THE ETERNAL BOY
[Illustration: "'Nothing but a "suveneer," gents, nothing guaranteed'"
(Page 123)]
THE ETERNAL BOY
BEING THE STORY
OF
THE PRODIGIOUS HICKEY
[Illustration]
BY
OWEN JOHNSON
AUTHOR OF "MAX FARGUS," ETC.
NEW YORK
DODD, MEAD & COMPANY
1909
COPYRIGHT, 1908, BY
THE CENTURY CO.
COPYRIGHT, 1907, 1908, 1909, BY
THE CURTIS PUBLISHING COMPANY
COPYRIGHT, 1909, BY
DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY
PUBLISHED, JANUARY, 1909
CONTENTS
PAGE
The Awakening of Hickey 3
The Great Pancake Record 25
The Run That Turned the Game 55
The Future President 81
Further Persecution of Hickey 104
Making Friends 128
The Hero of an Hour 167
The Protest Against Sinkers 194
Beauty's Sister 209
The Great Big Man 241
The Political Education of Mr. Baldwin 271
The Martyrdom of William Hicks 321
ILLUSTRATIONS
"'Nothing but a "suveneer," gents, nothing
guaranteed.'" (p. 123) _Frontispiece_
FACING PAGE
"Hickey it was ... who ... organised
the midnight feasts." 12
"'I'll stop when it's time,' said Smeed; 'bring
'em on now, one at a time.'" 50
"A stinging hand descended upon the crouching Piggy." 62
"All day long he walked with drawn sword." 98
"Then he lost track of the rounds." 160
"'I don't know--I'm full of gravel!'" 178
"Trousers that were limp and discouraged,
grew smooth." 224
"'Get off my feet! ... A fine lady you are!'" 230
"'He hadn't any proof,' he said, brokenly, 'no
proof--damn him!'" 330
THE ETERNAL BOY
[Illustration: title decoration]
THE AWAKENING OF HICKEY
"'He forged a thunderbolt and hurled it at what? At the proudest blood
in Europe, the Spaniard, and sent him home conquered; at the most
warlike blood in Europe, the French'"....
Shrimp Davis, on the platform, piped forth the familiar periods of
Phillips's oration on Toussaint L'Ouverture, while the Third Form in
declamation, disposed to sleep, stirred fitfully on one another's
shoulders, resenting the adolescent squeak that rendered perfect rest
impossible. Pa Dater followed from the last bench, marking the position
of the heels, the adjustment of the gesture to the phrase, and the
rise and fall of the voice with patient enthusiasm, undismayed by the
memory of the thousand Toussaints who had passed, or the certainty of
the thousands who were to come.
"I would call him Napoleon, but Napoleon made his way to empire over
broken oaths and through a sea of BLOOD," shrieked the diminutive
orator with a sudden crescendo as a spitball, artfully thrown, sung by
his nose.
At this sudden shrill notice of approaching manhood, Hickey, in the
front row, roused himself with a jerk, put both fists in his eyes and
glanced with indignant reproach at the embattled disturber of his
privileges. Rest now being impossible, he decided to revenge himself
by putting forth a series of faces as a sort of running illustration
to the swelling cadences. Shrimp Davis struggled manfully to keep his
eyes from the antics of his tormentor. He accosted the ceiling, he
looked sadly on the floor. He gazed east and west profoundly, through
the open windows, seeking forgetfulness in the distant vistas. All
to no purpose. Turn where he might the mocking face of Hickey danced
after him. At the height of his eloquence Shrimp choked, clutched at
his mouth, exploded into laughter and tumbled ingloriously to his seat
amid the delighted shrieks of the class.
Pa Dater, surprised and puzzled, rose with solemnity and examined the
benches for the cause of the outbreak. Then taking up a position on the
platform, from which he could command each face, he scanned the roll
thoughtfully and announced, "William Orville Hicks."
Utterly unprepared and off his guard, Hickey drew up slowly to his
feet. Then a flash of inspiration came to him.
"Please, Mr. Dater," he said with simulated regret, "I chose the same
piece."
Delighted, he settled down, confident that the fortunate coincidence
would at least postpone his appearance.
"Indeed," said Mr. Dater with a merciless smile, "isn't that
extraordinary! Well, Hicks, try and lend it a new charm."
Hickey hesitated with a calculating glance at the already snickering
class. Then forced to carry through the bravado, he climbed over
the legs of his seat-mates and up to the platform, made Mr. Dater a
deep bow, and gave the class a quick bob of his head, accompanied
by a confidential wink from that eye which happened to be out of
the master's scrutiny. He glanced down, shook the wrinkles from his
trousers, buttoned his coat, shot his cuffs and assumed the recognised
Websterian attitude. Twice he cleared his throat while the class waited
expectantly for the eloquence that did not surge. Next he frowned,
took one step forward and two back, sunk his hands in his trousers and
searched for the missing sentences on the moulding that ran around the
edge of the ceiling.
"Well, Hicks, what's wrong?" said the master with difficult
seriousness. "Haven't learned it?"
"Oh, yes, sir," said Hickey with dignity.
"What's the matter then?"
"Please, sir," said Hickey, with innocent frankness, "I'm afraid I'm a
little embarrassed."
The class guffawed loud and long. The idea of Hickey succumbing to
such an emotion was irresistible. Shrimp Davis sobbed hysterically and
gratefully.
Hickey alone remained solemn, grieved and misunderstood.
"Well, Hicks," continued the master with the ghost of a smile,
"embarrassment is something that you should try to overcome."
At this Turkey Reiter led Shrimp Davis out in agony.
"Very well," said Hickey with an injured look, "I'll try, sir. I'll do
my best. But I don't think the conditions are favourable."
