THE QUARREL.
By the time Jim Townsend reached the campus he was at a white heat.
“Hang him!” he snapped viciously. “I know that’s what he’s up to, but
how in the mischief can I make Bob understand? He’s such a softy he
simply won’t believe a thing against Blake, just because he likes him.
The double-faced skunk!”
The last remark was intended for Blake, but Jim was too wrought up to
talk coherently. He wandered around the campus for a few minutes and
then decided to take his troubles to Blair Hildebrand, one of his
particular chums, whose cool, level-headed advice had helped him out on
more than one occasion.
He found the big, blue-eyed senior alone, glancing over the latest issue
of the _Lit_, and evidently very tired of his own company.
“Hello, old man,” he said cordially, as Townsend appeared. “You’re a
perfect godsend. George has gone to New York, and I was just thinking of
looking up some congenial spirit and painting the town red. How’s
everything?”
“Rotten!” returned Townsend shortly, as he dropped onto a chair. “That
dub, Jarvis Blake, is over at the rooms jabbering football and keeping
Bob from doing an earthly thing with to-morrow’s work. And you know how
the dean warned him the other day.”
Hildebrand nodded.
“Yes, I heard about it,” he returned. “Isn’t that something new—Blake’s
coming around, I mean?”
“He’s done it every night this week,” Jim explained morosely. “I’ll bet
any money, Blair, that he’s doing it on purpose so Bob will be dropped
and he’ll get on the varsity. I told Bob as much to-night.”
“How did he take it?” Hildebrand asked interestedly.
“Wouldn’t listen to a word against the man,” returned Townsend. “Thinks
he’s all to the good. You know Bob never will hear anything against a
fellow he likes.”
“Yes, he’s a dandy chap that way,” Hildebrand answered absently. “That’s
one of the reasons why every one likes him so well.”
He was evidently thinking about something else.
“That’s all very nice,” Jim retorted quickly; “but a fellow can carry it
too far. He’s making a fool of himself going on the way he’s been all
this term. He’ll be dropped unless he wakes up mighty sudden. And I
don’t want him dropped. He’s too good a fellow for that.”
Townsend’s voice was mournful and his face downcast and dejected at the
thought of what might happen to his chum.
Presently Hildebrand looked up.
“I shouldn’t wonder a bit if you were right about Blake, Jim,” he said.
“He makes a mighty good showing with his frank, hearty manner, but I
have every reason to think that he’s far from being above just such a
trick as this.”
Townsend sat up suddenly, his face aglow with interest.
“You have?” he exclaimed quickly. “What was it? Anything which Bob would
listen to?”
“Just a little experience I had with him last year,” the stalwart guard
returned quietly; “but it proved pretty conclusively that Blake was
mighty poor stuff. Whether it would have any effect on Bob or not, is
quite another question.”
“Can’t you tell a fellow what it was?” Jim asked eagerly.
Hildebrand shook his head slowly.
“What’s the use?” he said, with a quiet smile. “I don’t believe in
knocking a man unless it’s necessary, even if he isn’t straight. I
haven’t told a soul about this; but if you really think that’s what
Blake’s up to, I have no objection to putting Bob wise on the quiet some
time.”
“I’m sure it is,” Townsend said decidedly. “He never used to come
around, but ever since Bob got that talking to from the dean, he’s been
in every solitary night, and insists on jawing football from the time he
sets foot in the room until he leaves. I’ll take my oath that he’s got a
reason for it.”
“If that’s the case,” Hildebrand returned, “I’ll brace Bob the first
chance I get and tell him a thing or two which will open his eyes.”
The opportunity came the very next afternoon. Both Hollister and
Hildebrand were late getting away from the field, and it happened that,
quite without premeditation on the part of the latter, they came out of
the gate together. In the bustle and turmoil of practice, the big guard
had quite forgotten his promise to Townsend, but now it suddenly came
back into his mind.
“Say, Bob,” he said slowly, “do you mind walking for a few minutes? I
just remembered something I wanted to tell you.”
Hollister looked a little surprised.
“Why, no, not at all,” he returned quickly. “Anything about the team?”
Hildebrand hesitated. He had suddenly discovered that what he had to say
was not going to be at all easy.
“Partly, yes,” he answered presently. “I hope you won’t think I’m a
beastly butter-in, Bob, if I touch on something which is rather
personal. I wouldn’t do it if I didn’t think so much of you and hate to
see you knifed.”
Hollister frowned and a puzzled look came into his eyes.
“I don’t see quite what you’re driving at,” he said, a bit shortly; “but
go ahead.”
The guard’s pleasant face was flushed. He almost wished he hadn’t
promised Jim; but at length, he drew a long breath and took the plunge.
