HANRIHAN PROMISES
“The beauty of being on probation,” observed Nick, “is that a fellow is
able to give his entire time to the improvement of his mind. I recall
that during my junior year being on pro was very helpful to me. It
allowed me to do a lot of studying that I wouldn’t have been able to
accomplish otherwise, and so, without doubt, preserved me to Grafton
posterity. If it hadn’t been for that thoughtful act on the part of
faculty you might not have me with you this evening, fellows.”
“Faculty has a heap to answer for,” said Guy sadly.
“I don’t mind――much,” said Hugh. “It knocks me out of football, though,
doesn’t it?”
“Yes, and the worst of it is,” said Pop Driver, “that you’ll have to go
to gym and do your four hours per week.”
“I don’t think I shall mind that, really. I fancy it’s dumb bells and
clubs and that sort of thing, eh?”
“Yes, and bar bells and free arm movements, which are tiresome things,
and chest weights. _Creak――creak――creak――creak!_ I hate the thought of
the things.” And Nick disgustedly shook his head.
“You got off easily, if you want to know it,” said Bert. “Two weeks
isn’t anything. Usually it’s a month at least. The only thing that
saved you from getting it harder was that faculty is up in the air
about last night’s rumpus. It has a sort of an idea that a lot of
things went on it doesn’t know about and that if justice was done half
the school would be on pro.”
“They’re always easier with a new fellow,” said Guy. “Two weeks will
soon pass, Hugh. Take my advice, though, and try for B’s in everything.
That always makes them happy and they’ll let you off easy.”
“B’s?” exclaimed Bert. “Why B’s? Hugh gets an A-minus in about
everything now! By the way, fellows, Jimmy’s been pussy-footing it all
over school today trying to find out what really happened last night.
He cornered me in lower hall after French this morning and said he had
heard the juniors had held a very successful meeting. You know the way
he smiles when he wants to――to lull your suspicions?”
“Wow!” applauded Nick. “That’s langwidge!”
“So I said yes, I’d heard they had. And then he asked: ‘You――ah――you
weren’t present then yourself, Winslow?’ And I said no, I didn’t think
the juniors allowed any of the other class fellows at their meeting.
Innocent, I was. So he said, ‘H’m, yes, very true, Winslow,’ and I beat
it. What gets me is that they didn’t hear the racket and come out. I
suppose, though, they thought it was the usual rumpus.”
“There are some mighty funny-looking faces around today,” observed Pop.
“Phillips couldn’t see at all out of one eye, and――――”
“Phillips isn’t anything,” cut in Nick. “You should see Downer! He’s
positively disreputable! I told him so, too. Told him he oughtn’t to
appear among gentlemen looking as he did. He was quite short-tempered
about it.”
“I wonder if they’ll do anything,” pondered Bert.
“Someone said he’d heard they were going to stop junior meeting after
this,” replied Guy. “It would be a good thing if they did. Such
behavior is most――er――reprehensible.”
“Piffle!” scoffed Nick. “You were just dying to get into it yourself
last night, you old hypocrite!”
“I did get into it,” said Guy grimly. “And I got this for my pains.” He
laid a finger on his bruise. “Pop was the one who put ’em to rights.
Pop went into it like a whirlwind. _Thump!_ Down goes a lower! _Bang!_
Down goes an upper! Great stuff, Pop!”
“You fellows could have fought all night,” replied Pop calmly, “for all
I cared, only I thought it would be rather a silly piece of business
for half of you to get nabbed and put on pro. To come right down to
hunks, though, it was a pretty rank piece of business for grown kids to
pummel each other for no reason at all. You upper middlers ought to be
proud of it.”
“Well, we didn’t start it,” said Nick aggrievedly. “One of those chaps
punched one of us and so we punched back.”
“It’s always the other fellow who starts things, I notice. If you and
Bert and Kinley and a few more had been caught at it a fat chance the
team would have had!”
“That’s so,” agreed Guy. “I understand that Bonner was extremely
eloquent this afternoon.”
“He flayed us,” said Bert grimly. “He has a nasty tongue sometimes.”
