OFF TO CAMP
Tom Fairfield disposed himself comfortably on the bed before replying.
There was room there, now, for the food and drink had been disposed of.
Tom stretched out, finished a half-consumed sardine sandwich, and went
on.
“You know old Efficiency, don’t you?” began Tom, with tantalizing
slowness.
“I should say we did!” came in a whispered chorus.
“The prof who’s always lecturing on improving your opportunities, isn’t
he?” asked a student who had not been at Elmwood very long.
“That’s the one,” resumed Tom. “You know he claims we all eat and drink
too much. He holds that a person should find the minimum amount of food
on which he can live, and take no more than that.”
“I’ve had more than my share to-night, all right,” comfortably murmured
Jack.
“And Efficiency, as we call him,” went on Tom, “is a hater of feasting
of any sort, unless it be a feast of reason. I think he lives on half
a cracker and a gill of milk a day, or something like that.”
“Well, what’s the idea?” asked Bert, impatiently.
“This,” answered Tom, calmly. “We will take the remains of our herewith
feast, the broken victuals, the things in which they were contained,
the empty tins, the depleted bottles, and deposit them on the doorstep
of the domicile of Professor Hazeltine, otherwise known as Old
Efficiency. When they are seen there it will show to the world that he
does not practice what he preaches.”
There was silence for a moment following Tom’s announcement, and then
came chuckles and smothered laughter.
“Say, that’s a good one all right!”
“It sure is!”
“Ha! Ha! Ha! It takes Tom Fairfield to think ’em out!”
“Easy there!” Bert cautioned them. “You’ll give the whole snap away, if
you’re not careful.”
“Well, shall we do it?” asked Tom.
“I should say we will!” declared Jack.
“Then gather up the stuff and come along, a few at a time,” advised the
ringleader. “We don’t want to make too much noise.”
A little later dark and silent figures might have been observed
stealing across the school campus, carrying various objects. The front
stoop of the professor, who was such a stickler for efficiency and the
maximum of effect with the minimum of effort, was in the shadow, and
soon it was piled high with many things.
Emptied sardine tins, olive bottles which contained only the appetizing
odor, pasteboard cartons of crackers or other cakes, ginger-ale bottles
with only a few drops of the beverage in the bottom, papers and paper
bags, the pasteboard circlets from Charlotte russes--these and many
more things from the forbidden midnight feast were piled on the steps.
Then the conspirators stole away, one by one, as they had come.
Tom Fairfield lingered last to make a more artistic arrangement of the
empty bottles; then he, too, joined his chums.
“I rather guess that’ll make ’em lie down and close their eyes,” he
said, in distinction to the process of “sitting up and taking notice.”
“It sure will,” agreed Jack, with a chuckle.
There were whispered good-nights, pre-holiday greetings and then the
students sought their rooms, for there was a limit beyond which they
did not want to stretch matters.
In the morning they were sufficiently rewarded for their efforts--if
rewarded be the proper word.
Professor Hazeltine, going to his front door to get his early morning
paper, saw the array of bottles and debris. At first he could not
believe the evidence of his eyesight, but a second look convinced him
that he could not be mistaken.
“The shame of it!” he murmured. “The shame of that disgraceful gorging
of food. They must be made an example of--no matter who they are. The
shame of it! I shall report them! Oh, the waste here represented! The
shameful waste of food! I suppose all that is here represented was
consumed in a single night. It might have lasted a month. I shall see
that they are punished, not only for their disgraceful action in thus
littering my stoop, but for gorging themselves like beasts!”
But the professor forgot one thing, namely, that to punish a culprit
one must first know who he is, and how to catch him. It was the old
application of first get your rabbit, though doubtless the professor
would have changed the proverb to some milder form of food.
However, he took up his paper, ordered the servant to remove the
debris, and then proceeded to his simple breakfast of a certain
bran-like food mingled with milk, a bit of dry toast and a cup of
corn-coffee. After which, bristling with as much indignation as he
could summon on such cold and clammy food, he went to Dr. Meredith and
complained.
The Head smiled tolerantly.
“You must remember that it is the holiday season,” he said. “Boys will
be boys.”
