HASELTINE MAKES HIS DÉBUT.
It has been, and still is, the fashion in certain circles to decry
base-ball, and to hold up to the youth of the country the superiority
of cricket, as a pastime. The arguments, such as they are,――chief
among which is the plea that cricket is a more gentlemanly game, for
the reason that one can play it with exceeding comfort after leaving
school and college as well or nearly as well as before,――need not be
reiterated, inasmuch as there is no longer room for argument. The case
is closed. The boys have heard what was to be said on either side, and
have come to a final conclusion in regard to the matter. Base-ball is
undeniably the national sport from one end of the land to the other,
and no amount of chafing on the part of those who think the decision
unwise can make the long cherished cricket of our English cousins
widely popular on this side of the water. And after all, if we examine
the reasons, the boys are not far out. Be it said with bated breath
and yet clearly and unequivocally, that it requires more skill, far
more skill to excel at base-ball, as it is played to-day, than at any
other sport. Talk of muscle, nerve, wind, quickness and correctness
of eye, fleetness of foot, temper, bottom, and grit,――what one of
these qualities is not put in training when two closely matched nines
meet to play ball? Try it, gentlemen of England, for yourselves and
see. You will have to come to the conclusion――take my Yankee word for
it――that there is more in our game than you think; and what is more,
you will know in your hearts, though you will never acknowledge it,
that an all-day cricket match under the trees, relieved by respites
for beef and beer and dawdled the whole time,――for you take things
pretty leisurely after every “over,”――is a tame affair, though a very
gentlemanly and delightful one, compared with what we are able to show
you under the head of ball-playing. Don’t mistake us, gentlemen of
England: we know that cricket is a grand old game, we have watched it
often (though it is a trifle dull to watch), played it, too, and we
continue to play it at times, but when you come to talk about muscle
and nerve and temper and bottom and grit, and all that, as we have said
already, we are ready to back our national game against the world.
Chalmers and Hackett, the captains of the rival dormitory teams, are
tossing up to see which nine shall go in first, as the two new boys
arrive on the scene. Fullham wins and sends its opponents to the bat.
“Game called!” cries the umpire, and Haseltine has just time to throw
off his jacket and get into position at third base before Rainsford,
who is to pitch for the Fullhamites, enters the box. Rainsford is
known as “the kid” because of his slight appearance. He is only in the
fourth, but his drop balls have proved successful teasers ere this.
See how every player on the fielding nine has his nerves taut as Billy
Douglas steps to the home plate to lead off, and poises his bat!
They are boys, of course,――they have not the experience and sinew of
professional or college teams,――but they are sturdy fellows for all
that. They mean business: so does Billy; there is blood in his eye; he
hopes to start off with a three bagger.
“One ball!” cries the umpire.
“Two balls!”
That won’t do, Rainsford; you can’t afford to let him get his base on
balls. Carefully now.
“One strike!”
Ah, that’s better; the kid is settling down to his work. Now another!
A hit, a palpable hit! Away scuds Douglas with all the vim of his
Scotch forefathers, to get to first before the ball. No use, Billy;
Goldthwaite has it at second easy enough and pops it to Maitland, who,
as every one knows, is pretty sure to hold on to anything that comes
within his reach. A shout goes up from the Fullhamites, who to the
number of a score or more, including Jack, are grouped together on
one side of the catcher, which is answered by a bracing cheer from a
similar posse from the rival dormitory at the other side.
Pousland, the next striker, makes a base hit, but not to much purpose,
since Hackett knocks up an easy fly for the kid to absorb without
difficulty, and Johnson succumbs on a foul tip to Chalmers catching
under the bat in his iron mask and padded gloves with an eye to second
which Pousland is hoping to steal. But the third out settles that
question, and down goes a goose-egg for Rogers.
The formidable Bedloe is a brawny lad to look at, and he has to back
him Bobby Crosby at left field and Harry Ramsay at first, making three
of the school nine against only Chalmers and Goldthwaite on the side of
Fullham. Chalmers goes to the bat to give his team courage, and sends a
sky scraper to centre field which is captured cleverly. The kid falls
a prey to an easy grounder to short stop, and it looks as though the
innings would pan out poorly for the Fullhamites. But one can count on
nothing at base-ball until the last man is out; in testimony to which
Hamlen, who comes next in order, is given his base on called balls,
steals second by a judicious slide, and is sent to third on a fumble of
a hot liner,――a corker,――which Jackson hits to second, getting his base
thereby. Then Goldthwaite comes to the bat amid great applause, and
some one cries out, “Now for a grass-mower, Goldy!”