“It struck me he was mighty easy with you,” said Pop unfeelingly. “When
you’re on the School Team, Bert, you’re supposed to behave yourself
and not act like a kid.”
“Oh, chuck it, Pop,” returned Bert shortly. “I’ve been lectured enough.
You’re as cheerful as a raven.”
“After all,” said Nick, “’is ’Ighness is the only one should kick. He’s
dished on football for two weeks, anyway, and that queers him utterly
for this year. If anyone has a right to grouch it’s Hugh, and he’s the
most cheerful of the lot.”
“Do you really think it lets me out for the year?” asked Hugh sadly. “I
was hoping that maybe, if it was only two weeks, they’d let me back on
the――the――grinds.”
“The what?” demanded Nick. “Oh, the scrubs! Grinds isn’t bad, though!
That’s what they do, all right.”
“Hope on, hope ever,” said Guy. “Put it up to Ted some time. Maybe he
will fix it for you. Who’s going to captain the second this year, Pop?”
“I don’t know. I suppose it will be Ben Myatt.”
“Honest? Poor old Bennie! He’s been trying for the first team for three
years now. I hoped he would make it this time.”
“Perhaps he will, but I doubt it. Ben just doesn’t reach to the first.
He’s a clever player, too.”
“Better than Tom Hanrihan, in my estimation,” said Nick. “I’d like to
see Ben make it this time.”
“So would I,” agreed Pop, “but he isn’t the player Tom is. Tom’s got
the zip, you know. Ben’s too good-natured, I guess.”
“There’s something in that,” mused Guy. “Remember Powell, who pitched
for us year before last, Pop? He was a nifty twirler, all right, and
had a fast one that would fool you two times out of three, but you
simply couldn’t rile him, and when things got away from us Powell was
no earthly use in the box. When you’re a run or two behind along in the
eighth or ninth you want just nine fellows in the field who are mad
clear through!”
“I say,” exclaimed Hugh, “you’re spoofin’, what?”
“Nary a spoof, Duke,” replied Guy. “Getting your mad up is what does
the business. I don’t mean you’re to show it or froth at the mouth, you
understand, but you want to have it inside you. Then when your chance
comes you bust out and something happens.”
“Really?” marveled Hugh. “I’ve always thought quite the contrary. It
seems to me, you know, that a chap who keeps his temper is the one who
can do the best.”
“Sure! I said that. _Have_ a temper, but keep it! Am I right, Pop?”
“Yes, I think so. I know that when a fellow plays football he has to
sort of seethe inside before he can really do much.”
“Did you ever seethe?” asked Nick incredulously.
“I’ve been mad enough to bite,” said Pop, smiling. “Haven’t you?”
“Me? Great Scott, yes! But you’re such a sleepy, unemotional beggar,
Pop, that I didn’t suppose you ever felt that way. Bert and I, now,
being sort of temperamental――――”
“I always get mad,” confessed Bert, “the first time a fellow tackles me
or gives me a jolt. I’ve got a rotten temper, anyway.”
“Good reason to play football, then,” said Pop. “Football’s a fine
thing for temper.”
“I fancy I’d never make a player, then,” remarked Hugh ruefully. “I
don’t get angry very easily, you see.”
His regret was so evident that the others laughed, and Nick said:
“Don’t worry about that, ’Ighness. You’ll get over it bravely when you
come to play. Just let a couple of fellows sit on your head and another
one twist your ankle for you and you’ll be mad enough to eat dirt!”
Nothing came of Thursday night’s affair. Possibly faculty didn’t
quite know where to begin, since fully two-thirds of the school was
concerned. The fracas went down in history as the Junior Meeting Riot,
and the _Campus_, the school monthly, managed to get a lot of sly fun
out of it in its next issue. Leslie and several other more prominent
members of the senior class were taken to task for allowing matters
to go as far as they had, which, considering the fact that they had
sustained various injuries in their efforts to promote peace, was
rather unkind. In the end faculty prohibited future interference with
junior meeting and, lest the temptation should prove too great for the
lower middlers, provided that the meeting should take place in Manning
common room.
