COUNTER CURRENTS IN THE “GYM”
“How are you coming on with your farce, Dick?” asked Mr. Holwell, the
next evening, as he stepped in at the Y. M. C. A. building to see how
the boys were coming on, and also to fulfill several errands.
“Oh! I seem to be forging right ahead, sir,” laughed Dick, “though I
find it a pretty hard proposition to get up the songs and choruses. I
don’t believe I could have tackled the job only for your permission
to get such assistance in the song part that we could from any of our
young companions.”
“Yes, you told me before that one of the girls had been helping you
there,” remarked the minister, who was showing a very deep interest in
all of the boys belonging to the new department of the association. “I
have given the same permission to all who intend to compete. But it is
expressly understood that the words of the songs and choruses, as well
as everything save the musical score, must be entirely original with
the ones who submit their farces to the committee, or else they will
be thrown out.”
“Sometimes I am almost tempted to tear mine up,” admitted Dick,
frankly; “because it reads silly to me; but my folks at home seem to
like it, and my chum Leslie says it is fine. But then, I guess he only
tells me that because he is my chum.”
“Don’t think of tearing it up, my boy,” urged the minister, earnestly.
“Many a famous man has had his hours of doubt, and come near abandoning
the career he had marked out for himself. You are no judge of your own
productions. Older heads must decide on the merits of the compositions.
Promise me that no matter what you think you will finish the farce and
hand it in.”
“Oh! I can promise you that, sir,” replied Dick, flushing with
pleasure, since he felt that Mr. Holwell had a certain amount of
confidence in him.
Shortly afterward the minister left the building, having accomplished
what errands he had in view when entering. It was the one evening in
the week when the juniors were allowed the freedom of the gymnasium,
and a dozen fellows had already donned their “gym” garments, so that
they could have perfect freedom of movement when exercising in their
favorite ways.
Nat and Dit were on hand, for they never missed an opportunity to be
present on “gym” night. Indeed, Dick strongly suspected it was this
very thing that had tempted Nat and his cronies to swallow their pride,
and send that apology to Mr. Holwell.
Being quite an athlete, Nat always took a leading part in the varied
exercises of the gymnasium. He could do many feats that caused some of
the other less muscular and agile boys to envy him very much.
Mr. Holwell, who read boys so well, understood that it was only a
slender hold the association had on such a wild fellow as Nat. He
hoped, however, that by degrees the influences of the new life might
serve to tone the other down, and cause him to change his ways.
After some of the boys had tired themselves out in their exercises
with the parallel bars, the swinging hoops, the lifting weights, and
many other devices calculated to make them stronger in every way, they
clustered around Nat, who was holding forth on the subject of his farce.
“Wait till you hear it,” he was telling them in his exultant and
superior way. “Chances are you’ll double up like a hinge with every
page that’s read. Am I right, Dit?” and as he said this last he turned
on his “shadow,” Dit Hennesy, who, as always, was hovering close by Nat.
“Say, it’s sure a screamer,” asserted the other, vigorously. “Talk
to me about funny business, Nat’s got every minstrel show beat to a
frazzle. He read some of the stuff to me last night, and I’m giving
you the straight thing when I tell you my mother says she heard me
laughing in my sleep ever so many times.”
Nat grinned happily as he looked around. Then his eye fell on Dick,
who he very well knew was also writing a farce so as to enter the
competition for the golden prize.
“I reckon that makes you feel some sore, eh, Dick?” he sneered, as
though delighted at the opportunity to pay back some of the long score
he thought he owed the other. “Course you’re doing your level best; but
shucks! you’re only wasting your time let me tell you. There never was,
and there never will be as funny a farce as I’m goin’ to spring on the
committee. Huh! even makes me laugh myself when I get off a rattlin’
good joke, and hurry to write it down before I forget it.”
To tell the truth, Dick did feel as though he hardly had the ghost of
a chance in the competition, after hearing all this boasting. Not for
worlds, however, would he let that fellow see him look downcast. So he
laughed good-naturedly as he went on to say in reply:
“Oh! well, I’m doing my level best, and that’s all any fellow can do.
If the committee turns down my effort, all right. I’ll take my medicine
without whimpering. I believe the best original farce ought to win, and
that’s all there is to it.”
Nat looked keenly at him as though he wondered whether Dick could have
any hidden meaning back of his words.
“Well, you see,” he continued, “I’m one of the kind of fellows always
on the lookout for a chance to get off a crackin’ good joke on people.
That helps me a heap in doin’ my writin’. Right now I’ve been thinking
up a little scheme to give old Limpy Peters, the shoemaker, the scare
of his life.”
“How’s that, Nat?” asked Dit Hennesy, as he invariably did when the
other showed signs of having conjured up some scheme that promised to
give them the selfish enjoyment felt by the boy who was stoning the
frogs.
“I’ll tell you,” chuckled Nat, who seemed to be feeling particularly
jolly on this occasion. “You know Limpy Peters lost his wife some
years ago. He always goes to the graveyard on nights when there’s a
full moon, and sits there a long time like a silly old fool. Well, I’m
thinking what fun it’d be to hide near that place and start to groaning
when he comes. Say, just try to picture that cripple makin’ tracks for
the gate, will you? It’d be enough to make a mummy grin to see him
tumblin’ all over himself.”
