TELEGRAMS
When Will Phelps returned to the college, the entire place to him seemed
to be deserted, and a stillness rested over all that was almost
oppressive. Even the few college boys who were to be seen about the
grounds all shared in the prevailing gloom and increased the sense of
loneliness in the heart of the young freshman. When he entered his room,
the sight of his room-mate's belongings was almost like that of the
possessions of the dead and Will Phelps was utterly miserable and
dejected.
Work he decided was his only cure and at once he busied himself at his
task from which he was aroused in the course of an hour or two by the
coming of the senior who was tutoring him.
"I'm mighty glad to see you," said Will impulsively. "I feel as if I was
about the only one of my kind in the world."
"You're downhearted over deciding to stay in town, to-day?" replied his
tutor pleasantly. "Oh, well, never mind. It will be a good tonic for you
and when you've passed your mid-year's in Greek, you'll never once think
of this trip with the team to-day."
"I'm afraid that's cold comfort just at the present moment. I've just
been hanging on and that's all there is to it."
"Sometimes it's the only thing a fellow can do. It may bring a lot of
other good things with it, though."
"Maybe," replied Will dubiously. "There's one thing I've learned
though, and if I ever come to know my Greek as well as I know that, I'll
pass all right."
"What's that?"
"Never to get behind. I'll keep up and not catch up. When I see what a
fool I made of myself in my 'prep' days, I wonder sometimes that I ever
got into college anyway. I never really worked any except in a part of
the last year."
"You're working now," suggested the senior.
"Yes, I have to. I don't like it though. The descent to Avernus is the
easy trip, if I remember my Virgil correctly. It's the getting back
that's hard."
"Do you know, I never just believed that."
"You didn't? Why not? Why, you can see it every day! It's just as easy
as sliding down hill. It's dragging the sled back up the hill that makes
the trouble."
"That isn't quite a fair illustration. If I'm not mistaken, it seems to
me that somewhere, sometime, some one said that 'The way of the
transgressor is hard.' He didn't seem to agree with Virgil's statement
somehow, did he?"
"But that means it's hard afterward."
"That isn't what it says. I think it means just what it says too."
"I don't see."
"Well, to me it's like this. In every fellow there's a good side and a
bad side. Sort of a Doctor Jekyl and Mr. Hyde in every one of us. I
heard the other day in our laboratory of a man who had taken and grafted
one part of the body of an insect on the body of another. He tried it
both on the chrysalis and on an insect too. I understood that he took
the pupa of a spider and by very careful work grafted upon it the pupa
of a fly. Think of what that monstrosity must have been when it passed
out from the chrysalis and became a full-fledged living being. One part
of it trying to get away from the other. One wanting to fly and the
other to hide. One part wanting to feed on flies and the other part in
mortal terror of all spiders."
"Was that really so?" inquired Will deeply interested.
"I didn't see it myself, but it was told over in the biological
laboratory and I don't think there was any question about it. It struck
me that it was just the way some of us seem to be built, a sort of a
spider and fly combination and not the ordinary combination either, when
the fly is usually inside of the spider and very soon a part of his
majesty. And yet when you've told all that you know, it's a sort of
monstrosity after all, and that the truth is that a fellow really _is_
his best self if he'll only give that part half a chance. That's why I
say the way of the transgressor is hard and not easy. A fellow is going
against the grain of his best side. He throws away his best chances
under protest all the while, and _he_ doesn't want to do it either. No,
Phelps, I believe if a fellow goes down hill it's like a man dragging a
balky horse. It looks easy but it isn't, and he himself is pulling
against it all the time."
"I never thought of it in that way before."
"Then on the other hand this very kind of work you're doing now is the
sort that stirs your blood. I expect that those fellows who live down in
the tropics and about all the work they have to do to feed themselves is
to pick a banana off a tree and go through the exertion of peeling it,
don't really get half the fun out of life that some of us boys had up on
the hillside farms in Vermont. Why, when we'd have to get up winter
mornings, with the weather so cold that we'd have to be all the while on
the lookout that we didn't freeze our ears or noses, and when we'd have
to shovel out the paths through three feet of snow and cut the wood and
carry water to the stock, it did seem at times to be a trifle strenuous;
but really I think the boys in Vermont get more fun out of life than the
poor chaps in the tropics do who plow their fields by just jabbing a
hole in the ground with their heel, and when they plant, all they have
to do is to just stick a slip in the ground. It's the same way here,
Phelps. This sort of thing you're doing is hard, no doubt about that;
but it's the sort of thing that really stirs up a live man, after all."
"I'm afraid I'll be all stirred up if we don't get at this work pretty
soon," laughed Will, who was nevertheless deeply impressed by the words
he had heard from the prospective valedictorian of the senior class.
"Why can't we do it all up this morning?" he inquired eagerly.
"All?"
"Oh, I mean all we were planning to do to-day. I'd like to go down to
the gym this afternoon and watch the bulletins of the game. I decided
not to go, but if I can get my work off that'll be the next best thing;
and besides it'll help to pass the time. It's going to be a long day for
me."
"All right, I'm agreeable," replied the senior cordially.
