A CHANCE MEETING
Two days after the visit to Hugh Ordway’s room Jimmy Logan’s joke
which he had attributed to Dud bore unexpected fruit. The remark
had tickled the fellows who had heard it and consequently they very
promptly repeated it, with the natural result that within twenty-four
hours it got around to Starling Meyer himself. Star, as he was
generally called, was a large, good-looking boy of seventeen, well
supplied with self-conceit. He was a rattling good hockey player,
undoubtedly the best in school, and a fair performer with the second
nine in the outfield. There his athletic prowess ended, for he
considered――or pretended to consider――track sports unimportant and
football unscientific. He was a clever student and stood high in
class, and was, in consequence, rather a favorite with the faculty.
As a member of the Forum Society his activities were critical rather
than constructive, for he took no part in the debates beyond attending
them and pointing out the deficiencies of the debaters in a superior
manner. Most fellows liked him, especially those who were not clever
in the lines he affected, and even those who saw through his poses and
couldn’t stand his conceit accorded him honor for his brilliancy in
class-room and on the ice. Although Star roomed next door to Dud, the
latter knew him only as he knew three-fourths of the students, that is,
to nod to on passing. Once or twice, since they had both been rather
unimportant members of the second baseball team last year, they had
spoken. But beyond that they were strangers, and so when, two days
after that visit to 29 Lothrop, Star Meyer stopped Dud in front of Trow
by the simple but effective method of seizing him by the arm, Dud was
somewhat surprised. Star was scowling and Dud didn’t need more than
one glance at his face to realize that he was angry. Even when angry,
however, Star didn’t allow himself to forget his pose of contemptuous
superiority, and now when he spoke he managed a one-sided smile
designed to remind Dud of the honor being done him.
“Baker, you’re a remarkably fresh young kid,” began Star, “and some day
that mouth of yours is going to get you into a heap of trouble. Ever
think of that?”
Dud, puzzled, moved restively in the bigger boy’s grasp but failed to
get free. “I don’t know what you mean, Meyer,” he protested.
“Yes, you do. What’s the good of lying? After this you leave my name
out of your funny jokes; hear?”
“I don’t know what――――” began Dud again. Then recollection of Jimmy’s
bon-mot came to him and he flushed.
“The next time I’ll kick you from here to the river,” said Star in a
quietly venomous tone. “I’d do it now for a couple of buttons, too. You
leave my name strictly alone, Baker, after this. Understand me?”
“Yes, but honest, Meyer, I didn’t say――――” Then, however, Dud had to
stop, for, although innocent, to insist on the fact would put the blame
on Jimmy. He dropped his eyes. “All right,” he muttered.
Somehow that phrase seemed to add fresh fuel to Star’s smoldering
anger, for he took a fresh and very painful grip on Dud’s arm and said:
“All right, is it? Well, it isn’t all right, kid! You’re a sneaky
little bounder, that’s what you are! Saying smart-aleck things and then
trying to lie out of it! Don’t you ever mention my name again. If you
do I’ll get you and you won’t forget it in a hurry. Now you beat it!”
[Illustration: “‘You’re a sneaky little bounder, that’s what you are!’”]
With a sudden wrench at the captive arm, Star spun Dud around and aimed
a kick at him. Fortunately, a premonition of what was happening
caused Dud to jump aside and Star’s foot missed its goal. Dud, angry
himself now, turned with clenched fists and flashing eyes. But the
situation was distinctly hopeless. Star topped him by a head and Dud
was suddenly conscious of his own physical inferiority. Still he
might have tried conclusions had it not been for the smile of haughty
contempt on the other’s countenance. Somehow that smile was too much.
It seemed to say: “What, you dare to show disrespect to _me_? Begone,
impious mortal!” Dud’s fingers straightened again, he gulped down his
resentment, stole a doubtful glance at a group of fellows who were
looking on curiously from the dormitory steps and walked away, trying
his best to appear dignified and unconcerned but secretly feeling like
a whipped cur. Later, when he recounted the episode to Jimmy the latter
took him to task vigorously.
“Why didn’t you tell him you didn’t say it? I’m not afraid of the big
fraud!”
“Considering you’d told everyone that I had said it――――”
“Yes, that’s so.” Jimmy frowned mightily. “Well, then, why didn’t you
light into him? Don’t you see that the fellows who were watching you
will think you were afraid of him?”
“I wanted to, but――but somehow he looked so――so sort of _superior_――――”
“Yah! That’s Star’s best bluff! Bet you anything if you’d hit him just
one little tap on the nose he’d have run! Hang it, Dud, you’ve got to
play up, boy! Here I am making you out a regular feller, and the first
chance you get to――to put yourself in the lime-light you fall down!
Why, you had the finest sort of an opportunity to distinguish yourself!
