THE CLUB IN SPLINTERS.
There is such a thing as a club breaking, going to splinters even. This
sad end of a club was experienced by the Up-the-Ladder Club. It was not a
strange thing, as all human organizations have their ups and downs, and
many have their downs especially.
It happened in this way.
"Boys," said the president one day, "let's play school. I'll be teacher.
No; let's have a public declamation--pieces, you know, and so on. Then we
can charge something and perhaps get a little money--nails, I mean."
The real cash was scarce, and nails became a necessity.
"And not play school?" asked the literary governor. "A school is real
interestin', you know."
"Yes, we might play that afterward as a sort of rest."
"Agreed," was the general sentiment. The old sheet that had done service
so many times was once more brought out and strung across one corner of
the barn chamber. An audience of three was secured, the governor's
youngest brother, Pip's little sister, and Sid Waters's young cousin from
the country. The members of the club gathered behind the sheet for action,
but the auditors, all of them plump children, were ranged in a row upon a
window-blind supported by blocks of wood. The first piece was a song by
Sid. He strutted out pompously and began, "How beau--" He stopped. He had
forgotten his bow. Executing this, he started once more, "How beautiful
the cow--"
He was halting again.
"How beautiful the cow--"
He hesitated once more.
"O beautiful cow," sang out the roguish Wort behind the sheet.
"Shut up!" shrieked the infuriated vocalist, rushing to the bed-sheet.
"Don't interrupt me!"
He resumed his recitation:
"How beautiful the cow-slip
Upon the verdant mead,
How diligent the sower
Who drops the tiny seed."
He continued and finished the piece amid great enthusiasm on the part of
the boys behind the sheet, who applauded tumultuously. There was little
movement on the part of the butter-tubs. They opened their eyes and stared
wonderingly. Then they opened their mouths and grinned.
Charlie now appeared, announcing as his selection "Independence Bell," a
subject which he commenced to treat vigorously. The reference was to the
bell at Philadelphia, rung at the Declaration of Independence, and
somebody behind the sheet now began to shake a cowbell, a device which it
was thought would heighten the effect of the performance.
"'Taint time!" called out Charlie, turning in despair to the curtain. Here
Wort's round, beaming face appeared at a rent which was growing larger
every few minutes.
"Tell me when," he whispered.
Charlie resumed his recitation. Soon he whispered, "Go it!" Didn't Wort do
his duty! No bell-ringer in Philadelphia could have been more
enthusiastic, and no cow astray seeking after home ever wagged her bell so
continuously. It was afterward found out that every boy behind the curtain
had a chance to swing that bell, a fact accounting for the popularity of
the piece and for the tumultuous applause following it. The applause came
from brother-performers, but was none the less gratifying to the speaker.
The final piece was by Wort, "The Last Rose of Summer." If given, no one
can say how successful it might have been, but while the subject implied a
compliment to Wort and those preceding him, the adjective "last" was
ominous. There were several boys struggling to look through the curtain,
one through the old rent Wort had used, and the others through new rents
that they had ingeniously made with their fingers. But what curtain could
hold up against the continued pressure of three stout boys? There was
nothing that such a curtain could do but come down; and this it did, the
three boys sprawling at the base of the stem of the Last Rose of
Summer--in other words, at Wort's feet! Wort, in turn, was ignominiously
night-capped by the sheet, for it completely covered him. The butter-tubs
now gave way to their sense of the ludicrous, and clapped and laughed
merrily. This did not please the four boys in or on the floor, who angrily
rubbed their shins. Sid declared that it was too bad to act as
disgracefully. All this was poor preparation for the serious duties of
school-keeping, to which the president now directed his attention. With
how much pomp and dignity he took up the duties of school-teacher,
confronting a row of uneasy boys occupying seats on a green blind, each
one wearing his cap!
"Hats off!" shouted Sid.
"Where are my books?" asked Charlie.
"They are probably where they ought to be, young man, in your desk."
Each boy then proceeded to take an imaginary reader out of an imaginary
desk. Wort, though, had a book.
"All properly supplied with readers? Open them. Read, 'Merry Gentlemen,'
read. Wort may begin."
There was no response.
"Read, I say."
There was silence still.
"Do you mean to disobey me?"
"You haven't told us what to read," replied Wort.
"Yes, I have."
"You haven't," stoutly reaffirmed Wort. "You said, 'Merry gentlemen,
read.'"
"I mean the piece called 'Merry Gentlemen,' on page--well, you know. We
have read it in school enough times to know it, and then scholars ought to
know their readers well enough to be able to turn to any place and read
without a book even. Who is that speaking? Tell me. Haven't I told you a
thousand times that there must be no speaking in this school? I see the
guilty scholar. Richard Grimes, come this way!"
"I didn't."
"No trifling, young man. Come this way," and collaring the refractory
Rick, Sid led him into the closet. The governor was not to be wholly
suppressed, and kept protruding a red pug-nose into very plain sight.
"Teacher," called out Wort, "I see a red sugar-plum sticking out."
"Richard, come this way. You're looking out."
"No, sir; it was my nose."
"Hold out your hand. If you flinch, sir, you will receive another."
The punishment was moodily received, and the governor went back to the
closet. Charlie and Wort were soon consigned to the same spot for
disobedience. Pip was noisily moving about.