“It’s about Blake,” he said quickly. “Jim tells me he’s been coming in
every night and keeping you from your work. I think you ought to know
that he isn’t—well, he isn’t quite—a fellow to be trusted. I know,
because I caught him cheating in a poker game last spring—a game for
money.”
An ominous silence followed. In the light of a near-by street lamp,
Hildebrand saw his companion’s lithe figure stiffen and his pleasant
face harden.
“Well, is that all?” inquired Hollister at length, in a cold, cutting
voice.
“Why, yes,” Hildebrand answered in surprise. “I should think it was
enough.”
Hollister was evidently keeping his temper with an effort.
“Entirely too much!” he snapped. “I hope you’re pleased with your
attempt to blacken the character of one of my friends. Nice, pleasant
occupation, isn’t it, running down a man when he isn’t around to defend
himself? However, you’ve had your trouble for your pains. I don’t
believe a word of it.”
Hildebrand caught his breath suddenly and his face turned scarlet.
Stopping abruptly, he turned fiercely on Hollister, with blazing eyes
and clenched fists. Another moment and he would have landed a smashing
blow on the face of the man who had called him a liar, but, just in
time, he got a grip on himself and realized the utter impossibility of
two seniors indulging in a fist fight in the street.
“You’ll be sorry for that, Hollister!” he said, in a voice which
quivered with suppressed anger. “I might have known that this would be
all the thanks I’d get for trying to do you a good turn. I’ll send you
written proof of the statement I just made. Luckily there were two other
men in the game.”
Without another word, he walked quickly away, leaving Hollister alone, a
feeling of regret that he had been so hasty, struggling with the anger
which Hildebrand’s accusation against his friend had aroused in him.
“I suppose I shouldn’t have said that,” he murmured regretfully. “But he
made me mad with those rotten insinuations against Jarv.”
Then the thought came to him that Hildebrand had not contented himself
with insinuations. He had made a downright, matter-of-fact statement,
which he proposed to back with written proof. But even then Bob could
not bring himself to believe that Blake would descend so low as to cheat
at cards.
There must have been a mistake made somewhere—must be some explanation
of the thing. Blake was one of his special friends whom he had known and
liked ever since they first entered college together, and in all that
time he had never known Jarvis to do anything which was not quite square
and honorable.
Hollister was not at all a good judge of character. His likes and
dislikes were very strong, but they were governed by his heart and not
by his head. If he once came to care for a fellow he was ready to stick
to him through thick and thin, stand up for him at all times and places,
and refused to listen to a word against him. Once or twice during his
college life he had been disappointed in a man who had been admitted to
the inner circle of his friendship. One notable instance was that of a
perfectly charming fellow who was possessed of almost every known
accomplishment and talent, but in whom the sense of right and wrong was
strangely, inexplicably lacking.
Hollister had taken to him tremendously from the very first, and the
fellow’s charm of manner and personal magnetism had blinded him to a
realizing sense of his sinister failings. For months Bob stuck to him,
refusing to listen to the advice of other friends who had discovered the
man’s real character, and had only been brought to his senses by coming
in suddenly one day and catching the fellow in the act of taking money
out of the bill case he had left carelessly on the table.
So he had been all through his college career; honest, loyal,
true-hearted, but strangely blinded by prejudice, sometimes almost
lacking in common sense when it came to judging the real character of a
man.
Presently a car appeared, but Hollister let it go. Hildebrand would
probably take it, and at the present moment he did not feel like riding
back to the campus face to face with the man he had just insulted.
The more he thought over the matter the sorrier he was that he had
allowed his temper to get the best of him. He liked Blair, and, now that
he had calmed down, he realized that the big guard must have been
perfectly sincere when he made the charge against Blake. He had probably
done it with the best intentions in the world.
“Though why everybody is so down on Jarv I can’t imagine,” Bob muttered
to himself. “He’s a good fellow, and we’ve had some dandy talks about
football lately. It’s all rot about his keeping me from work. I can’t
get down to boning, anyway.”
The next car was a long time coming, and, as he stood on the curb
waiting for it, he remembered his roommate’s somewhat heated talk of the
night before. But that was perfectly absurd. There could not be anything
in that. Why, Blake had been actually helping him out with some of the
football problems, giving him some really clever ideas, and he was not
at all likely to do that if he were scheming for his place on the
varsity.
“This is worse than trying to study!” he exclaimed presently, in a tone
of exasperation. “I wish people wouldn’t take such an infernal interest
in what I am doing! Why can’t they let me alone to do as I like?”
The answer was simple, though he would never have guessed it in a
thousand years. He was too decent a fellow to be let alone to ruin
himself by his own blind folly so long as any of his friends could
prevent it.
Just then a car came along and Hollister took it. He did his best to
forget his regrettable quarrel with Hildebrand, but all the way back to
the campus it kept recurring to his mind, bringing with it curious,
disturbing little doubts as to whether there might not be something
after all in the statements the stalwart guard had made, and which
fitted in so patly with Jim Townsend’s petulant outburst.
