GOSSIP AND A MEETING
Harry and Dick were sitting on the lower step of the little flight
leading to the Cottage porch. It was between ten and eleven of a
perfect May morning. The crumbling red bricks paving the short path
which led to the curving drive glowed warmly in the sun, and the little
blades of grass springing up between them were very green and pert. The
campus looked vastly different to-day from what it had that January
afternoon when Harry had introduced Dick to Ferry Hill. To-day there
was the bluest of blue skies overhead, and instead of the waste of snow
the grass stretched away on every side fresh and verdant. The Grove was
fast clothing itself in new, tender green, and beyond, at the foot of
the long hill, the river dimpled and shone in the sunshine. Something
of this occurred to Harry, I think, for she stopped pulling Snip’s
ear--an operation which that member of the group, half-asleep in the
sunlight, thoroughly approved of--and asked:
“Dick, do you remember the day I brought you up here to show you the
school? And how cold it was? And how nasty and dismal everything
looked? After you’d gone I never thought for a minute that you’d come
back.”
“Neither did I,” answered Dick with a little laugh. “I guess I’d have
stayed at Hammond and liked it all right if I hadn’t got there before
school opened. It seemed so beastly lonesome over there, and the
fellows who stayed during vacation were such a ghastly bunch, that I
just had to get out. It was a toss-up whether I’d come over here and
try this or hit the trail for home.”
“Are you sorry you came?” asked Harry anxiously.
“Not a bit,” replied Dick with convincing heartiness. “I like it, and I
like you and Chub and Roy. You’ve all been so decent to me, you know.
You’re all three mighty good fellows, Harry.”
Harry flushed and looked pleased.
“I--I guess we liked you,” she said. “I’m glad you like Roy and Chub,”
she continued. “I just love them! They’re--they’re the nicest boys I
ever knew, I guess; and you too, Dick.”
Dick shook his head sorrowfully.
“I’m jealous,” he said. “You put Roy and Chub first.”
“Well, you see, I’ve known them longer, Dick,” answered Harry
earnestly. “You don’t mind, do you?”
“Not a bit,” he laughed. “Besides, next year they won’t be here, and
you’ll have to like me best.”
Harry looked grave.
“That’s the trouble,” she sighed. “When you get to like a boy he goes
and graduates and then you never see him again. I don’t know what I’ll
do when Roy and Chub go.”
“Don’t know what I’ll do, for that matter,” growled Dick. “It’ll be
beastly lonely at first. Maybe I won’t come back myself.”
“Oh, Dick, you must!” cried Harry. “Why, then there wouldn’t be any
one! You’ve got to come back! You will, won’t you, Dick?”
“Maybe.”
“No, promise!”
“All right, I’ll come, Harry. You and I’ll have to comfort each other,
eh? Say, isn’t this a dandy day? Hope it’ll be like this Saturday, eh?”
“It’s going to be,” said Harry decisively. “John says we’re in for a
spell of settled weather, and he knows all about it; he never misses.”
“Well, I hope he’s right. I want a good hard track on Saturday.”
“Do you think we can beat them?” asked Harry.
Dick hesitated, then shook his head slowly.
“Honestly, I don’t. But I’m not telling the fellows that. It doesn’t
help any, that sort of talk. I tell them we can win if we do our level
best; and we can; the trouble is that every fellow can’t do his level
best when the time comes. Lots of them will be nervous, you know; can’t
help it. I may be myself. By the way, Sid got a note from their manager
yesterday asking if we would mind changing the order of events so that
the mile run will come last; he says two of their men who are going
to run the mile are in the low hurdles and they wouldn’t have time to
get their wind. I told Sid to write and say it would be all right. It
doesn’t matter to us, although I suppose if we insisted on having the
things run off the way we first agreed to we’d have a better chance to
win the meet.”
“But it wouldn’t seem quite fair, would it, to make those boys run in
the mile just after they’d been hurdling?”
“Well, it would be fair enough, I guess; that’s their lookout, you
know; only--well, I don’t want to win that way. I say let every fellow
have an even chance, and then the one that wins is the best man.”
“Are you going to practise this afternoon?” Harry asked.
“No, on account of the ball game with Whittier. But to-morrow we’ll
have a good stiff afternoon of it. Then Friday we’ll rest up. That
reminds me: Sid’s trying to get up a meet with Prentice Military
Academy for some time the last of June. I hope he fixes it, for if
he doesn’t the fellows won’t keep in training; and if they don’t it
will be all the harder to get in form again next year. I wish we were
sure of having a decent track here next spring. If only the dormitory
business had turned out better I guess the Doctor would have been
willing to spend some money on the field and track.”