Hugh took his punishment philosophically, although he really regretted
having to give up trying for the football team. He had just begun to
find something besides hard work in the daily practice, and, while he
hadn’t for a moment counted on making the first, he had entertained
hopes of finding a place on the second team. It was Tom Hanrihan who
took the matter hardest. Tom, a big, raw-boned, good-hearted chap of
eighteen, took his commission of coaching the “rookies” very seriously,
and Hugh’s defection grieved him sadly. The talk that Hugh had received
from Jimmy, otherwise the assistant principal, Mr. Rumford, was nothing
to what Hanrihan had to say to him Saturday morning. Hanrihan told Hugh
quite explicitly how many kinds of an idiot he was and would listen to
no excuses.
“You seem to think all we have to do is waste time on you fellows and
then you can drop out whenever it pleases you. Making a football team
isn’t any cinch, Ordway, when you’ve got only nine weeks to do it. You
haven’t any right to take up our time if you don’t mean to stick it
out.”
“But I did mean to stick it out,” expostulated Hugh. “It wasn’t my
fault if those beggars got me and――――”
“You shouldn’t have given them the chance. You shouldn’t have had
anything to do with that scrap, anyway. (This despite the fact that the
speaker had a very puffy and discolored left eye!) When a fellow goes
out for the team he’s supposed to look after himself. He’s trying for
the――the biggest thing in school, and he ought to realize it. You had
a good chance to make good. I as much as told you that a dozen times.
(If he had, Hugh didn’t recall it!) You showed some gumption, and you
were quick and handled a ball nicely. Now you’ve gone and spoiled it
all. Honest, Ordway, I’d like to punch your head for you!”
“Oh, very well, do it,” replied Hugh meekly. “I’m sorry. That’s all I
can say, Hanrihan.”
“A lot of good being sorry does,” snorted the other.
“It’s only two weeks, Mr. Rumford said, and I thought that possibly I
could get back again,” said Hugh wistfully.
“Get back! Lay off two weeks and get back! That’s likely! By that time
we’ll be in the middle of the season. Who do you suppose is going to
take time to coach you individually, Ordway?”
“Well,” and Hugh smiled ingratiatingly at Hanrihan, “you could, you
know, if you cared to!”
“I could!” Hanrihan stared in amazement. “Well, you’re certainly a
cheeky youngster, Ordway! What the dickens should I do it for? You
don’t suppose the team’s going to pot just because you’re out, do you?”
“N-no, of course not. I didn’t mean that.” Hugh colored in his quick
fashion. “Only, I thought that possibly――if I sort of watched practice
and saw what was being done, why, after I was off probation, you might
sort of――sort of show me, if you know what I mean!”
“Huh! You’ll have to get Bonner to let you back first. And I don’t
think he will.” Hanrihan paused. “He might, though, if I put it up to
him. Confound you, Ordway, you seem to think you can do as you please
and play hob all around and then――then get folks to square things for
you! You _are_ a cheeky youngster, and no mistake!”
“I dare say,” replied Hugh, “but you’ll speak to Mr. Bonner, eh? You
know yourself it wasn’t my fault, old chap, now don’t you?”
“Well, no, I suppose it wasn’t――in a way,” acknowledged Hanrihan more
graciously. “Well, I’ll see if we can do anything. But look here, now.
You keep in shape, do you understand? And keep in right with faculty.
No more nonsense, Ordway!”
“Right-o! And thanks awfully, Hanrihan.”
“Don’t thank me until it happens――if it does,” grumbled the other.
“I’ll let you know if――if anything comes up. So long.”
That conversation left Hugh hopeful again, but when he recounted it
to Bert the latter threw cold water on the project. “Tom will do his
part,” he said, “but there isn’t a chance that Bonner will let you
back. I know him too well. I’m sorry, Hugh. I wish he would. But I
wouldn’t expect too much if I were you.”
“I shan’t,” replied Hugh untroubledly. “But there isn’t any harm in
hoping, eh? Even if you don’t get what you want you’ve had the fun of
wishing for it, if you know what I mean!”