“The whole thing’s a big swindle!” declared Chester Baker in disgust.
“Here I’ve been watching them ever since lunch, and what has happened?
Not a thing! There hasn’t even been a false step!”
He turned away from the window and punched a cushion vindictively.
Phillip laughed and took his place beside him, glancing upward at
the source of Chester’s discontent. In the upper end of the Yard
a little army of men in brown jumpers, armed with pruning-shears
attached to bamboo poles, were swarming over the elms, waging a war of
extermination against the brown-tail moths whose nests dotted the tips
of the topmost branches.
“I shouldn’t want to be up there,” said Phillip.
“There isn’t the least danger,” answered Chester. “They never fall.
They walk around up there, seventy feet or more from the ground, and
balance themselves on twigs and leaves and poke those poles around and
have a perfectly elegant time. Why, they won’t even make believe to
fall or lose their balance or anything! Well, I’ve simply wasted two
hours, that’s all.”
“It’s hard luck,” grinned Phillip.
“Oh, I suppose you don’t care,” complained Chester. “You have no art
in your soul. I’m disgusted. For two hours I’ve sat here and waited
patiently to see a body come hurtling downward. But nary a hurtle!
Not one corpse has dropped with a dull, sickening thud upon the
snow-covered ground. Not a speck of gore decorates the landscape. I
shall write to the _Crimson_ about it.
“By the way, Phil, talking of gore; there’s a peach of a show at the
Bowdoin Square this week: ‘The River Pirates.’ They say it’s simply
lovely. There’s one scene on the East River where a police launch
chases the pirates, with a dandy fight; the launch blows up and a big
ocean liner comes along just in the nick of time and rescues everybody.
All right on the stage! It’s great! I’m going in Thursday evening; want
to come?”
“No; I can’t, Chester.”
“Got something on for Thursday? How about Saturday? I rather like
Saturday nights, anyway.”
“I can’t afford it,” answered Phillip. “Fact is, Chester, I’ve got to
go awfully slow the rest of the year. Things haven’t turned out very
well with us at home. When father died I thought he had left plenty of
money, but I’ve found out just lately that we have practically nothing.
So, you see, I’m out of theatres and such things.”
“I’m sorry to hear that, Phil; I know how it is to be hard up. But,
look here; come along with me; I’ll treat. I’d have done it before,
only I imagined you had plenty of tin. Will you?”
“I’d rather not, thanks,” Phillip answered.
“Oh, come on; don’t be so fussy! I’d let you pay if I was hard up!”
“No, Chester. I’m much obliged to you, but I’ve sworn off on theatres.”
“Oh, all right. But I wish you would. By the way, I met John North
yesterday. He said you’d changed your room and wanted to know if I
could tell him where you were living. But I didn’t know anything about
it. He said he’d been looking all over for you.”
“Yes; I gave up those rooms I had. They were rather high, and I found
I could give them up by paying a month’s rent. I’m rooming on Dewolf
Street.”
“Jumping Moses! Dewolf Street! Man, that’s the limit! It must be
awful, isn’t it? All babies and muckers and pushcarts and things like
that?”
“Well, it isn’t as nice as some places,” answered Phillip evasively,
“but it will do all right. It’s good and cheap.”
Chester observed him commiseratingly for a moment. Then he asked
suddenly:
“Did you bring Maid back?”
“No, I left her. She’s happier at home, I reckon.”
“Good work! Then look here, Phil; what’s the matter with coming here?
I wish you would! It would only be forty dollars for the rest of the
year. Would that be too much?”
“No; that’s what I pay where I am; only――if I really thought you wanted
me and weren’t just taking pity on me, I’d like mighty well to come.”
“Pity be blowed! Of course I want you. I wish I’d known before that you
were going to change.”
“But I haven’t any furniture,” Phillip objected. “I sold about
everything.”
“You wouldn’t need anything except a bed, and you can get that cheap
any old place. Will you come?”
“Yes. You’re mighty good, Chester.”
“I don’t see that,” was the answer. “Fact is, I’m rather lonesome. I
thought when I started out it would be nice to have a place by myself.