Goldthwaite proves worthy of the confidence reposed in him. Two strikes
are called on him while he waits for a ball just in the right place.
He gets it at last, when Bedloe, hoping that the umpire will call
another strike (for until this year you know three strikes was the
limit), eases up and throws in a slow one. Goldthwaite swipes with all
his might and sends the ball between left and centre field, but clean
out of reach of Crosby and Plympton. A home run! No, not quite, only
a three bagger. Goldthwaite holds his third, but Hamlen and Jackson
have scored. Two runs to a goose-egg; not bad to start with. But there
is Ogden out on a foul and the innings over with Goldthwaite still on
third.
Three innings more on either side do not vary the lead, for while
Rogers gets a run in the third, Fullham caps it with a single in the
fourth, and the score is three to one. No chance now for a complete
whitewash, which some of the enthusiasts among the lookers-on,
encouraged by the start, have hoped for. On the contrary, the shrewder
mind knows that it will be all Fullham can do to hold her lead. Rogers
has been settling down to work. Bedloe is in fine form, and is being
backed up bravely. They are getting on to the kid, too, and pound
him for a run and two base hits in the fifth, being prevented from
tying the score only by a magnificent double play of Goldthwaite and
Maitland. Then they put the Fullhamites out in one, two, three order.
Haseltine has been doing fairly well, though as yet he has had but
two chances in the field, the first of which, a fly, went up a
moderate distance and fell so plump into his hands that he did not
have to budge. The other, a gently ambling grounder, shot between
his legs just as he thought he had it; an error which elicited from
Horton, who was sitting beside Jack, the unflattering exclamation,
“Beastly butter-fingers!” However, there is a style and general air of
knowingness about him which has attracted attention, and Chalmers has
so far continued his own confidence in him as to fling twice to third
in order to frighten men who were off their bases, on each of which
occasions Haseltine got on to the ball, and once came very near putting
the too daring adversary out. He is evidently no green hand, as he has
further shown by the way he handles the bat. Though apparently too
small to be a very formidable willow-wielder, his first whack sent the
ball far to right field, where it was taken into camp very prettily,
it must be owned. The second time he got his base on balls, but was
put out trying to steal second, in spite of a most admirable slide on
his stomach for several feet. The decision of the umpire displeased
the crowd of Fullhamites, who manifested their resentment by crying
“Not out, not out!” vociferously, and applauded Haseltine as he came
in from the base crestfallen and covered with dust. It had been in the
next innings that he muffed the grounder, and he was now feeling very
much dissatisfied with himself and eager to wipe out these spots on his
record by some brilliant stroke.
The sixth innings adds another goose-egg to each score, in spite
of hard hitting on both sides, and the seventh begins amid a hush
of suspense. Jack can scarcely sit still, he is so nervous with
excitement, and he is hoarse with spelling out at the top of his
lungs, after every favorable play, “F-U-L-L-H-A-M! Fullham!” which is
the dormitory yell. It is anybody’s game, as Rainsford, the kid, well
knows, and he plants his feet in the box with the air of one aware that
the least let-up or carelessness will be fatal. Pousland is at the bat
again, and whacks at the first ball. It flies whizzing in Haseltine’s
direction, but out of reach, and a shout from the Rogers crowd rends
the air. But it is short-lived, for the umpire, who is watching
carefully, cries, “Foul ball!” Whereupon Pousland, who is halfway to
first, has to retrace his steps in a melancholy fashion. Had it but
struck just the other side of the line, it would have been good for two
bags. He poises his bat again viciously.
“One strike,” calls Prendergast, the umpire, who is captain of Dudley.
There is a roar from Fullham, and the striker, glancing round at the
umpire sulkily, strikes the tip of his bat against the ground and grits
his teeth as he makes ready for another ball.
“Foul,――out!”
The tick is plainly audible, and Chalmers’ gloves have closed firmly on
the ball. Pousland drops his bat and walks away in disgust. His place
is taken by Hackett, who strikes at the first two balls without hitting
either, but sends the third over second base skimming to centre, where
Ogden jumps a little and holds it above his head,――a pretty but not
very difficult catch, whereat the welkin rings.
“Here come Dr. and Mrs. Meredith,” says Horton to Jack, as the uproar
gradually subsides.
Sure enough, they are close at hand, having come down expressly to
see the end of the match, and are given good seats on one of the few
benches supplied for such celebrities. Several of the masters have been
watching the contest since the beginning, but the presence of the head
of the school is evidently a new incentive to every player to good
work, if any were still needed.
