HE'S "THROUGH WITH GIRLS"
Nine o'clock in the morning saw the "Tigers" assembled in front of the
Silvey home. Sid wore his elaborate outfit; Bill, the ragged football
trousers which had done duty in the autumn, and John sported a battered
cap. Other uniforms among them there were not, but the team made a brave
showing, nevertheless, as it trooped lustily toward the corner. No
scampering across the railroad embankment this time for the members. A
baseball game demanded a more ceremonious arrival on the grounds. They
neared the viaduct and Red and Perry Alford began a tattoo on the cement
walk with the baseball bats. The other players broke into that
time-honored refrain,
Hip! Hip!
I had a good job
And I quit.
My name is Sam
And I don't give a--[pause]
Hippetty hippetty, hip!
With the corner and adult ears left behind them, Sid, in a spirit of
bravado, filled in the tabooed expletive and aroused the awed admiration
of his subordinates.
Past the long, low, red art shops they swaggered, keeping perfect time
to the chant as they rounded the corner. John who was a little ahead of
the others, broke into a sharp cry of dismay.
"Look! _Our grounds!_"
The consternation which was on his face spread to theirs. The shaky,
weather-beaten fence by the sidewalk had been torn down before their
arrival. At intervals, load after load of building stone rumbled over
hastily formed paths of heavy planks. Further in, on the field, from the
home-plate northward over the painstakingly levelled earth, harnessed
horses sweated and tugged at the traces as scoop after scoop bit into
the turf and came up filled with dirt to be emptied against the railroad
tracks.
"Flats," gasped Silvey, as they drew nearer. John said nothing, but his
lower lip trembled as the last trace of the beautifully sanded base
lines disappeared under the excavators' devastating hands.
"'Tis a pity," said the kindly Irishman, who noted their approach, "but
it has to be, I guess, kids. Yis, the other team went home, fifteen
minutes ago. Said they didn't guess there'd be a game today."
They stopped in dazed bewilderment to watch the progress of the
foundation work. At last, John, sick at heart, slunk away. He wanted to
be home, away from everyone until he could get control of his feelings.
As he came down the street with his baseball glove dangling aimlessly in
one hand, he stumbled over the Mosher youngster who was intent upon some
childish pursuit in the dust of the gutter.
"Get out of the way," he stormed angrily. To vent his disappointment
upon even so small an offender was a relief. The infant smiled
maliciously.
"Johnny an' Louise, Johnny an' Louise," he chanted, reviving the cry of
the autumn before.
"Well, what about it," demanded John belligerently.
"Louise had a soda with Sid. Saw her, saw her!"
"When?" Had Louise, too, forsaken him in this hour of grief?
"Yesterday. Sidney an' Louise, Sidney an' Louise," came the taunting
revision.
John's face set. All the wrongs which Sid had perpetrated since the
Halloween party--the earlier sodas, the persistence which had culminated
in the theater affair, the baseball election, and his arrogance since
that time--clamored for revenge. He'd get even, he would. He'd go back
and punch Sid's face in, and muss that new suit, and throw his baseball
gloves up on a house roof. Then Mr. Sid would quit monkeying with his
girl.
The appearance of that gentleman around the corner put a stop to his
meditations. John waited until he sauntered unsuspectingly up to him.
"Say, Sid!"
"Yes?" A note in the voice put the captain of the "Tigers" on his guard.
"What's this I hear about Louise?"
"N-nothing."
"Been drinking sodas with her again, have you?"
"Who told you?" Sid made a futile effort to edge past the inquisitor.
"Never mind who. Promise not to do it any more or I'll--" He clenched
one fist and drew it back threateningly.
"Guess I won't," retorted Sid with sudden spirit. "Guess I've got as
much right to drink sodas with her as anybody. Who's going to stop me?"
"I am!"
"You," scornfully.
At this moment, the very cause of the dissension came skipping along
with the inevitable package from the grocery under one arm. Feminine
intuition told her that trouble was lurking in the air, and she would
have passed but John held up a detaining hand.
"Louise, you've been drinking sodas with Sid again."
"Haven't either," in the same breath came the admission, "who told you?"
John gave her a searching glance. "Tell this _guy_," he said with
infinite scorn, "that you won't have anything more to do with him. Tell
him you're my girl, Louise," he added incautiously.
The lady's head went back to a warning angle.
"Go on!" John ordered.
"Guess I won't!" she snapped, angered by his persistence. "Guess I
won't!" she repeated angrily. "'Cause I'm not anybody's girl. So there!"
With nose held regally in the air and knees strangely jointless, she
walked away from the pair.
"Ya-a-a-h," jeered Sid incautiously.
John drove out, full strength, with his right fist upon his adversary's
nose. Sid stepped back in dismay. It wasn't fair, punching without the
preliminary tilt of words and wary skirmishing. Again John set upon him
and he turned, dodged behind a tree, and fled for home. Down the street
they tore at top speed. Inch by inch, the space between the two
diminished as they passed the Alfords, the Harrisons, and finally
arrived at the DuPree iron gate.
"Ma-a-a-a!" yelled Sid, as he struggled with the handle. "Come quick,
come quick."
The gate suddenly yielded. Sid sprang inside, up the front steps, and
into the hallway. There he turned, locked the screen door, and stuck out
his tongue at his adversary.
"Ya-a-a-a!" he taunted.