Consequently, by the time he reached the training table his condition of
mind was not enviable. Hildebrand was already in his place and seemed to
have recovered completely from his fit of anger; but, though he was
pleasant and genial to the others, he paid no attention to Bob, ignoring
his existence quietly, but completely.
In spite of the fact that he had brought it on himself, Hollister was
hurt by this, and unconsciously his attitude toward Jarvis Blake
underwent a change.
As a result of all these wheels within wheels, a sort of damper was
thrown over the whole table which was felt by every one, though few
understood the cause. They only saw that the jokes fell flat, laughter
was forced, or absent altogether, and the resulting silences long drawn
out.
Dick Merriwell was quick to see that something unusual had happened, and
long before the meal was over he was sure that Hollister and Hildebrand
had fallen out in some way. Knowing that there was nothing worse for the
discipline of the team or more productive of poor work than internal
dissensions, he resolved to find out what the trouble was; and, as they
walked back to the campus through “Grub Alley,” he slipped his hand
through Hollister’s arm.
“Say, Bob, what’s the trouble between you and Blair?” he asked, in a low
tone.
Hollister hesitated.
“Oh, we had a run-in this afternoon about Blake,” he said, in a rather
pettish tone. “He told me that Jarv had been caught cheating at poker,
and I as much as said he was a liar. I reckon I shouldn’t have been so
strong, but he made me mad. He had no business to say such a thing about
a friend of mine.”
“I see,” Merriwell returned thoughtfully. “Do you mind telling me what
his object was in giving you that information?”
“It’s all come about through Jim!” Hollister burst out. “He needs to
have his head punched. He’s got the insane idea that Jarv wants to see
me dropped so he can cinch my place in the line. He came out with that
silly story last night. Said Blake comes around on purpose to keep me
from boning so that I’ll flunk in the classes and be thrown out. Of
course, I shut him up quick, and I suppose he went to Blair with his
fool story.”
“Blake been coming around much lately?” Dick asked casually.
“Quite a little.”
“Almost every night, hasn’t he?” Dick persisted.
“Well—yes,” Hollister acknowledged. “This week, that is.”
There was silence for a few moments, which was broken by Merriwell.
“I’m not much on knocking a man, Bob,” he said quietly; “but if I were
you I wouldn’t trust Blake too far. I know of one or two things he’s
done which weren’t quite——Well, you wouldn’t have done them yourself,
old fellow.”
Without waiting for a reply, he dropped Bob’s arm and walked quickly
away, leaving Hollister more of a prey to doubt and suspicions than he
had been before.
He knew that Merriwell was a man who almost never said anything against
a fellow student. If he did not like a man, or disapproved of him for
any reason, he had as little to do with him as possible, but his lips
were generally sealed. If he could not say anything good of a fellow, he
preferred keeping silent.
It was only on very rare occasions when something important was at stake
that he gave an adverse opinion of a man, and, consequently, the few
words he had just uttered concerning Blake were especially significant.
They must have some foundation or Merriwell would never have given voice
to them.
Hollister’s mind was in a turmoil. Unwilling to believe the worst of
Blake, it was impossible not to realize that there must be something
underhand about him or two such fellows as Merriwell and Hildebrand
would never have said what they had against him.
Bewildered and sick at heart, Bob made his way slowly to his rooms. Jim
had gone out for the evening, so that he was alone, and, having tossed
hat and overcoat aside, he dropped down in a chair.
At any rate, he did not want to see Blake that night. With this thing on
his mind, he could not feel at ease with him, and he would rather not
see the man until he had come to some final decision as to what his
course would be. All at once he glanced quickly at the clock.
“By Jove!” he exclaimed, springing up. “He’s likely to be here any
time.”
Snatching up his coat and hat, he was about to hurry out when he heard
the muffled slam of the big entrance door below.
“I’ll bet that’s him now,” he muttered.
The next moment he had switched off the light and hurried into the
bedroom, where he softly drew the door partly shut and stood behind it.
Presently a step sounded in the hall, followed by a knock at the door.
Then the latch clicked and some one entered the room.
“Hello, Bobby,” called a familiar voice.
There was no response. Presently Blake stepped over to the electric
light and switched it on.
“Not here,” he murmured, his eyes traveling swiftly about the room.
“That’s funny. He was ahead of me crossing the campus.”
There was a pause during which the big, blond fellow whistled softly, as
he walked up and down the room.
“What’s the good of waiting?” he muttered at length. “He may not come in
for an hour or two. His hash is as good as settled, anyhow. After the
exhibition he made of himself to-day, the dean can’t help doing
something. Maybe little Jarvie will play in the Harvard game after all.”
He laughed softly; there was a click and the room was shrouded in
darkness; the door closed and silence fell.
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