Johnson is the third man at the bat. Prendergast calls one ball on
the kid, and Johnson swipes the next. It somehow or other gets past
Goldthwaite, and before Hamlen can field it to Maitland the striker is
safe at first. It is now the turn for Rogers to howl, which it does
with a vengeance,――“R-O-G-E-R S! Roger-r-rs!”
Ferguson is to strike now. He is third base and one of Rogers’ heaviest
sluggers. Hackett goes down behind first to coach Johnson and tell him
when to try to steal second.
“One strike!”
“One ball!”
“Two balls!”
Johnson, meanwhile, is bobbing up and down hesitating whether to run or
not. The kid, just as he looks ready to pitch the fourth, turns and
makes the gesture of hurling to first.
“Look out!” bawls Hackett, and Johnson rushes back to the base and
plumps one foot on it.
There is no need for so much exertion, as it happens, for Rainsford’s
throw is make-believe. He has only pretended to fling the ball.
Whereupon he turns and pitches rapidly.
“Go!” holloas Hackett, excitedly. “Go-o!”
“Three balls!” cries the umpire.
Johnson is scooting for second at the top of his speed. Although the
pitch was a trifle wild, the padded gloves are in the right place,
and Chalmers slams it to Goldthwaite, who claps it on to Johnson, and
holds up his hand claiming an out. But Prendergast, who has run forward
nearly to the pitcher’s box in order to see distinctly, shakes his head
and waves Johnson to hold his base, amid deafening cheers from the
Rogerines, and groans from the Fullhamites.
Let me say right here, boys, that the trick of “downing” umpires is
cowardly, and smacks of the blackguard. Be careful, to begin with,
whom you select to act; but when your choice is made, be men enough
to keep your temper and accept his decisions without kicking. It has
come to be the fashion among the great crowds that attend base-ball
matches over the country, to abuse umpires in language worthy only of
Billingsgate, and even to threaten them with personal violence. It is a
mean and contemptible method of bullying a man in a position where he
is powerless to defend himself, and at a time when he needs to have all
his faculties bent on the game, and no gentleman will take part in it.
Johnson holds his base, and the kid prepares to pitch again.
“Four balls!”
Rainsford must be getting nervous.
“Five balls!”
This will never do.
“Two strikes!”
Ah, there! Now or never!
“Six balls! Take your base.”
Ferguson trots leisurely to first, and his place at the diamond is
filled by Plympton, the centre field, who hits the first ball for
a clean single between short and second, letting in Johnson, and
advancing Ferguson a base. The score is tied, and the hubbub is very
disheartening to the backers of Fullham.
“Looks sort of sick for our side,” Jack hears some one say to Carlisle,
who is squatting not far from him.
“Game’s young yet,” is the cheery answer.
It is Bedloe’s turn now. He advances confidently, and in imitation of
Plympton’s example lifts the first ball and drives it to left field,
where Jackson gets under it, and――sad to chronicle――drops it. Ferguson
comes in, of course, and Plympton too, although he should have been
out; but Chalmers fails to hold Goldthwaite’s swift throw from second.
Five runs to three! Those muffs were very costly.
Bobby Crosby hits an easy grounder to Haseltine, which the little
fellow picks up neatly and throws to first. Maitland holds it, and the
Rogerines are out at last.
Jackson is at the bat first. He hits hard, anxious, doubtless, to atone
for his error; but Hackett is on deck at second and fields beautifully
to Ramsay. There is a flutter of anticipation as “Goldy” steps to
the front. Like several of his opponents he swipes at the first ball
pitched. “Hurrah! Look――look――is it a home run?” Everybody is on his
feet following the ball to left field. Bobby Crosby, there’s your
chance. Gently now, or it will be over your head. It is going faster
than it seems. Oh, well caught, well caught, youngster, and well
judged, too, which is more than half the battle! Right over your left
shoulder and on the full run, too! O-U-T! Everybody is cheering, for
even Fullham can afford to applaud a play like that, and the Doctor,
shouting as loud as any one, waves his hat and cries, “Well caught,
Crosby!” Hard luck, Goldthwaite. It was a good crack, but not quite
elastic enough. Who’s the next victim?
It is Ogden, who pops up a fly which falls into Bedloe’s hand, snug as
a bug, and the side is out.
“Confound it!” says Horton, a sentiment which Jack echoes at heart.
Ramsay begins the eighth with a single to right field. Pousland goes
out on a foul tip once more. Hackett takes a base on balls. Johnson
hits to Jackson at left, who does not muff this time. Ferguson, the
slugger, swipes hard and misses.