Mr. Dater commanded silence. Hickey bowed again and raised his head
cloaked in seriousness. A titter acclaimed him. He stopped and looked
appealingly at the master.
"Go on, Hicks, go on," said Mr. Dater. "Do your best. At least, let us
hear the words."
Another inspiration came to Hickey. "I don't think that this is quite
regular, sir," he said aggressively. "I have always taken an interest
in my work, and I don't see why I should be made to sacrifice a good
mark."
Mr. Dater bit his lips and quieted the storm with two upraised fingers.
"Nevertheless, Hicks," he said, "I think we shall allow you to
continue."
"What!" exclaimed Hickey as though loath to credit his ears. Then
adding calm to dignity, he said, "Very well, sir,--not prepared!"
With the limp of a martyr, he turned his back on Mr. Dater, and
returned to his seat, where he sat in injured dignity, disdaining to
notice the grimaces of his companions.
Class over, the master summoned Hicks, and bent his brows, boring him
with a look of inquisitorial accusation.
"Hicks," he said, spacing his words, "I have felt, for the last two
weeks, a certain lack of discipline here. Just a word to the wise,
Hicks, just a word to _the wise_!"
Hickey was pained. Where was the evidence to warrant such a flat
accusation? He had been arraigned on suspicion, that was all,
absolutely on mere haphazard suspicion. And this was justice?
Moreover, Hickey's sensitive nature was shocked. He had always looked
upon Pa Dater as an antagonist for whose sense of fair play he would
have answered as for his own. And now to be accused thus with innuendo
and veiled menace--then he could have faith in no master, not one in
the whole faculty! And this grieved Hickey mightily as he went moodily
along the halls.
Now, the code of a schoolboy's ethics is a marvellously fashioned
thing--and by that each master stands or falls. To be accused of
an offence of which he is innocent means nothing, for it simply
demonstrates the lower calibre of the master's intelligence. But to
be suspected and accused on mere suspicion of something which he has
just committed,--that is unpardonable, and in absolute violation of the
laws of warfare, which decree that the struggle shall be one of wits,
without recourse to the methods of the inquisition.
Hickey, disillusionised and shocked, went glumly down the brownstone
steps of Memorial and slowly about the green circle, resisting the
shouted invitations to tarry under the nourishing apple trees.
He felt in him an imperative need to strike back, to instantly break
some rule of the tyranny that encompassed him. With this heroic
intention he walked nonchalantly up the main street to the jigger-shop,
which no underformer may enter until after four. As he approached the
forbidden haunt, suddenly the figure of Mr. Lorenzo Blackstone Tapping,
the young assistant housemaster at the Dickinson, more popularly known
as "Tabby," rolled up on a bicycle.
"Humph, Hicks!" said at once Mr. Tapping with a suspicious glance at
the jigger-shop directly opposite, "how do you happen to be here out of
hours?"
"Please, sir," said Hickey glibly, "I've got a nail that's sticking
into my foot. I was just going to Bill Orum's to get it fixed."
"Humph!" Mr. Tapping gave him a searching look, hesitated and mounting
his wheel continued, unconvinced.
"He looked back," said Hickey wrathfully, peering through the misty
windows of the cobbler's shop. Then smarting at the injury, he added,
"He didn't believe me--the sneak!"
It was a second reminder of the tyranny he lived under. He waited a
moment, found the coast clear and flashed across to the jigger-shop.
Half drugstore, half confectioner's, the jigger-shop was the property
of Doctor Furnell, whose chief interest in life consisted in a
devotion to the theory of the millennium, to the lengthy expounding of
which an impoverished boy would sometimes listen in the vain hope of
establishing a larger credit. On every-day occasions the shop was under
the charge of "Al," a creature without heart or pity, who knew the
exact financial status of each of the four hundred odd boys, even to
the amount and date of his allowance. Al made no errors, his sympathies
were deaf to the call, and he never (like the doctor), committed the
mistake of returning too much change.
Al welcomed him with a grunt, carefully closing the little glass doors
that protected the tray of éclairs and fruit cake, and leaning back
drawled:
"What's the matter, Hickey? You look kind of discouraged."
"Give me a coffee jigger, with a chocolate syrup and a dash of whipped
cream--stick a meringue in it," said Hickey. Then as Al remained
passively expectant, he drew out a coin, saying, "Oh, I've got the
money!"
He ate gloomily and in silence, refusing to be drawn into conversation.
Something was wrong in the scheme of things. Twice in the same hour
he had been regarded with suspicion and an accusing glance,--his
simplest explanation discountenanced! Up to this time, he had been like
a hundred other growing boys, loving mischief for mischief's sake,
entering into a lark with no more definite purpose than the zest of an
adventure. Of course he regarded a master as the Natural Enemy, but he
had viewed him with the tolerance of an agile monkey for a wolf who
does not climb. Now slowly it began to dawn upon him that there was an
ethical side.
He vanished suddenly behind the counter as Mr. Tapping, returning, made
directly for the jigger-shop. Hickey, at the end of the long counter,
crouching amid stationery, heard him moving suspiciously toward his
hiding place. Quickly he flicked a pencil down behind the counter and
vanished through the back entrance as Tapping, falling into the trap,
sprang in the direction of the noise.
The adventure served two purposes: it gave Hickey the measure of the
enemy, and it revealed to him where first to strike.
II
The President of the Dickinson by virtue of the necessary authority
to suppress all insubordination was Turkey Reiter, broad of shoulder,
speckled and battling of face, but the spirit of the Dickinson was
Hickey. Hickey it was, lank of figure and keen of feature, bustling of
gait and drawling of speech, with face as innocent as a choir-boy's,
who planned the revolts against the masters, organised the midnight
feasts and the painting of water-towers. His genius lived in the
nicknames of the Egghead, Beauty Sawtelle, Morning Glory, Red Dog, Wash
Simmons and the Coffee Cooler, which he had bestowed on his comrades
with unfailing felicity.