Think what it would have meant to you, Dud! Fellows would have said:
‘What do you know about young Baker licking Star Meyer right in front
of Trow this morning? Had it all over him, they say! Beat him something
brutal! Some class to that kid, eh?’ That’s the way they’d have talked
you up. Now you’ve gone and――――”
“Don’t be an ass,” begged Dud with spirit. “You know plaguey well I
couldn’t lick Star. He’s six inches taller than I am, and he’s at least
seventeen years old, and he’s――he’s stronger――――”
“Son, when you get in a row with another chap,” replied Jimmy
emphatically, “don’t you stop to figure out how much bigger or stronger
he is. You jump in and get the first lick at him. You’ll be surprised
to find what a lot of inches that first whack takes off the other chap!
What you should have done――――”
“Well, I didn’t,” said Dud shortly. “You wouldn’t have, either, I
guess.”
Jimmy grinned. “Never mind what I’d have done, Dud. I’m not making a
name for myself. I’m not――――”
“Neither am I. You are. And I’m getting sick of it. It’s no use,
anyway. Let’s drop it.”
“Drop nothing,” replied Jimmy vigorously. “We’re getting on famously.
Why――――”
“You’ve just said I’ve queered myself!”
“I said you’d missed a chance to make a hit. So you have. But we can
fix that all right. Those fellows who saw it will talk, I guess, but we
can talk too. Who were they?”
“I don’t know. Stiles was one, though.”
“The sweetest little gossip in school,” commented Jimmy. “All right,
Dud, you leave it to me. Your Uncle James will fix it all hunky for
you. You sit tight and――yes, that’s the game! Dud, you must go around
looking very dignified for a couple of days.”
“Rot!”
“I mean it. You must make fellows think that you resisted a great
temptation and that it has――er――has sobered you. Get me?”
“What temptation?” asked Dud, puzzled.
“Why, the temptation to lose your temper and beat Star up, of course,”
explained Jimmy patiently. “That’s our line, don’t you see? It was only
by――by superhuman control that you manfully resisted the impulse to
fell him to the ground! Great stuff, what? You just wait till I tell
it!”
“Jimmy, for the love of lemons don’t start anything else! Every time
you get to talking you put me in a hole. You’ve got fellows thinking
I’m a wit, and they all look at me in a funny sort of a way as if they
were waiting for me to spring something bright, and I get tongue-tied
and can’t think of a thing to say. And you’re telling it around that
I’m going to be a wonderful pitcher, too. They don’t believe that, of
course, but it makes me look silly. And now you want to make me out
a――a scrapper――――”
“Not at all, not at all! Star resented your remark about him and spoke
insultingly to you. You gave him a beautiful calling down and he didn’t
dare talk back. Then, when your back was turned, he tried to kick you,
and you, stifling your――er――your natural and excusable indignation,
kept your temper wonderfully and walked superbly away. All through the
encounter your dignity was sublime!”
Dud groaned. “You’ll simply make me out an awful ass and fellows will
laugh at you――and me. I wish you wouldn’t, Jimmy!”
“That remark merely shows how little you appreciate my powers of
diplomacy,” replied the other in tones of sorrowful resignation. “But
never mind. I shall continue to do my best for you, Dud, even though
my efforts are unappreciated, misunderstood. Leave it all to me, my
young friend. Appear very dignified and――and aloof. Let’s see you look
aloof, Dud.”
Dud only looked disgusted.
“Not a bit like it,” resumed the other cheerfully. “More like this. Get
it? Sort of hinting at a secret sorrow or――no, that’s not exactly the
idea, either. You want to look like the hero in the second act of the
play, when everyone thinks he stole the jewels and the heroine spurns
him. He knows that he’s innocent, you see, and knows that the audience
will know it in the last act. So he just looks disdainful and a bit sad
and sort of moons around by himself and smokes a good deal to salve his
sorrow――――”
“I can’t smoke,” interrupted Dud practically. “They won’t let me, and I
don’t like it anyway.”
Jimmy waved his hand airily. “You get the idea, though, Dud. ‘Too proud
to fight’ is your line, old chap. Now shut up and let me think.”
Jimmy’s thinking resulted in action. That afternoon about four he might
have been observed lingering idly in front of School Hall, hands in
pockets, whistling tunelessly, evidently quite at a loose end. Nick
Blake tried to entice him up to Lit to play pool, Gus Weston suggested
the joys of a trip to the village for hot soda and Pete Gordon strove
to lure him to his room. Jimmy resisted heroically and was left to his
devices. It was a particularly disagreeable afternoon, with a hard
wind freezing the pools along the walk, and Jimmy from time to time
glanced impatiently at the big doors behind him. But it was nearly the
half-hour before they finally opened again to emit Ned Stiles. Warned
by the creaking of the portal, Jimmy instantly assumed the appearance
of one who, passing, has his attention attracted by the sound of an
opening door. This in the face of the fact that he had been all along
aware that Stiles, in trouble with Mr. Gibbs, the history instructor,
had been having an after-school séance with “Gusty” in a classroom.
Stiles was an upper middler, seventeen years old, an uninteresting and
rather sycophantic youth whom Jimmy secretly disliked very much. Stiles
suspected the fact and was consequently somewhat surprised when Jimmy,
after nodding briefly, halted and awaited him at the foot of the steps.
