“RUSTY”
Two busy days followed for Dick. Stanley was a great help, however,
and getting settled into his stride was accomplished fairly easily.
There was his adviser to see and his courses to arrange: he was
required to take seven courses, one of them elective. For the latter
he chose General History, not so much because he felt a hankering
for such knowledge as the course afforded as because it entailed but
two recitations a week. You see, he had to arrange so as not to have
studies interfere too much with football! However, there seemed no
danger of his not having enough school work, for, with History, his
grand total was twenty-nine hours.
He passed his physical examination with flying colours and on Wednesday
set to work with the football candidates. Of these there was a
startling number, he thought. The field that afternoon was so thickly
sprinkled with fellows of all sizes, shapes and degrees of experience
that there was scarcely room to move about. Dick found himself simply
one of many, doomed to go through with the usual routine of the
beginner. At first he felt somewhat impatient and even peeved, but
presently he decided to view the thing as a joke. They would very soon
see that he belonged in an advanced squad, he thought, and meanwhile it
wouldn’t do him any harm to practice the kindergarten stuff with the
rookies.
The coach didn’t appear until Thursday, and when he came, Dick didn’t
altogether approve of him. In the first place, Dick considered him too
old: he looked to be every day of thirty-four or five. In the second
place, Coach Driscoll lacked the good-natured, free-and-easy manner
that Dick’s experience had associated with football instructors. He
wasn’t bad looking, and he had very evidently kept himself in good
physical trim, but, being so old, he would, Dick decided, be horribly
behind the times and out-of-date. “Tod” Driscoll was a Parkinson
graduate and a Yale man. At Yale, he had established an enviable
reputation as a football player. He had been coaching at Parkinson
for five years, Dick learned, and with success, for in that time
the Brown-and-White had thrice triumphed over the Blue of Kenwood.
And he was popular in spite of the fact that he was a very strict
disciplinarian.
Dick found Captain Bob Peters more to his liking. Peters was a homely,
tow-haired, snub-nosed chap built like a Greek athlete, with a smiling
countenance and a clear, creamy-brown skin against which his grey-blue
eyes looked startlingly bright. He was cheerful and light-hearted and
yet could be very intense and very earnest on occasions. He played
at right end on the team. Dick didn’t have any dealings with Captain
Peters at this period, however, for a youth named Warden appeared
to have control of his fortunes. Warden was a dark-complexioned,
earnest fellow who never said an unnecessary word to the squad of
beginners over whom he had been placed, and who worked very hard and
conscientiously every minute. Dick thought he took himself and his duty
a bit too seriously, but couldn’t help liking and respecting him.
Dick was rather surprised at the extremely earnest and business-like
way in which football practice was conducted. There was so much system
and everyone was so serious! Even the manager and his hard-working
assistant appeared to have no thought in life beyond that of turning
out a successful football team. Billy Goode, the trainer, alone seemed
to be unaffected by the contagion of effort. Billy even found time for
a laugh and a joke.
Naturally, Dick was especially interested in the quarter-back
candidates. He got one of the fellows to point out Gus Stone to him,
and was relieved to find that Stone didn’t look very wonderful. He was
rather short and perhaps a bit heavier than the position demanded,
although doubtless a week of work would remove some of the weight.
There was also Cardin, a slighter and younger boy who had played
the position on the Second Team last year. And there were a dozen
others, Dick amongst them, who had declared their preference for the
quarter-back job.
He saw Wallace Blashington now and then on the field or in the
gymnasium, and Blash always spoke, but there was no further meeting
until the following Saturday. By that time Dick had settled down into
the routine of school life, and had decided that he was going to like
Parkinson immensely and Stanley Gard even more. Dick had grown rather
used to having other fellows wait on him, run his errands and make
life easy for him in general. He had never consciously asked such
service, but had received it as a tribute to popularity. But he was
not getting it now. If he had expected Stanley to wait on him--and he
didn’t know whether he had or not, but probably had!--he was doomed
to disappointment. Stanley was the best-hearted chap in the world, but
if one of Dick’s shoes had got away from him and taken up a temporary
abode under Stanley’s bed, it was Dick who fished it out. Only once had
Dick asked a service. Then, seated at his study desk, he had lightly
suggested that Stanley should hand him a book that was lying on the
radiator top near the window. Stanley was seated in a chair somewhat
nearer the radiator than Dick, but there was no sound of movement and
after a second Dick looked around inquiringly. Stanley was still seated
and there was a quizzical grin on his countenance. After a somewhat
blank stare, Dick arose and got the book. As he sat down again he said
sarcastically: “Much obliged, Stan.”
Stanley chuckled. “Dick, you’ve been sort of spoiled, haven’t you?” he
said.