“One strike!”
“Two strikes!”
Ramsay is on third and Hackett on second, so that if Ferguson can make
a safe hit there is a good chance for two more runs.
“F-E-R-G-U-S-O-N! Ferguson-n-n!”
The kid examines the ball and puts down his head to pitch. The slugger
does not move.
“Three strikes!” cries the umpire. “Out!”
This is better, and revives somewhat the drooping courage of Fullham.
Carlisle proposes three cheers for the kid, which are given with great
enthusiasm.
“Now, Maitland,” says Chalmers.
Charley Maitland waits for two called balls and one strike before he
gets the one he is hoping for. Then he hits with all his might a driver
to the inner centre field, where there is no one to catch it, and takes
his first. The kid, who receives another round of applause as he steps
to the plate, knocks one to Johnson at short, who lets it by him this
time.
There are two on bases, Merriman. A good deal depends on you. Pshaw!
straight into Ramsay’s hands. Run, Rainsford; run, if you do not wish
to be cut off at second. Safe! but only just in time. If Ramsay had not
waited so long you were a sure out. The Rogerines are taking a turn at
muffing. Next striker.
It is our friend Haseltine. He glances across at Jack as he goes in.
“One strike!” calls Prendergast, though Haseltine has not moved.
“Don’t get flustered; take your time, youngster,” says Chalmers kindly.
“One ball!”
This gives the ex-Rising Sun hero courage. Charley Maitland and the kid
are edging off their bases ready to proceed the instant the ball leaves
the bat.
All of a sudden there is a terrific roar, and every one starts up
again, craning forward to see the third base line.
“Run!” bellows Chalmers to Haseltine, who cuts away for first. But
before he reaches it, the umpire, who has shaded his eyes with his hand
so as to make no mistake, cries “Fair ball!” and on Haseltine dashes to
second and again to third. Here Chalmers stops him with an emphatic
“Hold your base!” Meanwhile, Maitland and the kid have come home.
The score is tied again, and the uproar is prodigious. Panting but
thoroughly happy, Haseltine waits at third, and Captain Chalmers takes
his turn at the bat.
We are viewing the game through Jack’s eyes, to whom every safe
hit and every good bit of fielding seems marvelous; but though the
standard of play may be higher among some of you older boys, there
can be no denying the absorbing interest inspired at Utopia by these
yearly contests for supremacy between the respective dormitories,
second only to the occasional contests with nines from other schools.
The thrill felt by Jack as Chalmers takes his position to strike is
shared by every one of the two hundred boys and their masters present.
For by this time there is scarcely a soul in the school who is not a
spectator. Even Horace Hosmer is squatting at the further end of the
field beyond the possible reach of the ball, and Jack can see him clap
his big hands in honor of Haseltine’s three bagger.
But Chalmers is at the bat.
“One ball!”
Haseltine evidently has it in mind to try to steal home, for if
Chalmers does not get his first the side will be out; but “Goldy,” who
has taken the captain’s place as coach, cautions him with “Steady now,”
and “Bide your time, youngster,” not to stray too far from the base.
“One strike!”
Pousland, the catcher, hurls to third to intimidate Haseltine, who
dodges back in time to get his foot on the bag before Ferguson can
touch him.
“Two balls!”
Well done, Chalmers! Another shout, this time louder and more
star-striking than any yet evoked, bursts forth from the Fullhamite
ranks. There is ample reason for it, too. Both Bobby Crosby and
Plympton are in full career after the ball, which is bounding beyond
them at a fearful pace. They make superhuman efforts to overtake it,
and Bobby returns it magnificently, but to no purpose, for Chalmers
has made a clean round of the bases and is safely home. As for
Haseltine, he has trotted in comfortably and is sharing with the
captain hand-shaking and back-slapping from a score of palms. He knows
that the score is now seven to five, and that he has wiped out his
early errors. His happiness, already complete, is made ecstatic by the
congratulations of the Doctor, who comes up to him just as he is on
the point of going over to Jack and says, “You’re beginning bravely,
Haseltine; if you go on at this rate you will be in training for the
school nine before long.”
“The school nine!” Could there be a more enviable compliment to a new
boy on his first day at Utopia? He sees Mrs. Meredith smile at him from
her seat and clap her hands. He touches his cap in sheepish fashion,
and with cheeks aflame is glad to get down beside Jack and, riding his
bat, watch Hamlen strike.
“Ah!”
This time the cry of triumph is premature. The ball goes afield
grandly, but Billy Douglas is under it before it falls, and Hamlen
makes the third out.