[Illustration: "Hickey it was ... who ... organised the midnight
feasts"]
Great was Hickey, and Macnooder was his prophet. Doc Macnooder roomed
just across the hall. He was a sort of genius of all trades. He played
quarter on the eleven and ran the half mile close to the two-minute
mark. He was the mainstay of Banjo, Mandolin and Glee Clubs. He played
the organ in chapel and had composed the famous Hamill House March in
memory of his requested departure from that abode. He organised the
school dramatic club. He was secretary and treasurer of his class and
of every organisation to which he belonged. He received a commission
from a dozen firms to sell to his likenesses, stationery, athletic
goods, choice sets of books, fin de siecle neckties, fancy waistcoats,
fountain pens and safety razors, all of which articles, if report is
to be credited, he sold with ease and eloquence at ten per cent. above
the retail price. His room was a combination of a sorcerer's den and
junk-shop. At one corner a row of shelves held a villainous array of
ill-smelling black, green and blue bottles, with which he was prepared
to instantly cure anything from lockjaw to snake bite.
The full measure of Macnooder's activities was never known. Turkey
Reiter had even surprised him drawing up a will for Bill Orum, the
cobbler, to whom he had just sold a cure for rheumatism.
It was to Macnooder that Hickey opened his heart and his need of
vengeance. It cannot be said that the ethical side of the struggle
appealed to Macnooder, who had small predilection for philosophy and
none at all for the moral sciences, but the love of mischief was
strong. The encounter with Tapping in the morning had suggested a
victim near at hand and conveniently inexperienced.
Mr. Tapping in advance of young Mr. Baldwin (of whom it shall be
related) had arrived at Lawrenceville the previous year with latter-day
theories on the education of boys. As luck would have it, Mr. Rogers,
the housemaster, would be absent that evening at a little dinner of old
classmates in Princeton, leaving the entire conduct of the Dickinson in
the hands of his assistant. In passing, it must be noted that between
the two masters there was little sympathy. Mr. Rogers had lived too
long in the lair of the boy to be at all impressed with the new ideas
on education that Mr. Tapping and later Mr. Baldwin advocated in the
blissful state of their ignorance.
At three o'clock, Tapping departed to convey to a class of impatient
boys, decked out in athletic costumes with base-balls stuffed in their
pockets and tennis rackets waiting at their sides, the interesting
shades of distinction in that exciting study, Greek prose composition.
Then Hickey gleefully, while Macnooder guarded the stairs, entered the
study, and with a screw-driver loosened the screw which held the inner
door-knob, to the extent that it could later be easily removed with the
fingers.
At half past seven o'clock, when study hour had begun, Hickey entered
the sanctum ostensibly for advice on a perplexing problem in advanced
algebra.
Mr. Tapping did not like Hickey. He regarded him with suspicion, with
an instinctive recognition of an enemy. Also he was engaged in the
difficult expression of a certain letter which, at that time, presented
more difficulties than the binomial theorem. So he inquired with short
cordiality, concealing the written page under a blotter:
"Well, Hicks, what is it?"
"Please, Mr. Tapping," said Hickey, who had perceived the move with
malignant delight, "I wish you'd look at this problem,--it won't work
out." He added (shades of a thousand boys!), "I think there must be
some mistake in the book."
Now, the chief miseries of a young assistant master centre about the
study hours; when theory demands that he should be ready to advise and
instruct the discouraged boyish mind on any subject figuring in the
curriculum, whatever be his preference or his prejudice. Mr. Tapping,
who romped over the Greek and Latin page, had an hereditary weakness in
the mathematics, a failing that the boys had discovered and instantly
turned to their profit. He took the book, glanced at the problem and
began to jot down a line of figures. Hickey, meanwhile, with his back
to the door, brazenly extracted the loosened screw.
Finally, Mr. Tapping, becoming hopelessly entangled, raised his head
and said with a disdainful smile: "Hicks, I think you had better put a
little work on this--just a little work!"
"Mr. Tapping, I don't understand it," said Hickey, adding to himself,
"Old Tabby is up a tree!"
"Nonsense--perfectly easy, perfectly simple," said Tapping, returning
the book with a gesture of dismissal, "requires a little application,
Hicks, just a little application--that's all."
Hickey, putting on his most injured look, bowed to injustice and
departed at the moment that Turkey Reiter entered, seeking assistance
in French. Upon his tracks, without an interval, succeeded Macnooder
with a German composition, Hungry Smeed to discuss history, the
Egghead on a question of spelling, and Beauty Sawtelle in thirst for
information about the Middle Ages. Finally, Mr. Tapping's patience,
according to Macnooder's prophetic calculation, burst on a question of
biblical interpretation, and announcing wrathfully that he could no
longer be disturbed, he ushered out the last tormentor and shut the
door with violence.
Presently Hickey stole up on tiptoe and fastening a noose over the
knob, gave a signal. The string, pulled by a dozen equally responsible
hands, carried away the knob, which fell with a tiny crash and spun
in crazy circles on the floor. The fall of the inner useless knob was
heard on the inside of the door and the exclamation that burst from the
startled master. The tyrant was caged,--the house was at their pleasure!
Mr. Tapping committed the initial mistake of knocking twice imperiously
on the door and commanding, "Open at once."
Two knocks answered him. Then he struck three violent blows and three
violent echoes returned, while a bunch of wriggling, chuckling boys
clustered at every crack of the door, listening with strained ears for
the muffled roars that came from within.