At Exeter I had a roommate, but I didn’t like it. He always wanted to
cut up when I had to grind, and always had to grind when I wanted to
have fun. We were always scrapping.”
“I’ll move in on Monday if that’s all right for you.”
“Monday be hanged! What’s the matter with to-day? We can find a bed in
ten minutes and get them to send it right over.”
But Phillip held out for Monday. “It will be mighty handy for my
meals,” he said. “I have to walk a pretty good way as it is now.”
“Where are you eating? North said you’d left your table at The Inn.”
“Yes, I had to. I’m eating at Randall.”
Chester whistled. “Well, you are going the whole hog, aren’t you? Do
you like it?”
“Yes; it’s just what I want. I can pay as little or as much as I wish
to.”
Chester grinned. “I never tried Randall,” he said. “I’ll go to dinner
with you some time. Well, come on and let’s go down to Holmes Field and
watch the hockey. Your friend Kingsford’s playing coverpoint on the
freshman team and just tearing holes in the ice. It’s beautiful to see
him. I think he’s smashed everything except his left leg so far. How
are you coming with your exams?”
The winter term was two weeks old and the mid-years were upon them
in full force. Life was very serious, and the popular subjects of
conversation were seminars and flunks. Phillip was passing through the
ordeal very well, while Chester, although he spoke vaguely on every
possible occasion of having “a fighting chance” and of “never saying
die,” was forced to acknowledge to himself that the probabilities were
strongly in favour of his passing with disgustingly commonplace success.
Kingsford was not among the freshman players that afternoon――Chester
said he supposed he had finally killed himself――and after standing
about in the snow for nearly an hour watching the ’varsity practice,
the two walked back to the Union and had five o’clock tea. Phillip
found a letter for him in the rack and with a frown recognized John’s
writing. He slipped it into his pocket and did not open it until he was
in his room.
The most optimistic person could have found but one meritorious feature
about that room; it was cheap. The house was an ugly, yellow, box-like
erection, which contained a never-failing odour of boiled cabbage and
onions. Phillip’s room was on the third floor, under the eaves, and was
just large enough to accommodate the slim iron bedstead and three other
articles of furniture. His trunk stood under the narrow dormer window
and was spread with a saddle blanket, making, so he assured himself,
an excellent imitation of a window-seat. He had kept three of his
pictures, and these, with numerous photographs and his collection of
whips and spurs and bits, ornamented the sloping walls. This evening as
he climbed the dark stairway, entered the room and lighted the gas, it
looked meaner and more squalid than ever, and the prospect of leaving
it pleased him greatly. It was very cold up there, since a somewhat
mythical furnace never sent its heat higher than the first floor. He
lighted the little gas radiator beside the washstand and pulled up the
chair until the crackling contrivance of stovepipe was between his
knees. Then he drew forth John’s letter and opened it.
“DEAR PHIL” (he read)――“Where under the sun have you
disappeared to? We looked for you on Sunday evening, but you
didn’t show up, and so I went around to your house. There
the buxom landlady professed complete ignorance of your
whereabouts. You had gone; she knew nothing else, and didn’t
seem to care. At the post-office they coldly refused to divulge
your present address; I think they mistook me for a bill
collector. Your friend Baker could give me no assistance, and
so I am sending this to the Union as a last desperate resort.
If you ever receive it, come around to the room. If you don’t
appear before Saturday I shall place the affair in the hands of
the police.
“Yours, JOHN.”
Phillip sat for a moment in thought after finishing the note. Then he
placed it back in the envelope and gravely and deliberately tore it
across and across. For want of a waste-basket he dropped the pieces
back of the washstand. Unlocking the trunk, he selected a quarter from
a small horde and went to dinner.
John confidently expected Phillip at his rooms the following Sunday
evening, and when ten o’clock came without him his perplexity became
uneasiness.
“Maybe the boy’s sick, Davy,” he suggested.
David woke up from his doze and blinked.
