installed at Meadwold, and everything was ready for the housewarming.
Blessed Jones had been invited to become one of the party, but had
solemnly expressed it as his duty to remain in town and look after those
ball players who needed watching. He now came up, with a sad and doleful
expression on his face.
“Methinks thou wilt have a high old time, brothers,” he said. “But look
here, Steele, you want to remember that these fellows are under
training-table regulations. Don’t gorge them with ice cream and cake and
such disastrous delicacies.”
“Leave that to me,” said Dick. “We’ll behave, Jones. Don’t be afraid.
Too bad you don’t feel that you ought to come.”
“It is too bad,” nodded Steele. “I’d enjoy having you.”
“Without doubt,” said Blessed. “I would add immensely to the gayety of
the aggregation. I’m generally about as funny as a funeral.”
Tucker was pleased when he learned beyond doubt that he was to be one of
the party. Steele took them in his car, and soon they were at the curb
in front of the lodging house on York Street.
“I’ll get my things and come back here,” said Rob Claxton, as he sprang
from the car.
Thirty minutes later the big touring car was bearing them out of the
city.
“It’ll certainly be fine to get out into the country, where we can
gambol with the little lambkins,” laughed Tucker. “I need it. My! but
wasn’t that a lovely throw I made to you, Dick? I had a spasm when I
realized what I’d done. Didn’t think you’d ever touch it, but you raked
her in with one paw. Say, how long is your arm? I swear you reached
eleven feet into the air for that ball!”
“Please don’t talk about errors, suh,” entreated Claxton. “I’d like to
forget that awful mess I made.”
“Kates sure pitched a good game,” observed Buckhart. “But there was one
time I thought he had gone to the bowwows.”
“That game reminds me of the last one I played in before coming to
college,” said Tucker. “The finish was just about as sensational. We had
the other fellows going up to the seventh inning, when they got after
our pitcher and bumped him. In the ninth inning they needed one run to
tie, and two to win, and they had the bases filled. It was their last
turn to bat, and two men were out. I was playing center field. Up came
the heaviest batter on their team, and he slammed a long fly out into my
garden. The ground out there was awfully soft in spots, and when I
started for that fly one of my feet got stuck in a hole so that I
couldn’t pull it out to save my neck. There was the ball coming down
just about six feet beyond my reach, and me held fast by one hoof. I
tell you it was awful. Perspiration literally started out on my face in
drops as big as gooseberries. But I got the ball.”
“How did you do it, suh?” asked Claxton curiously.
“Why, you see, I just stooped down, cut my shoe laces, pulled my foot
out of my shoe, made a lunge, and grabbed the ball.”
“Remarkable!” breathed Rob. “Cut your shoe laces, did you?”
“Yep.”
“Do you usually carry a knife around in your baseball suit?”
“Oh, no,” confessed Tommy, looking a bit confused. “I didn’t cut my
laces with a knife.”
“What did you cut them with, if you don’t mind telling?”
“With a blade of grass, of course,” snorted Tucker.
Merriwell, Buckhart, and Steele laughed, and, after a moment, Claxton
joined in.
“That’ll about do for you, Tommy,” said Dick. “Don’t tell us any more
such wonderful yarns. We can’t quite digest them.”
New Haven was now left behind, and the car was humming smoothly over the
road. The boys had brought along their heavy coats, and, therefore, were
quite comfortable, although it was growing cool as the sun sank in the
west. A beautiful sunset filled them all with admiration and delight.
The ride in that big, easy car was calculated to soothe their
overstrained nerves after the excitement of the game.
“Strange,” said Claxton, “I didn’t see Miss Ditson or Miss Midhurst at
the game. They usually attend. Were they there, Dick?”
“I didn’t see them myself,” confessed Merriwell.
“Nor I,” said Buckhart. “I reckon they were not there.”
No one observed the faint smile that flitted across the face of Casper
Steele as he bent over the steering wheel.
“I fancy you’re right,” he said. “I looked around at the crowd in the
stand, and I saw nothing of those girls.”
The sun had vanished, and purple shadows were spreading in the east.
They stopped to light the lamps, and then bowled on again. Night
enfolded them softly, and the bright glare of the lamps grew more and
more effective as the darkness increased.
“We’re getting near Meadwold,” Steele finally announced.
A few moments later they swung in at a gate with high stone posts, and
followed a private road that wound between long lines of gnarled old
trees.
“We’ll see the lights in a minute,” said Casper.
Surmounting a little rise, they beheld before them the gleam of many
lights, and Steele told them that was Meadwold.
“Gee whiz!” piped Tucker. “They’ve certainly illuminated gorgeously for
our arrival.”
“I have a party of friends there who are expecting us,” was Casper’s
surprising announcement.
He now pressed the pedal, and the Gabriel horn sang sweetly through the
spring night.
“That will tell them we’re coming,” he laughed. “They’ll be on the
veranda to welcome us.”
And now the boys discovered that the veranda and the trees in the
immediate vicinity of the house were hung with hundreds of Japanese
lanterns.
As they swung up the fine road to the front of the house they heard a
chorus of youthful voices, and forth from the wide front door came
swarming a merry band of boys and girls. There were fully thirty of
them, and they crowded to the steps, waving their handkerchiefs and
laughingly crying welcome.
“Great horn spoon!” muttered Brad Buckhart. “What are we up against?”
But Dick was speechless, for there, in the mellow light of the many
lanterns, standing in front of all the others, her hands outstretched to
him, was the one girl he knew best in all the world—June Arlington!