The Rogerines are rather quiet. They have only this inning in which to
win the game. But the nine is not going to give in without making a
hard fight for it, you may be certain. Two runs will tie and three put
them ahead. Not so very many to get, if fortune favors them and they
can work in a batting streak.
Plympton is the first on the list of strikers. He is a determined-looking
fellow, with a bull-dog sort of jaw.
“One strike!” cries the umpire.
The Fullhamites shout, but the batsman, whatever his feelings, never
winks an eye. He is dangerously cool.
Whack! One can hear the sound all over the field. The bat is split as
completely as ever oak was riven by the lightning. But now Rogers has a
right to shout. Another home run just in the same place as Chalmers’,
and just as perfect. The din is deafening, and the prospects for a
tenth inning look very favorable.
“One more in the same spot will tie them,” exclaims Hackett, as Bedloe
nods at the kid to show he is ready.
“One ball.”
“Two balls.”
“One strike.”
“Three balls.”
“Four balls.”
“Five balls.”
“Six balls; take your base.”
Rogers howls once more. Bedloe has a level head, and knows enough to
play a waiting game. Perhaps he has reasoned that the kid is young, and
may lose his head in a tight place. It looks a little like it, now; if
he does, there are sluggers enough on the nine to knock him out of the
box.
It is Crosby’s turn next to have a hack at him.
“One ball.”
He hits the second. It is a scorcher to short stop, which strikes one
of Merriman’s feet and bounds into the air. Merriman looks in one
direction and the ball comes down in the other. Before he can collect
himself Bedloe is safe at second and Crosby at first.
Now, Harry Ramsay, captain of the school nine, is your chance. A
rattler from you like that you struck yesterday, ought to win the game.
One could hear a pin drop, it is so still. The excitement is almost
painful.
“One ball,” calls Prendergast.
“One strike.”
“Ah-h-h!”
That cry is because Bedloe has stolen third and Crosby second.
Chalmers, a little bewildered it may be, has hesitated until too late
which to throw to.
Ramsay has hit the third ball. What a paste! Where is it? Where has it
gone? He is tearing to first. Great heavens! what is the matter? Is the
game over? Everybody on the Fullham side is dancing and screaming and
waving like mad. The crowd is mixing with the players, and Crosby and
Bedloe and Harry Ramsay are coming in from the bases with a shamefaced
air.
“What is it? I don’t understand,” asks Jack of Horton, who is shouting
loud enough to burst a blood-vessel. Jack knows that Haseltine has
stopped the ball and done something big, but it was all so quick, he
cannot quite make out what.
“A triple play――all three out,” Horton answers.
“H-A-S-E-L-T-I-N-E――Haselti-n-n-n-e!”
A moment later Jack understands it all. The ball from Ramsay’s bat had
gone straight into Haseltine’s hands, and though it had almost knocked
the little fellow over, he had managed to hold it, to step on to third
before Bedloe, who had started for home, realized the situation, and
then, keeping his wits still about him, put it in to Goldthwaite, at
second, with all his might, just in time to cut off Bobby Crosby, who
was between the bases. Three out――side out at one fell swoop. Bull
luck, as the Rogerines said, in speaking of the game afterwards.
It was luck, of course, that the ball went just where it did, making
such a combination possible; but many an opportunity in life, no less
favorable than Haseltine’s, is lost every day by the inability of man
or boy to avail himself of it. The ex-third base of the Rising Suns was
equal to his emergency when it came; though, between ourselves, it was
always a wonder to him that the ball had stuck in his hands. He had
caught it before he knew it.
So the dormitory match was over, and Fullham champion for another year,
by the close score of seven to six. It was a proud moment for Haseltine
when Harry Ramsay, the great school captain, went out of his way to
shake him by the hand and tell him that he was sure to make a strong
player in a year or two. He received quite an ovation, and made the
acquaintance on the spot of most of his own dormitory, and many from
Rogers and Dudley. Jack stood by thoroughly satisfied with his friend’s
success and proud to be the bearer of his jacket. Really, to rejoice at
another’s triumphs is quite as sterling a trait of character as to bear
modestly one’s own.
As the two boys were returning to their dormitory in company with
several others, they were overtaken by Carlisle, who, after a few words
of congratulation on Haseltine’s play, brought a host of fears, which
the excitement of the afternoon had banished, back to the minds of both
of them by observing in a low tone,――
“I’m sorry to say Jack Spratt and his Wife will be all the more down on
you after this. They are Rogerines, and it’s the cockiest thing a new
boy has done for a dog’s age.”