John contemplated an attack upon the flimsy screening, but a remnant of
wisdom withheld him.
Fletcher,
The Fletcher,
The old fly-catcher!
came the cry from the porch.
"Think you're smart," John glared. "Just dare you to come down here!
Just dare you to!"
"The old fly-catcher" continued. John opened his lips for a reply in
kind.
Sid DuPree
Went out on a spree
And never got back
'Til half-past three.
The hero of the verse was struck suddenly dumb by this display of
poetical ability. Again John repeated his latest composition. He was
beginning to enjoy himself immensely. At the third repetition of the
adventures of Sid, a window creaked noisily up.
"John Fletcher," came the harsh voice from the upper window. "You're a
nasty little boy, and if you don't leave Sidney alone, I'll telephone
your mother."
"Ya-a-a-ah," jeered Sid in an undertone. John looked and longed.
"Go on," urged Mrs. DuPree. "The telephone's right here in the hallway."
He decided that discretion was the better part of valor and crossed over
to his own porch. Once up in his room, he threw himself on the bed, and
as the excitement of the chase wore off began to realize the extent of
the morning's losses.
The athletic field upon which they had labored so long and carefully,
was torn to pieces--gone forever. Worse than that, Louise wasn't his
girl any more. She'd said so herself. No more samples of cookery, no
more confidential little walks to and from school, no more
squirrel-feeding excursions. And the glorious dream of the future was as
completely demolished as the "Tigers' Home Grounds." There could be no
thousand dollars and a home when he reached his majority now.
He lay staring at the pattern in the ceiling paper, sobbing ever so
little now and then, for some minutes, then wrenched himself miserably
over on his side.
There he found that horrid old bank staring him in the face, that same
pig bank which stood a grinning monument to his industry of the past
months. But what good was the paper route now? or where the pleasure in
dropping his weekly income into that long, narrow slot? Louise wasn't
his girl any more. She'd said so, herself.
In a sudden fit of spite, he sprang up and seized the heavy, sneering
bit of pottery in both hands. The next moment, it crashed to the floor
and pennies, nickels, dimes, and even half-dollars rolled out on the
carpet or mingled with the shattered bits of china. He stood astounded
at the number for a moment, then gathered them up on his bed, and took
careful count.
Thirty-eight dollars and fifty-three cents? He could scarcely believe
his eyes.
Then he lay back, not quite so grief-stricken, and stared thoughtfully
into space until Mrs. Fletcher called him for dinner.
[Illustration: _"Thirty-eight dollars and fifty-three cents."_]
At the table, that evening, he was unusually quiet. As he finished his
last slice of bread and butter, he looked up at his father.
"Dad, if a fellow earns a lot of money, all by himself, he can spend it
any way he wants, can't he?"
Mr. Fletcher nodded. "Why, son?"
"I was just wondering. That's all."
A week later, Louise was sitting on the street curbing in front of her
apartment building, when a crimson-clad baseball warrior on a new
bicycle sped over the macadam and came to a sudden halt beside her. She
raised her eyes in astonished recognition. It was her late fiancé.
"'Lo."
"'Lo."
"Like my new wheel?"
"Uhu."
"Bought it out of the money I was saving so's we could get married. Cost
me twenty-one dollars, and it's got puncture-proof tires and a real
coaster brake. Just watch me ride it!"
He sped off, rode free for a moment, threw the brake on and came to a
sudden stop, then cut a figure eight over the paving. The clear spring
sun made miniature rainbows in the shining, rapidly revolving spokes,
and an early robin warbled his approval of the performance from his seat
in a linden's top.
"I can ride without touching the handles, too," he boasted, as he guided
the wheel back to her. "Isn't it peachy?"
She nodded. The long, curving bars bore a suggestion of possible rides
on this beautiful steel-and-rubber creation, if their quarrel could be
healed, and she held out a tentative olive branch.
"Want to play jacks?"
John shook his head. "Going over to the park baseball diamond with the
'Tigers.' We're going to play the 'Jeffersons,' this afternoon."
"But your paper route?"
He laughed joyously. "Sold it to the newspaper man. He gave me three
dollars and twenty-five cents for the customers."
"Oh!" There was a pause.
"Like my baseball suit?" he asked.
She gazed at the flaming horror and nodded enthusiastically.
"You ought to see me run that team!"
"You?" she exclaimed. "Why, I thought Sid was captain."
"He _was_," with zestful emphasis on the verb. "But I bought nine
baseball dollar uniforms and a lot of gloves and two bats, and a real
league ball out of my money, so the kids fired Sid and elected me. He
isn't even on the team any more."
"O-o-oh!" Truly John was becoming an important figure in the juvenile
world.
"And I've got a dollar and thirteen cents left for candy and peanuts,"
he concluded.
Louise studied the confident, freckled face before her, the sparkling
bicycle with its glossy saddle and acetylene lamp, the heavily padded
baseball glove on the nickeled handle bars, and then their owner again.
She took the last remnant of her pride and stamped it under foot in a
wave of regret.
"John," she said, shyly.
"Yes?"
"I won't have anything more to do with Sid."
The captain of the "Tigers" only laughed. "You can go with Sid all you
want, and drink all the sodas he'll pay for. I don't care, because--" he
leaned his weight forward on the pedals and started for the park so
suddenly that she barely caught his parting words, "I'm through with
girls. I'm going to be a bachelor!"