While one group began a game of leap-frog, another, under the guidance
of Hickey, descended into the housemaster's quarters and proceeded to
attend to the rearrangement of the various rooms. Working beaver-like
with whispered cautions, they rapidly exchanged the furniture of the
parlour with the dining-room, grouping each transformed room, exactly
as the original had been.
Then they placed the six-foot water-cooler directly in front of the
entrance with a tin pan balanced, to give the alarm, and shaking with
silent expectant laughter extinguished all lights, undressed and
returned to the corridors, white, shadowy forms, to wait developments.
Meanwhile, the caged assistant master continued to pound upon the door
with a fury that betokened a state of approaching hysteria.
At half past ten, suddenly the tin pan crashed horribly on the floor.
A second later every boy was sleeping loudly in his bed. Astonished at
such a reception, Mr. Rogers groped into the darkness and fell against
the water-cooler, which in his excitement he embraced and carried over
with him to the floor. Recovering himself, he lighted the gas and
perceived the transformed parlour and dining-room. Then he started
for the assistant housemaster's rooms, with long, angry bounds, saying
incoherent, expressive things to himself.
The ordeal that young Mr. Tapping faced, from his superior, one hour
later when the door had been opened, was distinctly unpleasant, and was
not made the more agreeable from the fact that every rebuke resounded
through the house, and carried joy and comfort to the listening boys.
The housemaster would hear no explanation; in fact, explanations were
about the last thing he wanted. He desired to express his disgust, his
indignation and his rage, and he did so magnificently.
"May I say one word, sir?" said Mr. Tapping in a lull.
"Quite unnecessary, Mr. Tapping," cut in the still angry master; "I
don't wish any explanations. Such a thing as this has never happened in
the history of this institution. That's all I wish to know. You forget
that you are not left in charge of a young ladies' seminary."
"Very well, sir," said the mortified Mr. Tapping. "May I ask what you
intend to do about this act of insubordination?"
"That is what I intend to ask _you_, sir," replied his superior.
"Good-night."
The next day after luncheon, Mr. Tapping summoned the house to his
study and addressed them as follows:
"Young gentlemen of the Dickinson House, I don't think you have any
doubt as to why I have called you here. A very serious breach of
discipline has taken place--one that cannot be overlooked. The sooner
we meet the situation in the right spirit, gravely, with seriousness,
the sooner will we meet each other in that spirit of harmony and
friendly understanding that should exist between pupil and master. I am
willing to make some allowance for the spirit of mischief, but none for
an exhibition of untruthfulness. I warn you that I know, that I _know_
who were the ringleaders in last night's outrage." Here he stopped and
glanced in succession at each individual boy. Then suddenly turning, he
said:
"Hicks, were you concerned in this?"
"Mr. Tapping," said Hickey, with the air of a martyr, "I refuse to
answer."
"On what ground?"
"On the ground that I will not furnish any clue whatsoever."
"I shall deal with your case later."
"Very well, sir."
"Macnooder," continued Mr. Tapping, "what do you know about this?"
"I refuse to answer, sir."
At each demand, the same refusal.
Tapping, repulsed in his first attempt, hesitated and reflected. Above
all things he did not wish to perpetuate last night's humiliation,
and to continue the combat meant an accusation _en bloc_ against the
Dickinson House before the head master.
"Hicks, Macnooder and Reiter, wait here," he said suddenly; "the rest
may go."
He walked up and down before the three a moment, and then said:
"Reiter, you may go; you, too, Macnooder."
Hickey, thus deprived of all support, remained defiant.
"May I ask," he said indignantly, "why I am picked out?"
"Hicks," said Mr. Tapping sternly, without replying to the question, "I
know pretty well who was the ringleader in this, and other things that
have been going on in the past. I warn you, my boy, I shall keep my eye
on you from this time forth. That's all I want to say to you. Look out
for yourself!"
Hickey could hardly restrain the tears. He went out with deadly wrath
boiling in his heart. The idea of singling him out from the whole house
in that way! So then every hand was against him; he had no security; he
was marked for suspicion, his downfall determined upon!
For one brief moment his spirit, the spirit of indomitable, battling
boyhood, failed him, and he felt the grey impossibility of contending
against tyrants. But only a moment, and then with a return of the old
fighting spirit he suddenly conceived the idea of single-handedly
defying the whole organised hereditary and intrenched tyranny that
sought to crush him, of matching his wits against the hydra despotism,
perhaps, going down gloriously like Spartacus, for the cause, but
leaving behind a name that should roll down the generations of future
boys.
[Illustration: chapter title decoration]
THE GREAT PANCAKE RECORD
Little Smeed stood apart, in the obscure shelter of the station,
waiting to take his place on the stage which would carry him to the
great new boarding-school. He was frail and undersized, with a long,
pointed nose and vacant eyes that stupidly assisted the wide mouth to
make up a famished face. The scarred bag in his hand hung from one
clasp, the premature trousers were at half-mast, while pink polka-dots
blazed from the cuffs of his nervous sleeves.
By the wheels of the stage "Fire Crackers" Glendenning and "Jock"
Hasbrouck, veterans of the Kennedy House, sporting the 'varsity
initials on their sweaters and caps, were busily engaged in
cross-examining the new boys who clambered timidly to their places on
top. Presently, Fire Crackers, perceiving Smeed, hailed him.
"Hello, over there--what's your name?"
"Smeed, sir."
"Smeed what?"
"Johnnie Smeed."
The questioner looked him over with disfavour and said aggressively:
"You're not for the Kennedy?"
"No, sir."
"What house?"
"The Dickinson, sir."