“Spoiled? What do you mean? Just because I asked you----”
“You’re one of those fellows who expect others to do things for ’em,
and get away with it. Wish I knew the secret. But it isn’t good for
you, Dick. You must learn to run your own errands, and whitewash your
own fences. Any time you break a leg, I’ll fetch and carry for you, but
while you’re able to get about--nothing doing! In fact, seeing that
I’m an older resident of this place, I’m not certain you shouldn’t be
fagging for me!”
“Oh, go to the dickens,” muttered Dick. “You make me tired.” Then,
after a moment, he added: “Maybe that was cheeky, Stan. I’m sorry.
Guess I’ve had it too easy.”
“That’s all right, son. It’s just as well to know where we stand,
though. Any other little thing I can do for you?”
“Yes, you can close your silly mouth,” was the answer.
By Saturday Dick felt almost like an old boy. His courses promised to
be only mildly difficult, and the instructors seemed a very decent lot,
notably “Old Addicks” who knew so much of ancient languages that he
looked like an elderly, benignant Greek philosopher, and Mr. McCreedy,
who taught mathematics. Through Stanley he met a great many of the
fellows, and he picked up a few acquaintances himself. Of these latter,
one was “Rusty” Crozier. He was a Fourth Class fellow who preferred
to live in the town, and occupied two comfortable rooms in a house on
Maple Street, just below the school. He was a jolly, light-hearted chap
with a perpetual smile and hair of that peculiar shade of red that
we associate with rusted iron: hence his nick-name. Dick met him in
classroom. “Rusty” borrowed Dick’s fountain pen for a minute. After
class they came together in the corridor and walked a little way along
The Front. That began it. When Dick asked Stanley if he knew Crozier,
Stanley nodded.
“Everyone knows Rusty,” he said. “But if you want to tread the straight
and narrow, Dick, keep away from him.”
“What do you mean? Isn’t he--all right?”
“Oh, yes, Rusty’s all right. That is, there’s nothing vicious about
him. In fact, he’s a very decent, very clean fellow. But he’s gifted
with a talent for discovering trouble. And a talent for squirming out
of it! If he wasn’t he’d have left Parkinson long ago. I’d say that
Rusty’s trouble was an over-developed sense of humor.”
“I rather liked him,” mused Dick.
“You would. So do I. Everyone likes Rusty. But wise guys say him nay
when he suggests one of his innocent amusements. It was Rusty who
closed traffic on Main Street in the middle of a busy Saturday one day
last year, only faculty doesn’t know it.”
“Did what?” asked Dick.
“He borrowed two carpenter’s horses and a sign and placed ’em across
the middle of Main Street, near School, about one o’clock one day
last spring. He found the sign somewhere, I don’t know where. It said
‘Street Closed by Order of Selectmen.’ Then he went over and stood in
Wiley’s drug store and watched the fun. It was almost an hour before
they discovered that it was a hoax. The paper was full of it, and the
selectmen made an awful rumpus, but everyone else thought it was a
pretty good joke.”
“And he wasn’t found out!”
“No. At least a score of people must have seen him set the barrier
up, but no two of them agreed as to what he looked like. Some said he
was a labourer in blue overalls, and others said he was a tall man
with whiskers, and so on. That’s just one of Rusty’s innocent ways of
amusing himself.”
“But doesn’t he ever get caught?” asked Dick incredulously.
“Oh, yes, heaps of times, but he always manages somehow to show that he
was actuated by good intentions or that circumstances worked against
him. Like the time he dropped the parlour match heads all over the
floor in Room G and every time anyone put his foot down, one of the
things went _pop_! He showed Jud the hole in his pocket where the
things had fallen out. If it hadn’t been for the hole, he claimed, it
wouldn’t have happened. He got off with a month’s probation, I think.”
Dick laughed. “He must be a cut-up! Well, I’ll keep away from him when
he feels frolicsome.”
“Trouble is,” said Stanley, “you never can tell when Rusty is going to
spring something.” He smiled and then chuckled. “Three or four of us
walked over to Princeville two years ago to the circus. It was one of
those little one-ring affairs, you know, with a mangey camel, and a
moth-eaten lion and a troop of trained dogs. It was rather fun. Rusty
was one of us, and he was as quiet as a mouse until near the end. Then
he began flicking peanuts at the ring master. We tried to stop him, but
he wouldn’t quit. Every time the ring master turned his back, Rusty
would land a peanut on him, and the crowd got to laughing and gave it
away. So they hustled us all out, and we didn’t see the performing
dogs. Has he asked you over to his room at Spooner’s?”
“Yes,” said Dick, suspiciously. “Is there any trick in that?”
“Oh, no,” answered Stanley, smilingly. “He has very jolly quarters. If
you like we’ll go over together some evening.”