Until the hour of noon was rung out by the clock in the tower, Will
labored hard. The words of his tutor had been inspiring, but he could
not disguise from himself the fact, however, that he had little love for
the task. It was simply a determination not to be "downed," as Will
expressed it, that led him on and he was holding on doggedly,
resolutely, almost blindly, but still he was holding on. About three
o'clock in the afternoon the few students who were in town assembled at
the telegraph office where messages were to be received from the team at
intervals of ten minutes describing the progress of the game. One of the
seniors had been selected to read the dispatches and only a few minutes
had elapsed after the assembly had gathered before the senior appeared,
coming out of the telegraph office and waving aloft the yellow slip. A
cheer greeted his appearance but this was followed by a tense silence as
he read aloud:
"They're off. Great crowd. Winthrop line outweighed ten pounds to a man.
Holding like a stone wall."
"That's the way to talk it!" shouted the reader as he handed the
dispatch to the operator, and then began to sing one of the college
songs, in which he was speedily joined by the noisy group.
The song was hushed when again the operator appeared and handed another
slip to the leader. Glancing quickly at it the senior read aloud:
"Ball on Alden's twenty-five yard line. Great run by Thomas. Hawley
playing star game."
Hawley, Thomas, and the captain of the team, and then the team itself,
were cheered, and once more the group of students gave vent to their
feelings in a noisy song. It was all stimulating and interesting, and
Will Phelps was so keenly alive to all that was occurring, that for the
time even his disappointment in not being able to accompany the team was
forgotten.
A groan followed the reading of the next dispatch. "Alden's ball on a
fumble. Steadily forcing Winthrop line back by superior weight. Ball on
Winthrop's forty-yard line."
"That looks bad," said Will's tutor, who had now joined the assembly and
was standing beside Will Phelps. "We've a quick team, but I'm afraid of
Alden's weight. They've two or three men who ought not to be permitted
to play, anyway."
"Professionals?" inquired Will.
"Yes, or worse."
"Have we any on our team?"
"Hardly," laughed the senior. But Will was thinking of the conversation
he had had with Hawley when they had first entered college, and was
silent. Besides, another dispatch was about to be read and he was eager
to hear.
"Ball on Winthrop's five-yard line. Hawley injured and out of the game."
"Too much beef," muttered the reader disconsolately, and the silence in
the assembly was eloquent of feelings that could not be expressed.
Less than the regular interval had elapsed when another yellow slip was
handed to the reader, and the suspense in the crowd was almost painful.
The very silence and the glances that were given were all indicative of
the fear that now possessed every heart.
"Alden makes touchdown. No goal," read the leader.
"Six nothing! Team's no good this year, anyway!" declared one of the
students angrily. "Had no business to play Alden, anyway! Ought to have
games with teams in our class."
"Alden seemed to be in our class last year, or rather she didn't," said
the reader quietly. "Remember what the score was?"
"No. What was it?"
"Twenty-four to nothing in our favor. If they win this year it will be
only following out the regulation see-saw that's been going on for seven
years. Neither college has won its game for two successive years."
"Alden will win this time all right enough."
"Perhaps. The game isn't ended yet. You haven't learned the Winthrop
spirit yet, which is never to give up till the game is played clear
through to the end. You've got something to learn yet." The rebuked
student did not reply, but the expression upon his face betrayed the
fact that he was still unconvinced, and that he did indeed have the
first of all lessons taught at Winthrop yet to learn.
The score was unchanged at the end of the first half, and the students
scattered during the period of intermission, assured that no further
information would be received until after the second half of the game
was begun. The confidence in victory was, however, not so great when
they assembled once more, though the interest apparently was as keen as
at the beginning. For some unaccountable reason the dispatches were
delayed and a much longer interval than usual intervened before the
welcome yellow slip was handed to the announcer. Murmurs of
disappointment were heard on every side, and it became more evident with
every passing moment that hope had mostly been lost. At last, however,
the welcome word was received, and even Will Phelps was so eager to hear
that he crowded forward into the front ranks of the assembly.
"Alden scores touchdown and goal. Winthrop fighting desperately, but
outweighed and outplayed since Hawley taken out."
"It's all over but the shouting," said the sophomore whose gloomy views
had been so sharply rebuked by the senior. "There isn't any use in
hanging around here. Come on, fellows! Let's go where there's something
a little more cheerful."
He made as if to depart from the crowd, but as no one followed him, he
apparently abandoned his purpose and remained with his fellows. Only two
more dispatches were read, the second of which announced the end of the
game with the score still standing in favor of Alden thirteen to
nothing.
"Rotten!" exclaimed the sophomore angrily. "Just what we might--" He
stopped abruptly as the senior advanced to a place where he could be
seen by all and began to harangue the assembly.
"Now, fellows," he began, "the best test of our spirit is that we can
stand up and take this in the right way. Of course, we wanted the game,
and some of us hoped and expected we would have it too. But the other
team, and doubtless the better one, has won. Next year we'll be ready
for them again, or rather you will, for I sha'n't be here, and the time
to begin to win then is right here and now. But I want to put in a good
word for our team. I haven't a doubt that they did their level best, and
if we could see them now, we'd be almost as proud of them as if they had
won. I know every man put in his best work. And what I propose is that
we go down to the station to-night and meet them with as hearty a cheer
as if they had won the game, for we know they did their best to uphold
the honor of old Winthrop to a man!"
A cheer greeted the senior's words, and at ten o'clock that evening all
the students who were in town assembled at the little station to greet
the returning members of the team. But Will Phelps, when the train came
to a standstill and the boys leaped out upon the platform, speedily
forgot all about the game in the sight which greeted his eyes.