"The Dickinson, eh? That's a good one," said Fire Crackers, with a
laugh, and, turning to his companion, he added, "Say, Jock, won't
Hickey and the old Turkey be wild when they get this one?"
Little Smeed, uncomprehending of the judgment that had been passed,
stowed his bag inside and clambered up to a place on the top. Jimmy,
at the reins, gave a warning shout. The horses, stirred by the whip,
churned obediently through the sideways of Trenton.
Lounging on the stage were half a dozen newcomers, six well-assorted
types, from the well-groomed stripling of the city to the aggressive,
big-limbed animal from the West, all profoundly under the sway of the
two old boys who sat on the box with Jimmy and rattled on with quiet
superiority. The coach left the outskirts of the city and rolled into
the white highway that leads to Lawrenceville. The known world departed
for Smeed. He gazed fearfully ahead, waiting the first glimpse of the
new continent.
Suddenly Fire Crackers turned and, scanning the embarrassed group,
singled out the strong Westerner with an approving glance.
"You're for the Kennedy?"
The boy, stirring uneasily, blurted out:
"Yes, sir."
"What's your name?"
"Tom Walsh."
"How old are you?"
"Eighteen."
"What do you weigh?"
"One hundred and seventy."
"Stripped?"
"What? Oh, no, sir--regular way."
"You've played a good deal of football?"
"Yes, sir."
Hasbrouck took up the questioning with a critical appreciation.
"What position?"
"Guard and tackle."
"You know Bill Stevens?"
"Yes, sir."
"He spoke about you; said you played on the Military Academy. You'll
try for the 'varsity?"
"I guess so."
Hasbrouck turned to Fire Crackers in solemn conclave.
"He ought to stand up against Turkey if he knows anything about the
game. If we get a good end we ought to give that Dickinson crowd the
fight of their lives."
"There's a fellow came from Montclair they say is pretty good," Fire
Crackers said, with solicitous gravity. "The line'll be all right if we
can get some good halves. That's where the Dickinson has it on us."
Smeed listened in awe to the two statesmen studying out the chances
of the Kennedy eleven for the house championship, realising suddenly
that there were new and sacred purposes about his new life of which he
had no conception. Then, absorbed by the fantasy of the trip and the
strange unfolding world into which he was jogging, he forgot the lords
of the Kennedy, forgot his fellows in ignorance, forgot that he didn't
play football and was only a stripling, forgot everything but the
fascination of the moment when the great school would rise out of the
distance and fix itself indelibly in his memory.
"There's the water-tower," said Jimmy, extending the whip; "you'll see
the school from the top of the hill."
Little Smeed craned forward with a sudden thumping of his heart. In the
distance, a mile away, a cluster of brick and tile sprang out of the
green, like a herd of red deer surprised in the forest. Groups of boys
began to show on the roadside. Strange greetings were flung back and
forth.
"Hello-oo, Fire Crackers!"
"How-de-do, Saphead!"
"Oh, there, Jock Hasbrouck!"
"Oh, you Morning Glory!"
"Oh, you Kennedys, we're going to lick you!"
"Yes you are, Dickinson!"
The coach passed down the shaded vault of the village street, turned
into the campus, passed the ivy-clad house of the head master and
rolled around a circle of well-trimmed lawn, past the long, low Upper
House where the Fourth Form gazed at them in senior superiority; past
the great brown masses of Memorial Hall and the pointed chapel, around
to where the houses were ranged in red, extended bodies. Little Smeed
felt an abject sinking of the heart at this sudden exposure to the
thousand eyes fastened upon him from the wide esplanade of the Upper,
from the steps of Memorial, from house, windows and stoops, from the
shade of apple trees and the glistening road.
All at once the stage stopped and Jimmy cried:
"Dickinson!"
At one end of the red-brick building, overrun with cool vines, a group
of boys were lolling in flannels and light jerseys. A chorus went up.
"Hello, Fire Crackers!"
"Hello, Jock!"
"Hello, you Hickey boy!"
"Hello, Turkey; see what we've brought you!"
Smeed dropped to the ground amid a sudden hush.
"Fare," said Jimmy aggressively.
Smeed dug into his pocket and tendered the necessary coin. The coach
squeaked away, while from the top Fire Crackers' exulting voice
returned in insolent exultation:
"Hard luck, Dickinson! Hard luck, you, old Hickey!"
Little Smeed, his hat askew, his collar rolled up, his bag at his
feet, stood in the road, alone in the world, miserable and thoroughly
frightened. One path led to the silent, hostile group on the steps,
another went in safety to the master's entrance. He picked up his bag
hastily.
"Hello, you--over there!"
Smeed understood it was a command. He turned submissively and
approached with embarrassed steps. Face to face with these superior
beings, tanned and muscular, stretched in Olympian attitudes, he
realised all at once the hopelessness of his ever daring to associate
with such demi-gods. Still he stood, shifting from foot to foot,
eyeing the steps, waiting for the solemn ordeal of examination and
classification to be over.
"Well, Hungry--what's your name?"
Smeed comprehended that the future was decided, and that to the grave
he would go down as "Hungry" Smeed. With a sigh of relief he answered:
"Smeed--John Smeed."
"Sir!"
"Sir."
"How old?"
"Fifteen."
"Sir!!"
"Sir."
"What do you weigh?"
"One hundred and six--sir!"
A grim silence succeeded this depressing information. Then some one in
the back, as a mere matter of form, asked:
"Never played football?"
"No, sir."
"Baseball?"
"No, sir."
"Anything on the track?"
"No, sir."
"Sing?"
"No, sir," said Smeed, humbly.
"Do anything at all?"
Little Smeed glanced at the eaves where the swallows were swaying and
then down at the soft couch of green at his feet and answered faintly:
"No, sir--I'm afraid not."