This was very depressing, and took the edge decidedly off the happy
frame of mind in which they would fain have remained. The game had
consumed most of the afternoon. There was an hour and a half of
recitation remaining before supper, the practice at Utopia being to
have recitations from nine until half-past twelve, and from half-past
four until six, during all but the last two months of the school
year, in order to let the boys have the best hours of sunshine on the
playground. In another week the rule was to change, and study would
follow dinner, as the afternoons were growing long and favorable for
sport.
When supper was done there was singing twice a week, and this was
one of the evenings. All the school gathered informally in the big
schoolroom, where, sitting round anyhow and anywhere, masters and
boys mingled together, chatted, and listened to songs supervised by
the singing-master, Mr. French, but entirely spontaneous. After the
singing was over, there was a short lee-way before bedtime, and every
one was left to his own devices. Most of the boys went back to their
dormitories, but the sixth class had the run of Mrs. Meredith’s parlor
during half an hour, where there were quiet games and puzzles of
various kinds to amuse them.
In returning to Fullham from this last-named entertainment, it was
necessary, of course, to traverse the quadrangle. When Jack and
Haseltine were about fifty yards from Granger, proceeding without
suspicions, they became suddenly aware of several figures in masks
and long cloaks, looming up ahead. At the same moment their feet were
tripped up from behind, a rope quickly and strenuously twisted around
their bodies, and a large hand compressed upon each of their mouths.
They had no time to cry out. After a few frantic, futile efforts to get
free, Jack ceased to struggle, and permitted himself to be bound by his
captors, whom he assumed with a sinking heart to be no other than the
notorious Spratt and Wife. A bandage had been fastened over his eyes
almost immediately, and, helpless as a dead man, he was borne along in
silence for a considerable distance, as it seemed to him, at a slow jog
trot. Presently the procession stopped, confronted by some obstacle,
and Jack was able to distinguish the voice of Carlisle remonstrating
with his persecutors. He heard him say distinctly, “They are good
fellows, both of them, I assure you; let them off this time.”
“They’re too beastly cocky,” was the reply, in a shrill, hyena-like
tone.
“That’s so,” broke in another with a no less bloodthirsty modulation,
whom Jack judged to be Wifey. “I vote we smash every bone in their
bodies.”
“On to the torture chamber,” continued the first speaker, a sentiment
which was received with an approving Ah-h-h! by the others present.
“I’ve done all I could to save them,” observed Carlisle, with a gloomy
sigh of resignation.
Jack, who had been laid upon the ground during this interlude, now
felt himself being carried up a flight of winding stairs and along a
corridor, to an apartment where, after some whispering on the part
of those about him, he perceived that he was being lowered into a
narrow box. This, it suddenly occurred to him, was a coffin. A fear
which brought the perspiration out in cold patches seized him. At its
height the cover was pressed down, and he was left to his own gloomy
reflections, which included the expectation of stifling. But though the
space was contracted and the air hot, he experienced no real difficulty
in drawing breath.
Here he lay for what seemed an eternity, listening to the preparations
which were evidently going on around him. He could hear the hum of
conversation and occasionally a smothered laugh, but the voices
had all the shrill, fiendish pitch of those which had replied to
Carlisle’s protestations. What were they going to do with him? Was he
dead already, and was this his funeral? He stirred one of his legs a
little and pinched himself to make sure that he was alive. Yes, he was
still in the flesh. The torture, then, was yet to come. Well, whatever
happened, he would die bravely. Not a groan, not a cry for mercy, would
he utter. He would be game to the last, and his tormentors should not
have the satisfaction of seeing him funk while they were breaking his
bones. A tear did come to his eye as he thought of his mother, and how
she would miss him; but he braced his nerves as he felt it trickling,
unwilling to be guilty of weakness, even under the shelter of the
coffin-lid.
At this moment he was lifted, box and all, and placed on what might be
a table. Immediately the cover was raised, and in spite of his bandage
the fact that the room was lighted became apparent to him, while a low
chorus of groans suggestive of animals eager to slake their thirst in
human blood vibrated on his imaginative and frenzied hearing. Then
there was a hush preliminary to the dreadful remark which proceeded
from the foot of the coffin, “Are the irons red-hot?”
“They are, your Mightiness.”
“Let the neophyte’s arm be bared.”
Jack, though ignorant as to the meaning of the word neophyte, did not
doubt for an instant that he was referred to. He was seized straightway
on either side and raised to a sitting posture. The rope was unbound
from his right arm and those in charge of him were about to roll up the
sleeve of his jacket, when the voice of his Mightiness enjoined,――
“Let the left be seared instead of the right, for in case the neophyte
chance to survive the operation he will thus not be disabled in his
base-ball arm. It is fitting that mercy should temper justice.”