Dit, of course, laughed as though he thought it a good idea. Several
other boys being thoughtless, also chuckled, as they mentally pictured
the poor cobbler stumbling and falling in his fright and mad desire to
escape.
Others, however, frowned on the foolish scheme, and could be heard
muttering the word “shame.” Nat stiffened up, and his cheeks flamed
with anger. He looked at Dick, as though believing that he had been
loudest in his condemnation.
“Seems you don’t like my little joke any too well, hey, Dick Horner?”
he demanded, with a scowl. “Well, mebbe you can originate a better one
yourself.”
“I don’t understand what it’s got to do with getting up a farce, and
I’d like you to explain that part to me,” Dick told him, calmly.
“Oh!” exclaimed the other, with a scornful laugh, “that shows that
you don’t appreciate the glorious possibilities a situation like
that offers a real author of farces. I’m deep in it right now, and
the conversation that is carried on between the poor scared chap in
the graveyard and the supposed ghost would make you split your sides
laughing, just to hear it.”
“Why,” spoke up the dutiful Dit, “I wanted him to read it to me, but he
just wouldn’t. He said it’d make me so weak with laughin’ I never could
walk home. Say, if it’s any better than what I did hear it sure must be
a corker.”
“But why frighten poor Limpy Peters when you’re getting on so well as
it is?” demanded Dick.
“Huh! shows your ignorance when you say that,” snorted Nat. “When a
dramatist gets up a show he always wants to try it on the dog first,
before it’s played in a big city. So I want to get what they call
_inspiration_ by seeing just how scared Limpy Peters will be when I
groan, and carry on.”
“Shame on you, Nat!” said Leslie Capes, indignantly.
“Yes, and a whole lot of us echo that sentiment,” Dick went on to say.
“Poor old Limpy Peters has suffered terribly in his life. Nearly every
boy in Cliffwood thinks a heap of the old man, and for one I won’t
stand by and hear of his being pestered, as you say, just to give you
‘inspiration.’”
“Huh! you talk pretty big, Dick Horner,” snapped Nat, with one of
his lofty looks. “What’d you do about it if I said I’d carry on as I
pleased?”
Dick faced him with flashing eyes. Somehow he was fully aroused by now,
and meant to give the other a piece of his mind.
“I’ll tell you what I’ll do for one thing!” he exclaimed, “and unless I
miss my guess, there are a lot of other fellows here who feel the same
way. I’ll tell Mr. Holwell about your scheme, and he’ll see to it that
old Peters is warned. Then if you try what you threaten you may get in
a peck of trouble.”
“That’s my way of thinking, too!” asserted Leslie, instantly ranging
alongside of his chum. “We listened to you on Hallowe’en, and came near
getting arrested for entering Mr. Nocker’s house to give him a scare.”
“Better forget about this idea, Nat,” warned Peg Fosdick. “For one I’d
never stand to hear of poor old Peters being scared half to death. I
know what it is to limp myself, and can feel for the lame cobbler.”
“Count me in as being opposed to that sort of cruel joke!” declared
Andy Hale.
“Ditto here!” sang out Clint Babbett. “Time’s gone by when I could get
any real fun out of giving pain to other people.”
“Plenty of other ways to find amusement, so far as I’m concerned, and
so put me down as being with you, Dick, if you feel that you’ve got to
give Nat away to Mr. Holwell,” observed Elmer Jones, positively.
Nat glared around him. To tell the truth every one seemed against him
save his crony Dit Hennesy.
“Oh! well,” he laughed harshly; “seein’ that you’re so timid a bunch,
I’ll call the joke off. Reckon I can finish my little imaginary
conversation between the ghost and the cobbler without tryin’ it on the
dog. And you needn’t say a word to Mr. Holwell about it, Dick; unless
you’re itchin’ to get me put out of the game so you could have a
walk-over.”
Dick felt the sneer, and turned red, but held his ground.
“I’ll promise not to say a word to Mr. Holwell,” he told Nat. “But I
mean to let Limpy know some boys are thinking of playing a practical
joke on him one of these nights, so he can carry a pistol along with
him when he goes to sit by the grave of his wife. That’s all I’ve got
to say about it.”
“Oh! forget it,” sneered Nat. “I don’t take any chances with a
shooting-iron. Limpy needn’t bother, for I won’t molest him.”
The look he gave Dick as he turned away was an ugly one.
“Better watch out more than ever for Nat, Dick,” cautioned Leslie, as
the two of them walked home together that evening. “He’s got it in for
you as sure as anything.”
“Oh! I’m not bothering my head about his ever laying a hand on me,”
declared the other boy, indifferently. “I only wish I could be as sure
that his farce wouldn’t make my effort look silly. From what they say,
Nat must be a rattling good hand at writing that sort of thing. Of
course, I’ll keep on trying my best, but I’m afraid there isn’t much
chance of my winning those twenty-five gold dollars.”