“But, Doctor, I do not so much object to the disgraceful exhibition
they made of me. I can stand that. No one who knows me, or my
principles, would think for a moment that I could consume the amount of
food represented there.”
“No, I think you would be held guiltless of that,” agreed the President.
“But it is the fact that the young men--our students--could so demean
themselves like beasts as to partake of so much gross food,” went on
Professor Hazeltine. “After all my talks, showing the amount of work
that can be done, mental and physical, on a simple preparation of whole
wheat, to think of them having eaten sardines, smoked beef, canned
tongue, potted ham, canned chicken--for I found tins representing all
those things on my steps, Dr. Meredith. It was awful!”
“Yes, the boys must have had a bountiful feast,” agreed the President
with a sigh.
Was it a sigh of regret that his days for enjoying such forbidden
midnight “feeds” were over? For he was human.
“I want those boys punished, not so much for what they did to me as for
their own sakes,” demanded Professor Hazeltine. “They must learn that
the brain works best on lighter foods, and that to clog the body with
gross meat is but to stop the delicate machinery of the----”
“Yes, yes, I know,” said Dr. Meredith, a bit wearily. He had heard
all that before. “Well, I suppose the boys did do wrong, and if you
will bring me their names, I will speak to them. Bring me their names,
Professor Hazeltine.”
But that was easier said than done. Not that “Efficiency” did not make
the effort, but it was a hopeless task. Of course none of the boys
would “peach,” and no one else knew who had been involved.
Professor Hazeltine came in for some fun, mildly poked at him by other
members of the faculty.
“I understand you had quite a banquet over at your house last night,”
remarked Professor Wirt.
“It was--disgraceful!” exploded the aggrieved one, and he went on to
point out how the human body could live for weeks on a purely cereal
diet, with cold water only for drinking purposes.
So the boys had their fun; at least, it was fun for them, and no great
harm was done. Nor did Professor Hazeltine discover who were the
culprits.
The school was about to close for the long holiday vacation. Already
some of the students, living at a distance, had departed. There were
the final days, when discipline was more than ever relaxed. Few
lectures were given, and fewer attended.
Then came the last day, when farewells echoed over the campus.
“Good-bye! Good-bye!”
“Merry Christmas!”
“Happy New Year!”
“See you after the holidays!”
“Get together now, fellows, a last cheer for old Elmwood Hall! We won’t
see her again until next year!”
Tom Fairfield led in the cheering, and then, gathering his particular
chums about him, gave a farewell song. Then followed cheers for Dr.
Meredith, and someone called:
“Three cheers for Professor Hazeltine! May his digestion never grow
worse!”
The cheers were given with a will, ending with a burst of laughter, for
the professor in question was observed to be shaking his fist at the
students out of his window. He had not forgiven the midnight feast and
its ending.
“Well, we’ll soon be on our way,” said Tom to Bert, Jack and George, as
they sat together in the railroad train, for they all lived in the same
part of New Jersey, and were on their way home.
“What’s the plan?” asked George.
“We’ll all meet at my house,” proposed Tom, “and go to New York City
from there. Then we can take the express for the Adirondacks. We go to
a small station called Hemlock Junction, and travel the rest of the
distance in a sleigh. We’ll go to No. 1 Camp first, and see how we like
it. If we can’t get enough game there, we’ll go on to the other camps.
As I told you, we’ll have the use of all three. None of the members of
the club will be up there this season.”
“But will whoever is in charge let us in?” asked Jack.
“Yes, all arrangements have been made,” Tom said. “There is grub up
there, bedclothes, and everything. All we’ll take is our clothes, guns
and cameras.”
“Yes, don’t forget the cameras,” urged Bert. “I expect to get some fine
snapshots up there.”
“And I hope we get some good gun-shots,” put in Tom. “We’re going on a
hunting trip, please remember.”
The time of preparation passed quickly, and a few days later, and
shortly after Christmas, the boys found themselves in the Grand Central
Station, New York, ready to take the train for camp.
They piled their belongings about them in the parlor car, and then
proceeded to talk of the delights ahead of them, delights in which
their fellow passengers shared, for they listened with evident pleasure
to the conversation of our friends.