This piece of executive clemency was scarcely reassuring to poor Jack,
for the reason that there was evidently occasion to believe that he
would not outlive the torture about to be inflicted on him. He gritted
his teeth to avoid trembling, and tried to show no signs of fear, while
the assistants bared his forearm well up to the elbow. Just when they
had completed their task there came a loud knock at the door, and
whoever went to answer it announced, after a moment’s delay, with a
chuckle of exultation, “The other neophyte is dead.”
A savage yell of pleasure followed this announcement, which was a
dagger, as it were, in the bosom of our hero. Haseltine dead! He had
been tortured, doubtless, in another chamber and had not been able to
endure the agony.
But there was no time for reflection. A powerful wrist had grasped his
arm and was holding it out at full length. Then something which felt
like a glowing coal was pressed down on it with force and imbedded
in his flesh. Jack knew that it was the red-hot iron. The pain was
terrible and he was tempted to cry out, but by biting his lips he
managed to restrain himself. Somehow or other the suffering did not
increase after the first few moments, and as he was wondering at
the circumstance he was astounded to hear, “Let me go! let me go!”
uttered in a voice of agony close at hand. The conviction that it was
Haseltine’s voice eclipsed the consciousness of pain, and in another
instant his arm was let go, the bandage snatched from his eyes, and
Jack found himself in a blaze of light, surrounded by a host of
laughing countenances which greeted him with a roar of laughter.
At first he was completely dazed and unable to credit his senses; then,
as he gradually took in the situation, he perceived that he was sitting
upright in an old shoe box lined with a shawl and supported by a table.
Not more than a yard away sat Haseltine in a similar predicament,
with his left sleeve rolled up, and looking extremely sheepish. On a
throne――an arm-chair surmounting a pile, the component parts of which
were concealed by a table-cloth――was perched Jack Spratt, wearing a
paper crown, bearing a cricket bat as a sceptre, and sharing royalty
with Wifey at his side in female attire, intended to simulate a queen,
but suggesting to practiced eyes a gown borrowed for this occasion only
from Mrs. Betty Martin. A row of Apollinaris bottles, in each of which
was a lighted candle, blazed along the edge of the dais, at either wing
of which stood a score of schoolboys shaking with merriment at the
appearance of the two unfortunates.
Jack’s first reflection was one of self-congratulation that he had not
cried out. Then it occurred to him to glance at his arm, a proceeding
which was the cause of another burst of laughter. To his surprise,
there was no mark of any sort beyond a slight redness which was
scarcely noticeable. But his skin looked somewhat wet, as though water
had been brought in contact with it.
After a moment, his Mightiness, having induced silence by a wave of his
sceptre, exclaimed with great seriousness, “The chief executioner will
read the indictment against the neophytes.”
Whereupon, to Jack’s intense surprise, that functionary stepped forward
in the person of Louis Carlisle, fantastically attired in a black
Oxford gown and carrying a meat chopper as the symbol of his office.
Having bowed to their majesties, he gravely drew forth a manuscript and
addressed the two bewildered lads as follows:――
“Know all men by these presents, that you, John Hall, of Boston,
Massachusetts, and you, Frank Haseltine, of St. Louis, Missouri, are
greener than the grass when it flourisheth in the early days of summer,
fresher than paint just after it is spread on the door of a mansion,
more guileless than the kid which gambols in the pasture beside its
female parent. You have been sent here with your mouths wide open and
ready to swallow anything that is stuffed into them. Such innocence
is praiseworthy in the extremely youthful, but a time comes in the
experience of us all when it is meet to be undeceived even at the
expense of dire mortification.
“Learn of me and be wise. Firstly and foremostly, you have been made
sport of――victimized――fooled, or, to speak more succinctly, sold. You
have been made egregious asses of, and led to believe that you were
to be the victims of physical violence, to have your bones broken,
your heads punched, and what not. You expected to be hazed and we did
not like to disappoint you; hence the midnight seizure, the rope, the
bandage, the coffin, the red-hot iron, the branding. You have been
taught to tremble at the blood-curdling names of Jack Spratt and Wifey.
Behold them in the flesh and bow before them! You came here stuffed
with old women’s yarns, and Horace Hosmer has loaded you up to the
muzzle with a fresh supply. Poor little lambkins!”