“Do you think we’ll ever get the money for the dormitory, Dick?” asked
Harry wistfully.
“Sure to, sooner or later,” he answered stoutly. “But it’s slow going,
isn’t it? Haven’t had any more letters, have you?”
Harry shook her head.
“Not one. I think some people are too mean for anything!”
“Well,” Dick laughed, “I dare say they’ve got plenty of uses for their
money. We’ll get it yet. This summer I’ll strike dad for a thousand.
If he’s had good luck he will give it in a minute. And when we’ve got
two thousand pledged I guess your father will be willing to help us. He
will see then that we’re in earnest.”
“I’m sure he will,” said Harry. “And isn’t it too funny for anything
about his being honorary president and not knowing it? Oh, Dick! What
time is it?”
“Twenty of eleven,” answered Dick, looking at his watch.
“I’ll be late if I don’t go this minute! And I’ll have to run half the
way anyhow!”
“I thought you didn’t have to go until two on Wednesdays,” said Dick.
“Eleven; it’s that awful music. ‘Do, re, mi, fa, sol--’ Good-by.”
“Good-by,” answered Dick, getting up and looking around for his books.
“I’ll see you at the game this afternoon.”
“Yes,” called Harry from the door. “And I hope we win.”
“Oh, we can’t help it,” laughed Dick. “It’s a way we have at Ferry
Hill!”
But they didn’t win; not unless the score lied. Seven to five it was
when the last inning was over. Whittier Collegiate Institute had some
good batters on her team and they had little trouble in finding Post
and Kirby for twelve hits. Chub was inclined to be doleful after the
game.
“Rotten!” he repeated over and over.
“Not a bit,” said Dick. “The trouble was only that you fellows haven’t
been practising enough the last week. It’s my fault entirely. I’ve
been after you for track work, and you can’t do two things at once and
do them well. I’m sorry, Chub, but after Saturday I’ll let you alone.”
“Think that’s it?” asked Chub, more cheerfully. “Well, if it is, I
don’t mind so much. Whittier isn’t Hammond, after all. And if we make a
good showing Saturday I shan’t mind losing to-day’s game. What do you
say, Roy?”
“Me?” asked Roy, trotting away to the shower-bath. “Oh, I’m not
worrying about anything.”
Events proved John the gardener to be a real weather prophet, for
Saturday dawned clear and warm. The track and field meeting with
Hammond was to begin at half past two, and at half past twelve Harry,
music-roll in hand, was hurrying back along the dusty road from her
music-lesson, fearful that she wouldn’t get through luncheon in time
to cross to Coleville on the first launch. Silver Cove was half a mile
behind her and the tower of School Hall was already in sight above the
tree-tops when the sound of wheels reached her from the road behind.
A station carriage drawn by a dejected white horse and driven by a
freckle-faced youth of seventeen or eighteen years was approaching
unhurriedly from the direction of the Cove. In the rear seat, as Harry
saw when the carriage overtook her, sat a gentleman in a neat gray
suit, derby hat and brown gloves. The gloves were especially noticeable
since they looked very new and were clasped tightly about the handle of
a slenderly rolled umbrella which stood between his knees. He was about
forty years old, had a round, smiling face, shrewd brown eyes and a
short, bristly mustache which terminated at each side in a sharp, waxed
point. As the carriage jolted past in its little cloud of dust the
occupant of the back seat, who had been observing the pedestrian for
several minutes, laid a hand on the driver’s shoulder.
“Stop,” he said.
“Whoa!” commanded the boy. “Whoa, I tell yer! Can’t yer stop nohow, yer
pesky brute?”
The horse showed as little inclination to stop as before it had shown
to go, and when the vehicle finally drew up motionless, with the driver
still scolding fretfully at the steed, it was some little distance
beyond Harry. But it was quite evident that the occupants were awaiting
her, and so she hurried up to it under the smiling scrutiny of the
passenger. She had been walking fast, the forenoon was quite warm
and her face was flushed as a result. Also the dust had settled upon
her shoes and half way up her ankles, and Harry was sensible of not
appearing at her best, a fact which annoyed her since the immaculate
appearance of the stranger seemed to set a standard of neatness. Then
she was looking up into a pair of smiling brown eyes, and--
“How do you do?” said the man. “May I offer you a seat?”