"Say," whispered Sid, "Be good, and take your seat properly."
"Take your seat properly!" he then roared.
"Pip, you may read about the 'Caravan,' on the fifth page. Take Wort's
book."
"Jutht thee--" began Pip.
"Juggie and Tony, you may both go into the closet for giggling," sharply
interposed the teacher. "Go now!"
There were now five boys inside the closet, five restless immortals with
ten restless legs and ten restless arms.
"Read, Pip, about the caravan."
"Jutht thee, the wild beathth--"
In harmony with this thought came a loud roar from the closet.
"Now you've got to be better," said Sid, turning to the wild beasts, "or I
will resign and I won't teach."
"Let me be teacher," squeaked Pip.
The principal, though, did not resign; but, advancing to the closet or
cage door, was about to make an appeal to his infuriated caravan. They
anticipated him.
"Teacher, Charlie is pinching me."
"Ow! somebody's on my foot."
"There isn't room! I can't breathe!" declared a third.
"It is disgraceful, boys, how you act," said their aged teacher. "You
can't play school worth a cent. Pip, come here!"
The only scholar now on duty had disgraced himself by making up faces
behind his teacher's back, and as Sid suddenly turned, the culprit was
detected.
"Pip, hold out your hand. There, take that!"
"Ow! you hit too hard."
"He will cry. Don't hit too hard!" shouted a warning voice from the
closet.
"Booh-ooh-ooh!" went Pip.
"I didn't hit you hard," explained the "principal of the academy," as he
had several times called himself. "You mustn't be a-foolin' in school. If
you were in a real school you would get worse whippings than that."
Pip's only answer was, "Booh-ooh-ooh!"
"Wort, come here. You are not presenting a respectful face to your
teacher. I caught you, sir. Hold out your hand."
"I don't want to."
"Do you rebel?" and the principal swelled as if ambitious to puff himself
into a giant.
It is not pleasant to put it on record that Wort did rebel. He refused to
hold out his hand, and when Sid seized him he resisted. Then a tussle set
in, and it was doubtful whether the teacher would floor the scholar, or
the scholar floor the teacher. But they drew off and scowled at one
another like two thunder clouds.
"There," said the principal of the academy finally, "I am not going to be
teacher any more. Who wants my chance may have it."
"And I won't belong to this old club any more," said Wort, smarting under
the castigation he had received. "Who wants my chance may have it."
"'Tith an old club," sobbed Pip, "and who wantth my chanth may have it."
"O, fellers, let's not get mad," said the president.
"Pooh!" exclaimed the governor. "You can say so, who gave all the
lickin's."
"And not had one yourself," said Charlie.
"O, fellers, don't get mad," besought Sid once more. "You know it was for
your good."
This last remark was greeted with sneers, showing that Sid's labors for
the welfare of youth were not appreciated. There was not only a
determination to get mad, but to stay mad. Besides, the offended ones were
moving toward the door, and this in a quarrel always looks bad.
"Let it go," said Sid. "I did not mean to hurt you. Come, let's march down
stairs. I was going to have you march down stairs properly, just as we do
at school. Come, let's form a line."
"Yes, and you be cap'n," sulked Wort.
"You may be, then," said Sid.
"I aint goin' to march," sobbed Pip.
That feather was too much for the camel's back, especially as the camel in
this case was a two-legged one, and a boy like Sid, and he made no further
attempts at reconciliation.
"Go it as you please, then," he said, angrily, and it was, indeed, a
go-it-as-you-please column that rushed down stairs.
"I'm going home," said Wort.
"O, don't!" pleaded Charlie.
"Let him go!" shouted Sid.
"And me, too," squeaked Pip, and a second sullen knight passed out of the
yard.
"It's of no us staying here, and I guess I'll go off and find Billy,"
observed the governor, and he left to hunt up his absent cousin.
"My mother wants me, and I might as well go, for the club is broken up,"
said Sid. He sauntered out of the yard with a reckless air, his hands in
his pockets.
Charlie, Juggie, and Tony were now the only ones left, and they looked at
one another sorrowfully.
"Charlie! Come!"
It was Aunt Stanshy calling. Tony and Juggie now moved off, and Charlie
went into the house with a heavy heart.
"What _is_ the matter, Charles Pitt Macomber?"
"Club has broken up," and Charlie's lips quivered.
"Mad?"
Charlie did not speak, but moved his head up and down like a saw.
"Who? Sid, Rick, Wort, Pip?"
Each time the saw went up and down.
"Are you mad?"
"I was, but I am not now."
"I'm sorry. I guess it's a pretty bad case, and the club has all gone to
splinters."
The club in splinters! All that day the chamber was deserted. It was
forsaken the next bright summer day. A mouse came out of his hole, and,
looking timidly about, gave a faint, surprised squeak. The flies buzzed in
the sunshine, and had all the time they wished to hum through their tunes.
The only other noise was the wind that murmured about the door and the
window that Aunt Stanshy had closed up so resolutely.
Nobody came to climb the ladder, and it did have such a forsaken look.
Nobody troubled the sheet, or the closet, or the various relics strewn
about.
Alas! alas!
The club was in splinters!