As Carlisle paused in his sarcastic peroration the audience broke into
another shout of laughter, which caused Jack to blush vividly. He
appreciated now for the first moment that he had been the victim of a
huge practical joke.
“Secondly,” continued the orator, with a wave of his hand, “let whoever
will search the universe from one end to the other, and I defy him
to produce two more thoroughly mild and amiable specimens of the
genus _homo_ than Tobey and Donaldson, who have been made to figure
as monsters of cruelty for your edification. In justice to them,
neophytes, I bid you approach them. Exhume yourselves, so to speak,
and go up to examine them. You will perceive that they are perfectly
harmless, and even unusually good-natured fellows. You may touch them
without fear that one of your bones will be dislocated. Approach,
neophytes, they are prepared to embrace you.”
Again everybody laughed, while Jack and Haseltine looked at one
another, at a loss, not unnaturally, to know whether the order to leave
their coffins was to be taken seriously. But this uncertainty was
solved when his Mightiness reiterated, at the same time removing his
crown and assuming an exaggerated expression of meekness, “Approach,
neophytes, we are prepared to embrace you.”
In a shamefaced manner, but doing their best to enjoy the laugh against
themselves, which now made the room ring, the two boys clambered down
from their boxes and walked toward the throne. Its grinning occupants
sat for a moment enjoying the confusion evinced by the poor lads before
them, then Jack Spratt put out his hand and said,――
“Shake, neophytes. My bark is worse than my bite.”
“Me, too,” piped Donaldson, in semblance to a female falsetto, which
elicited a roar.
“Thirdly and lastly,” exclaimed Carlisle, after Jack and Haseltine had
finished this hand-shaking and been relegated to their coffins, on the
edge of which they were permitted to sit,――“thirdly and lastly,” he
repeated, “there is a moral to all this, without which our efforts in
your behalf might be misunderstood, and that is, don’t be too English.
You boys――for I address you no longer as neophytes, but as Utopia
boys――must get out of your heads that an American school is just like
an English one, for it isn’t. You’ve come with the idea that we have
fagging and hazing and all that sort of thing, but it’s a mistake.
There isn’t a fag at Utopia, and if a big boy wants anything done he
has to do it himself. Every tub stands on its own bottom here, and a
sixth-class boy is just as good as a first. No running errands――no
cleaning out studies――no cuffing! That may be English; but it isn’t
American, is it, fellows?”
“Not much,” answered several voices.
“We’re all equals here. There may be a bully or two,――I don’t say there
is,――but there may be in any school. There’s no system of bullying,
though, and no boy thinks he has the right to order others round. If he
tried it on he’d soon find out his mistake.”
“That’s so.”
“And now, fellows,” continued Carlisle, whose satirical tone had
changed to a pleasant seriousness, “I tell Hall and Haseltine, in
all our names, that we’re glad to have them at Utopia; and some day
they’ll bring credit on the school, for they are both plucky boys. Hall
didn’t whimper once to-night; he was game from the word ‘go’; and we
Fullhamites haven’t forgotten that triple play of Haseltine’s, and we
shan’t for a good while to come.”
Whereupon the chief executioner, having divested himself of his robe
of office, emphasized the plaudits of the roomful of boys by coming
forward in easy, smiling fashion to grasp the two victims of his
oratory by the hand, in which example he was being followed by every
one, when a knock at the door introduced Mr. Sawyer, the dormitory
master, who had come to ascertain the cause of the merriment. He stood
on the threshold looking round the small study――it was Carlisle’s
own――packed with boys, quite unable, it was evident, to explain the
signification of the boxes, blacking-bottles, and various paraphernalia
of royalty which met his sight. Some of the participants seemed rather
disconcerted by his appearance, but there was a general disposition to
laugh, and one boy exclaimed,――
“You ought to have heard Carlisle, Mr. Sawyer; he was really as good as
Dr. Meredith.”
This necessitated an unfolding of the whole affair, which was listened
to somewhat dubiously until it appeared to the master’s satisfaction
that no real harm had been done, and that the moral deduced to justify
the high jinks was not without its value. Mr. Sawyer was fain to laugh
himself at the villainous traits ascribed to Spratt and his Wife, and
took occasion to clinch the lesson imparted by saying, as he patted
Jack on the head by way of sympathy for his discomfiture,――
“So you expected to be a fag, did you, my little man? We have nothing
of that sort here, you may take my word for it. Come,” he added, “it is
time for prayers and bed.”
While they were undressing, half an hour later, Haseltine whispered to
Homer, “What was it they put on my arm which stung so?”
“A lump of ice, you loony.”