“Hello, Stiles. Rotten day, isn’t it? Seen Guy Murtha lately?”
Stiles shook his head, changing his books from one elbow to the other
in order to reach his handkerchief and blow a very red nose. Stiles
always had a cold in winter and snuffled from October to April.
“Can’t find him anywhere,” continued Jimmy in preoccupied tones,
accommodating his steps to those of the other boy and continuing on
toward Trow. “Star Meyer said he thought he’d gone to the village. I
want to see him awfully.”
“I haven’t seen him all day, I guess,” said Stiles. He was hoping
that some of the fellows would look from their windows and see him
hob-nobbing with Jimmy.
“Well, I guess I can get him at supper,” said the latter. Then he
chuckled, and, in response to Stiles’ unspoken question, explained, “I
was thinking of Star. He hasn’t got over it yet, I guess. Grumpy as
anything he was.”
“Got over what?” asked Stiles eagerly.
“Didn’t you hear about it?” Jimmy looked at him incredulously. “Why,
Dud Baker gave him an awful calling down this morning and Star took it
like a lamb. Say, that kid certainly has got spunk!”
Stiles viewed the other suspiciously, but Jimmy’s countenance expressed
truth and quiet amusement. Stiles grunted. Then he said “Huh!”
doubtfully.
“Star was mad as a hornet about something Dud said; some joke or other,
you know.”
Stiles nodded. “Yes, about the hockey team dying of Star-vation.”
“Was that it? Well, anyway, he got after Dud and wanted Dud to
apologize and Dud told him to chase himself, that it was all true and
that every fellow in school knew it, and a lot more. And Star was mad
enough to bite! Think of Dud getting away with it!”
“I saw it,” said Stiles, “but it didn’t look――just like that to me.
Star had Baker by the arm and it looked like he was reading the riot
act to him. And then he tried to kick him and Baker beat it.”
“Good thing for Star he did, then,” said Jimmy knowingly. “I’d hate to
stand up to Dud Baker when he was riled!”
“I didn’t know he was――that sort,” said Stiles interestedly. They had
reached the entrance to Trow and paused at the door.
“Dud Baker? Didn’t you ever hear why he left the school he was at
before he came here?”
Stiles shook his head.
“Well, it isn’t a nice story to tell, although it wasn’t all Dud’s
fault. I heard it from a fellow who was there and saw it. In fact, he
helped to carry the other fellow to his room. He was three years older
than Dud and a whole head taller, too, they say. But Dud isn’t the sort
of fellow you can bully. Or he wasn’t. Nowadays Dud will stand a lot.
I guess after that fracas he learned to keep his temper. The other
fellow was in bed a month. It was such a close shave for him that it
sort of sobered Dud up and he will go most any length now to keep from
scrapping. He’s got an awful punch, they say.”
Stiles looked vastly amazed, but Jimmy, glancing from the corners of
his eyes, saw to his satisfaction that there was no incredulity in the
amazement. Stiles had swallowed the yarn whole and was gasping for
more. But Jimmy knew the value of silence.
“Well, I guess I’ll run over to Lothrop. If you should see Guy you
might tell him I’m looking for him. So long.”
“But, look here, Logan,” called Stiles eagerly; “what was it Baker said
to Star, eh?”
“Oh, I don’t know just what he told him, but it was aplenty. And Star
took it, too!”
“But he――he kicked Baker! We saw him!”
“Never!” replied Jimmy vehemently. “He may have kicked _at_ him. In
fact, some fellow told me he did aim a kick at Dud when Dud’s back was
turned. Said Dud turned like a tiger on him then and he thought sure
it was all up with Star. But Dud controlled himself and walked quietly
away. Gee, I couldn’t have done that, Stiles! It must have been great
to see, wasn’t it?”
“Why――er――yes, only――――” Stiles paused. “It looked to us as if Baker
was scared, Logan. Of course he wasn’t, but that’s what it looked like.
I didn’t know he was such a scrapper.”
“Who, Dud?” Jimmy spread his hands expressively. “Take my advice, old
man, and don’t let him hear you say he looked scared, though maybe he
wouldn’t touch you. And then again he might lose control of that temper
of his and―――― Better not risk it, I guess.”
“I wouldn’t think of it,” said Stiles earnestly. “I didn’t really think
he was scared, you know; only some of the other fellows who saw it said
it _looked_ that way. Don’t tell Dud Baker I said that, will you?”
“Me? No indeed. In fact, I wouldn’t mention the thing to him at any
price. He’s awfully touchy, you see, and ever since this morning he’s
been sort of like a bear with a sore head. I guess there’s times when
he wishes he’d forgotten himself and let fly! Well, so long!”
Jimmy walked on toward Lothrop and Ned Stiles plunged through the
door and hurried down the corridor to leave his books and then spread
his news to all who would hearken to it. And Jimmy, approaching the
first entrance to Lothrop Hall, winked gravely at the ornamental brass
knocker.