“Sick? Phil?” he asked. “Oh, I don’t believe so. He’s probably tired of
us middle-aged codgers and has found more congenial places to spend
his Sunday evenings. Maybe he’s in love. I thought I saw symptoms of it
before recess――an unnatural gaiety, a sort of feverish excitement.”
“You seem to know the symptoms,” laughed John. “One would almost think
you’d been in love yourself at some time?”
“Once,” answered David, reaching for his pipe, which had dropped to the
floor, leaving a long trail of ashes over his waistcoat and trousers,
“only once, John. I was twelve. It was desperate while it lasted. _She_
was my teacher. I discovered that if I failed at my lessons I was kept
after school and that she stayed with me. After that I never knew a
thing; I developed a sudden colossal ignorance that astounded her and
alarmed my parents. Day after day I sat in my seat after the others
were dismissed and feasted my eyes on her from behind my geography or
slate. Then――” he sighed deeply――“then the natural thing happened. Fate
parted us. I was taken out of her room and relegated to the next class
below, which was presided over by a young man with mutton-chop whiskers
and red neckties. It was an awful blow, John.”
“It must have been,” John said sympathetically.
“Yes. Of course, my whole ambition then was to get back to her room
again. I became the brightest scholar in the class. I astonished every
one. The man with the red necktie was tickled to death and went round
telling everybody about me and taking great credit to himself. In three
months they put me back in her class.”
He paused and sighed disconsolately.
“But she wasn’t there. She had married a druggist two days before. I
never saw her again.”
“And your young life was blighted!”
“Forever!”
“Which being the case,” said John, “let’s go to bed. To-morrow I shall
go in search of Phil.”
“You might take a dinner bell and go around like a town crier,”
suggested David, “yelling ‘Boy lost! Boy lost!’”
But Monday was a busy day for John and it was not until three o’clock
that he was able to start out on his search. His first step was to look
up Everett Kingsford. This occupied him the better part of an hour, but
resulted in what apparently meant success.
“He’s got a room on Dewolf Street,” said Everett. “He told me the
number, but I’m afraid I’ve forgotten it. However, it won’t be very
hard to find, I guess. If you like, I’ll go along with you.
“I don’t know what’s come over Phil,” he continued, as they began their
quest. “He’s left our table and he hasn’t been around to see me once.
I met him at the Union the other day and that’s the only time I’ve
had sight of him. He said the reason he left the table was because he
couldn’t afford it.”
“Ah,” said John. He thought he knew the solution of Phil’s
disappearance. Somehow, he told himself, Phil had discovered the
condition of the family finances and, animated by some idiotic pride,
was keeping aloof from his friends. “Just the sort of fool thing he
would do,” thought John.
They hadn’t far to seek. The second house they stopped at was the
yellow one with the boiled-cabbage aroma. The landlady, a red-haired
slattern who wiped the soapsuds from her hands and arms as she opened
the door, informed them somewhat crossly that Mr. Ryerson had roomed at
her house, but that he had moved away that very day.
“Not an hour ago,” she said. “No; I don’t know where he’s gone. Likely
the expressman could tell you. His name’s Donovan and he has a stand
on the corner there beyond. All I know is the gentleman took my room
until college ended and now he’s gone and thrown it up.” She closed the
door behind them with angry violence.
“I can’t honestly blame him,” said Kingsford dryly. “The smell is
enough to make one throw up anything, even a room.”
The expressman was absent, and inquiries at the corner grocery failed
to enlighten them as to his whereabouts or as to the time of his
return. “We’ll have to give up for to-day, I guess,” John said. “You
might ask around, Kingsford. Surely, somebody must know where he is!”
But what search failed to find, accident revealed. Phillip could not
hope to avoid John forever. He knew that sometime they must meet, and,
incensed as he was by what he termed the other’s treachery, he dreaded
the meeting. It took place that Monday evening.
In honour of his installation in the new quarters, Chester had
persuaded Phillip to take dinner with him at his boarding-house. As it
happened, John, at the invitation of a friend, had also been a guest at
the same place. When John came downstairs after dinner he literally ran
into Phillip and Chester at the front door. Phillip did not see John
until the latter had seized him by the arm and swung him around.