Another silence came, then some one said, in a voice of deepest
conviction:
"A dead loss!"
Smeed went sadly into the house.
At the door he lingered long enough to hear the chorus burst out:
"A fine football team we'll have!"
"It's a put-up job!"
"They don't want us to win the championship again--that's it!"
"I say, we ought to kick."
Then, after a little, the same deep voice:
"A dead loss!"
* * * * *
With each succeeding week Hungry Smeed comprehended more fully the
enormity of his offence in doing nothing and weighing one hundred
and six pounds. He saw the new boys arrive, pass through the fire of
christening, give respectable weights and go forth to the gridiron
to be whipped into shape by Turkey and the Butcher, who played on the
school eleven. Smeed humbly and thankfully went down each afternoon to
the practice, carrying the sweaters and shin-guards, like the grateful
little beast of burden that he was. He watched his juniors, Spider and
Red Dog, rolling in the mud or flung gloriously under an avalanche
of bodies; but then, they weighed over one hundred and thirty, while
he was still at one hundred and six--a dead loss! The fever of house
loyalty invaded him; he even came to look with resentment on the
Faculty and to repeat secretly to himself that they never would have
unloaded him on the Dickinson if they hadn't been willing to stoop to
any methods to prevent the House again securing the championship.
The fact that the Dickinson, in an extraordinary manner, finally won by
the closest of margins, consoled Smeed but a little while. There were
no more sweaters to carry, or pails of barley water to fetch, or guard
to be mounted on the old rail-fence, to make certain that the spies
from the Davis and Kennedy did not surprise the secret plays which
Hickey and Slugger Jones had craftily evolved.
With the long winter months he felt more keenly his obscurity and the
hopelessness of ever leaving a mark on the great desert of school life
that would bring honour to the Dickinson. He resented even the lack of
the mild hazing the other boys received--he was too insignificant to be
so honoured. He was only a "dead loss," good for nothing but to squeeze
through his recitations, to sleep enormously, and to eat like a glutton
with a hunger that could never be satisfied, little suspecting the
future that lay in this famine of his stomach.
For it was written in the inscrutable fates that Hungry Smeed should
leave a name that would go down imperishably to decades of schoolboys,
when Dibbles' touchdown against Princeton and Kafer's home run should
be only tinkling sounds. So it happened, and the agent of this divine
destiny was Hickey.
It so happened that examinations being still in the threatening
distance, Hickey's fertile brain was unoccupied with methods of
facilitating his scholarly progress by homely inventions that allowed
formulas and dates to be concealed in the palm and disappear obligingly
up the sleeve on the approach of the Natural Enemy. Moreover, Hickey
and Hickey's friends were in straitened circumstances, with all credit
gone at the jigger-shop, and the appetite for jiggers in an acute stage
of deprivation.
In this keenly sensitive, famished state of his imagination, Hickey
suddenly became aware of a fact fraught with possibilities. Hungry
Smeed had an appetite distinguished and remarkable even in that company
of aching voids.
No sooner had this pregnant idea become his property than Hickey
confided his hopes to Doc Macnooder, his chum and partner in plans
that were dark and mysterious. Macnooder saw in a flash the glorious
and lucrative possibilities. A very short series of tests sufficed
to convince the twain that in little Smeed they had a phenomenon who
needed only to be properly developed to pass into history.
Accordingly, on a certain muddy morning in March, Hickey and Doc
Macnooder, with Smeed in tow, stole into the jigger-shop at an hour in
defiance of regulations and fraught with delightful risks of detection.
Al, the watch-dog of the jigger, was tilted back, near a farther
window, the parted tow hair falling doglike over his eyes, absorbed in
the reading of Spenser's Faerie Queen, an abnormal taste which made him
absolutely incomprehensible to the boyish mind. At the sound of the
stolen entrance, Al put down the volume and started mechanically to
rise. Then, recognising his visitors, he returned to his chair, saying
wearily:
"Nothing doing, Hickey."
"Guess again," said Hickey, cheerily. "We're not asking you to hang us
up this time, Al."
"You haven't got any money," said Al, the recorder of allowances; "not
unless you stole it."
"Al, we don't come to take your hard-earned money, but to do you good,"
put in Macnooder impudently. "We're bringing you a little sporting
proposition."
"Have you come to pay up that account of yours?" said Al. "If not, run
along, you Macnooder; don't waste my time, with your wildcat schemes."
"Al, this is a sporting proposition," took up Hickey.
"Has _he_ any money?" said Al, who suddenly remembered that Smeed was
not yet under suspicion.
"See here, Al," said Macnooder, "we'll back Smeed to eat the jiggers
against you--for the crowd!"
"Where's your money?"
"Here," said Hickey; "this goes up if we lose." He produced a gold
watch of Smeed's, and was about to tender it when he withdrew it with
a sudden caution. "On the condition, if we win I get it back and you
won't hold it up against my account."
"All right. Let's see it."
The watch was given to Al, who looked it over, grunted in approval, and
then looked at little Smeed.
"Now, Al," said Macnooder softly, "give us a gambling chance; he's only
a runt."
Al considered, and Al was wise. The proposition came often and he had
never lost. A jigger is unlike any other ice cream; it is dipped from
the creamy tin by a cone-shaped scoop called a jigger, which gives it
an unusual and peculiar flavour. Since those days the original jigger
has been contaminated and made ridiculous by offensive alliances with
upstart syrups, meringues and macaroons with absurd titles; but then
the boy went to the simple jigger as the sturdy Roman went to the cold
waters of the Tiber. A double jigger fills a large soda-glass when ten
cents has been laid on the counter, and two such glasses quench all
desire in the normal appetite.