“Well, Phil! You’re really alive?”
Phillip moved away from the other’s grasp coldly and pretended not to
see the outstretched hand. John stared in perplexity. Then he stepped
forward and again laid a hand on the younger man’s shoulder.
“Phil, what does this mean?” he asked sternly. The little group of men
about the door watched curiously. Phillip found his calmness deserting
him. The blood seethed into his cheeks and his eyes blazed. He tore his
arm from John’s hand and swept it around in something between a blow
and a shove that sent the other reeling against the newel post.
“Take your hands off me, North!” he cried angrily, shrilly. Chester
sprang between and pushed Phillip toward the door. John grew very
white. His perplexity remained, but was swallowed up in a sudden flood
of intense anger at the indignity put upon him. He strode forward, his
eyes darkening, his hands clenched at his side. He had no thought of
returning Phillip’s blow, if blow it was; he wanted to take the other
by the collar and shake him until his teeth rattled. He found himself
confronted by Chester Baker, white and determined.
“You be careful, North!” he said defiantly. Phillip strove to push by
him.
“This is my affair, Chester,” he cried. But John paused and
contemptuously thrust his hands into his pockets.
“I beg your pardon,” he said coldly. “I mistook you for a friend.”
“It was the biggest mistake you could have made,” replied Phillip, his
voice a-tremble. Then Chester pushed him before him out the door.
The episode caused talk. A half-dozen men had witnessed it, and by the
next afternoon various accounts of it had reached John’s friends and
acquaintances, and it was being generally discussed, for John was a
public character whose affairs interested the entire university. It
became known that he had been Phillip’s guest during the holidays, and
various and wonderful were the theories evolved to account for the
quarrel. Phillip gained not a little notoriety; he was pointed out
as “the fellow who slugged John North”; but beyond his small circle
of personal friends, who, despite that he had vouchsafed to them no
explanation of the affair, stood by him loyally, he was looked upon
with disfavour and voted “darned fresh.”
John spoke of the affair to none save David. The latter heard of it
with mingled dismay and delight, and when John had finished surprised
him by the decision he rendered.
“Don’t take any more notice of him,” he said. “I don’t know any more
than you what the boy’s got against you, but you may depend that it’s
something he considers serious. Phil’s honest, John, whatever else he
is. I suppose it’s all some silly misunderstanding, but it’s quite
evident that Phil takes it very much in earnest. I suppose nothing
happened down in Virginia that he could have taken exception to?
Nothing about his sister, eh?”
“What do you mean by that?” demanded John angrily.
“I mean,” answered David undisturbedly, “that there was nothing――look
here, to be plain, did you get into any flirtation down there? Did you
do anything that Phil might construe into a slight against his sister?”
“If you don’t shut up I’ll smash you,” John threatened.
“By which I presume you mean me to understand that there was nothing
of the sort? Well, the next question is, does Phil _think_ there was
anything?”
John’s wrath gave way to thoughtfulness. Finally he said:
“I can’t see how he could, Davy, honestly. There was not a thing――――
Look here, Davy, I asked his sister to marry me and she refused. There
was nothing wrong with that, was there?”
“Nothing, I should say, except her decision,” answered David. “I’m
sorry she turned you down, old man, if you really care for the girl.
But, to tell the truth, it seems to me you’re rather fortunate not to
marry into such a fire-eating family. I suppose the girl couldn’t have
told Phil any yarns that――er――――”
“David!”
“Oh, well, I don’t know her, of course. Women are damned strange,
though, just the same. I’ve got two sisters of my own, if you
remember.” He smoked in silence awhile and John sat scowling crossly
at him through the smoke. Then, “Well, I give it up, Johnnie. Let him
alone; maybe he’ll have the grace to apologize and explain things.”
“He may apologize until he’s blue in the face,” said John wrathfully,
“for all I care. But I would like to know what in thunder it all means!”
David shook his head sadly.
“Children are contrary and exasperating things,” he said, “and the
guardian’s lot is not all roses.”