"If he can eat twelve double jiggers," Al said slowly, "I'll set them
up and the jiggers for youse. Otherwise, I'll hold the watch."
At this there was a protest from the backers of the champion, with the
result that the limit was reduced to ten.
"Is it a go?" Al said, turning to Smeed, who had waited modestly in the
background.
"Sure," he answered, with calm certainty.
"You've got nerve, you have," said Al, with a scornful smile, scooping
up the first jiggers and shoving the glass to him. "Ten doubles is the
record in these parts, young fellow!"
Then little Smeed, methodically, and without apparent pain, ate the ten
doubles.
* * * * *
Conover's was not in the catalogue that anxious parents study, but then
catalogues are like epitaphs in a cemetery. Next to the jigger-shop,
Conover's was quite the most important institution in the school. In a
little white Colonial cottage, Conover, veteran of the late war, and
Mrs. Conover, still in active service, supplied pancakes and maple
syrup on a cash basis, two dollars credit to second-year boys in good
repute. Conover's, too, had its traditions. Twenty-six pancakes, large
and thick, in one continuous sitting, was the record, five years old,
standing to the credit of Guzzler Wilkins, which succeeding classes had
attacked in vain. Wily Conover, to stimulate such profitable tests, had
solemnly pledged himself to the delivery of free pancakes to all comers
during that day on which any boy, at one continuous sitting, unaided,
should succeed in swallowing the awful number of thirty-two. Conover
was not considered a prodigal.
This deed of heroic accomplishment and public benefaction was the
true goal of Hickey's planning. The test of the jigger-shop was but a
preliminary trying out. With medical caution, Doc Macnooder refused to
permit Smeed to go beyond the ten doubles, holding very wisely that the
jigger record could wait for a further day. The amazed Al was sworn to
secrecy.
It was Wednesday, and the following Saturday was decided upon for the
supreme test at Conover's. Smeed at once was subjected to a graduated
system of starvation. Thursday he was hungry, but Friday he was so
ravenous that a watch was instituted on all his movements.
The next morning the Dickinson House, let into the secret, accompanied
Smeed to Conover's. If there was even a possibility of free pancakes,
the House intended to be satisfied before the deluge broke.
Great was the astonishment at Conover's at the arrival of the
procession.
"Mr. Conover," said Hickey, in the quality of manager, "we're going
after that pancake record."
"Mr. Wilkins' record?" said Conover, seeking vainly the champion in the
crowd.
"No--after that record of _yours_," answered Hickey. "Thirty-two
pancakes--we're here to get free pancakes to-day--that's what we're
here for."
"So, boys, so," said Conover, smiling pleasantly; "and you want to
begin now?"
"Right off the bat."
"Well, where is he?"
Little Smeed, famished to the point of tears, was thrust forward.
Conover, who was expecting something on the lines of a buffalo, smiled
confidently.
"So, boys, so," he said, leading the way with alacrity. "I guess we're
ready, too."
"Thirty-two pancakes, Conover--and we get 'em free!"
"That's right," answered Conover, secure in his knowledge of boyish
capacity. "If that little boy there can eat thirty-two I'll make
them all day free to the school. That's what I said, and what I say
goes--and that's what I say now."
Hickey and Doc Macnooder whispered the last instructions in Smeed's ear.
"Cut out the syrup."
"Loosen your belt."
"Eat slowly."
In a low room, with the white rafters impending over his head, beside a
basement window flanked with geraniums, little Smeed sat down to battle
for the honour of the Dickinson and the record of the school. Directly
under his eyes, carved on the wooden table, a name challenged him,
standing out of the numerous initials--Guzzler Wilkins.
"I'll keep count," said Hickey. "Macnooder and Turkey, watch the
pancakes."
"Regulation size, Conover," cried that cautious Red Dog; "no doubling
now. All fair and above-board."
"All right, Hickey, all right," said Conover, leering wickedly from the
door; "if that little grasshopper can do it, you get the cakes."
"Now, Hungry," said Turkey, clapping Smeed on the shoulder. "Here is
where you get your chance. Remember, Kid, old sport, it's for the
Dickinson."
Smeed heard in ecstasy; it was just the way Turkey talked to the eleven
on the eve of a match. He nodded his head with a grim little shake and
smiled nervously at the thirty-odd Dickinsonians who formed around him
a pit of expectant and hungry boyhood from the floor to the ceiling.
"All ready!" sang out Turkey, from the doorway.
"Six pancakes!"
"Six it is," replied Hickey, chalking up a monster 6 on the slate that
swung from the rafters. The pancakes placed before the ravenous Smeed
vanished like snow-flakes on a July lawn.
A cheer went up, mingled with cries of caution.
"Not so fast."
"Take your time."
"Don't let them be too hot."
"Not too hot, Hickey!"
Macnooder was instructed to watch carefully over the temperature as
well as the dimensions.
"Ready again," came the cry.
"Ready--how many?"
"Six more."
"Six it is," said Hickey, adding a second figure to the score. "Six and
six are twelve."
The second batch went the way of the first.
"Why, that boy is starving," said Conover, opening his eyes.
"Sure he is," said Hickey. "He's eating 'way back in last week--he
hasn't had a thing for ten days."
"Six more," cried Macnooder.
"Six it is," answered Hickey. "Six and twelve is eighteen."
"Eat them one at a time, Hungry."
"No, let him alone."
"He knows best."
"Not too fast, Hungry, not too fast."
"Eighteen for Hungry, eighteen. Hurrah!"
"Thirty-two is a long ways to go," said Conover, gazing apprehensively
at the little David who had come so impudently into his domain;
"fourteen pancakes is an awful lot."
"Shut up, Conover."
"No trying to influence him there."
"Don't listen to him, Hungry."
"He's only trying to get you nervous."
"Fourteen more, Hungry--fourteen more."
"Ready again," sang out Macnooder.
"Ready here."
"Three pancakes."
"Three it is," responded Hickey. "Eighteen and three is twenty-one."
But a storm of protest arose.
"Here, that's not fair!"
"I say, Hickey, don't let them do that."
"I say, Hickey, it's twice as hard that way."
"Oh, go on."
"Sure it is."
"Of course it is."
"Don't you know that you can't drink a glass of beer if you take it
with a teaspoon?"
"That's right, Red Dog's right! Six at a time."
"Six at a time!"
A hurried consultation was now held and the reasoning approved.
Macnooder was charged with the responsibility of seeing to the number
as well as the temperature and dimensions.
Meanwhile Smeed had eaten the pancakes.
"Coming again!"
"All ready here."
"Six pancakes!"
"Six," said Hickey; "twenty-one and six is twenty-seven."
"That'll beat Guzzler Wilkins."
"So it will."
"Five more makes thirty-two."
"Easy, Hungry, easy."
"Hungry's done it; he's done it."
"Twenty-seven and the record!"
"Hurrah!"
At this point Smeed looked about anxiously.
"It's pretty dry," he said, speaking for the first time.
Instantly there was a panic. Smeed was reaching his limit--a groan went
up.
"Oh, Hungry."
"Only five more."
"Give him some water."
"Water, you loon; do you want to end him?"
"Why?"
"Water'll swell up the pancakes, crazy."
"No water, no water."
Hickey approached his man with anxiety.
"What is it, Hungry? Anything wrong?" he said tenderly.
"No, only it's a little dry," said Smeed, unmoved. "I'm all right, but
I'd like just a drop of syrup now."
The syrup was discussed, approved and voted.
"You're sure you're all right," said Hickey.
"Oh, yes."
Conover, in the last ditch, said carefully:
"I don't want no fits around here."
A cry of protest greeted him.
"Well, son, that boy can't stand much more. That's just like the
Guzzler. He was taken short and we had to work over him for an hour."
"Conover, shut up!"
"Conover, you're beaten."
"Conover, that's an old game."
"Get out."
"Shut up."
"Fair play."
"Fair play! Fair play!"
A new interruption came from the kitchen. Macnooder claimed that Mrs.
Conover was doubling the size of the cakes. The dish was brought. There
was no doubt about it. The cakes were swollen. Pandemonium broke loose.
Conover capitulated, the cakes were rejected.
"Don't be feazed by that," said Hickey, warningly to Smeed.
"I'm not," said Smeed.
"All ready," came Macnooder's cry.
"Ready here."
"Six pancakes!"
"Regulation size?"
"Regulation."
"Six it is," said Hickey, at the slate. "Six and twenty-seven is
thirty-three."
"Wait a moment," sang out the Butcher. "He has only to eat thirty-two."
"That's so--take one off."
"Give him five, Hickey--five only."
"If Hungry says he can eat six," said Hickey, firmly, glancing at his
protégé, "he can. We're out for big things. Can you do it, Hungry?"
And Smeed, fired with the heroism of the moment, answered in disdainful
simplicity:
"Sure!"
A cheer that brought two Davis House boys running in greeted the
disappearance of the thirty-third. Then everything was forgotten in the
amazement of the deed.
"Please, I'd like to go on," said Smeed.
"Oh, Hungry, can you do it?"
"Really?"
"You're goin' on?"
"Holy cats!"
"How'll you take them?" said Hickey, anxiously.
"I'll try another six," said Smeed, thoughtfully, "and then we'll see."
Conover, vanquished and convinced, no longer sought to intimidate him
with horrid suggestions.
"Mr. Smeed," he said, giving him his hand in admiration, "you go ahead;
you make a great record."
"Six more," cried Macnooder.
"Six it is," said Hickey, in an awed voice; "six and thirty-three makes
thirty-nine!"
Mrs. Conover and Macnooder, no longer antagonists, came in from the
kitchen to watch the great spectacle. Little Smeed alone, calm and
unconscious, with the light of a great ambition on his forehead, ate
steadily, without vacillation.
"Gee, what a stride!"
"By Jiminy, where does he put it?" said Conover, staring helplessly.
"Holy cats!"
"Thirty-nine--thirty-nine pancakes--gee!!!"
"Hungry," said Hickey, entreatingly, "do you think you could eat
another--make it an even forty?"
"Three more," said Smeed, pounding the table with a new authority. This
time no voice rose in remonstrance. The clouds had rolled away. They
were in the presence of a master.
"Pancakes coming."
"Bring them in!"
"Three more."
"Three it is," said Hickey, faintly. "Thirty-nine and three makes
forty-two--forty-two. Gee!"
In profound silence the three pancakes passed regularly from the plate
down the throat of little Smeed. Forty-two pancakes!
"Three more," said Smeed.
Doc Macnooder rushed in hysterically.
"Hungry, go the limit--the limit! If anything happens I'll bleed you."
"Shut up, Doc!"
"Get out, you wild man."
Macnooder was sent ignominiously back into the kitchen, with the curses
of the Dickinson, and Smeed assured of their unfaltering protection.
"Three more," came the cry from the chastened Macnooder.
"Three it is," said Hickey. "Forty-two and three makes--forty-five."
[Illustration: "'I'll stop when it's time,' said Smeed; 'bring 'em on
now, one at a time.'"]
"Holy cats!"
Still little Smeed, without appreciable abatement of hunger, continued
to eat. A sense of impending calamity and alarm began to spread.
Forty-five pancakes, and still eating! It might turn into a tragedy.