“All right. Only I don’t like that catfish grin of yours. I suppose
he has a trick staircase that folds up and lets you down in a heap or
something?”
“No. Rusty’s fun is pretty harmless. We’ll wander over there tonight if
you like.”
“Well, but I’m going to keep my eyes open just the same,” Dick laughed
“You’re too anxious to go along, Stan!”
That afternoon Dick found a letter in the rack downstairs. It bore
the Warne postmark, and was addressed to him in a very dashing hand:
“Richard C. Bates, Esq., Sohmer Hall, Parkinson School, Town.”
Wondering, Dick opened the envelope. Within was an oblong of pasteboard
punched with three holes of varying sizes. In one of the holes was an
ancient looking cent so badly corroded that it was hard to read the
lettering. Dick’s thoughts naturally fell on Rusty Crozier, although
what the joke meant, he couldn’t make out. But he smiled and dropped
the coin in a waistcoat pocket, and presently forgot about it.
Returning from football practice at five, however, he found another
missive awaiting him. The envelope was different and the writing
different, but there was just such another coin-card within and in
the card was a second penny. This one was bright enough, but it had
been badly bent. Dick, puzzled, added the second coin to the first,
resolved to find out the meaning of the prank that evening.
He and Stanley went across the campus and down Maple Street about
eight. Spooner’s was a large, square house standing almost flush with
the sidewalk. Like many of the residences thereabouts, its upper floors
were tenanted by students unable or disinclined to secure rooms on the
campus. Stanley pulled open a squeaky screen door and entered. At the
foot of the staircase, he paused and lifted his voice.
“Oh, Rusty!” he shouted. “Rusty-y-y!”
Somewhere above a door opened and a voice answered.
“A-a-ay! Come up!”
Stanley led the way again up two flights, and then to a door at the
front of the house. Oddly enough, it was closed tightly, which fact,
since it had been opened a moment before, struck Dick as peculiar.
Stanley knocked and a voice called “Come in!” Somehow Stanley managed
to get behind Dick, and it was Dick who turned the knob and pressed
the door inward. The next instant he was precipitated into a glare of
light. The knob had jerked itself out of his hand, and something--he
supposed at the moment the something to have been Stanley--had
banged against his heels and pushed him violently into the room. He
stopped to find himself asprawl over an armchair with a placard bearing
the word WELCOME a few inches from his nose.
“Good evening,” said Rusty amiably from across the room.
[Illustration: _“Good evening,” said Rusty amiably_]
“Hello,” gasped Dick. Then he looked back at the door for Stanley.
Stanley was not there. But at the instant the door opened again and
Stanley appeared. He was grinning broadly, but Dick was too much
interested in the door to see it. The door was not opening like any
door Dick had ever seen. In the first place it was turning on pivots
at top and bottom, half of it coming in, and half of it going out, so
that the aperture for entrance was scarcely wider than Stanley. In the
second place, Stanley was holding hard to that knob and being fairly
dragged through, for above the sill and below the lintel was a coiled
spring that, so soon as the knob was turned, swung the door swiftly on
its axis from left to right. Dick stared in surprise.
“Just a little idea of my own, Bates,” said Rusty, coming forward and
removing the placard from the back of the chair to a place on the wall.
“Have a chair.”
Dick looked from the proffered chair to Rusty and then to Stanley and
shook his head. “No, thanks,” he muttered. “I’ll stand!”
However, Stanley assured him on oath that the chair was quite safe and
wouldn’t double up under him and he consented to try it, although not
without anxiety. But he was up again a moment later, demanding to be
shown the working of the amazing door.
“Quite simple,” laughed Rusty. “First I unlock it, thus. Then I stand
clear of it. Then the unsuspecting visitor outside turns the knob.”
He turned it from the inside, stepping quickly out of the way, and
the door leaped open, swung once around and stopped as the latch
snapped again into its socket. “That’s all there is to it. I place the
cushioned chair here to receive the caller and place the ‘Welcome’ sign
where he will be sure to see it. Most all the fellows know about it
now, though, and I have to rely on newcomers like you, Bates, for a bit
of fun.” He locked the portal again.
“Well, but--but suppose you want to go out?” asked Dick.
“I go out the other door.” Rusty indicated the adjoining bedroom. “In
fact,” he added with a twinkle, “I seldom use this entrance myself. I
keep it locked until I am expecting a distinguished visitor.”
“Still, I don’t see how you knew I was with Stan,” Dick objected.
“You’ll have to ask Stan about that,” laughed Rusty.
“I told him,” explained Stanley, grinning.
“Oh! Then that’s why you were so anxious to come with me.” Dick fixed
his room-mate with an accusing eye. “All right. I’ll get even with you,
old son, if it takes my last--if it takes my last two pennies!” He
looked quickly at Rusty, but there was nothing to show that the latter
had grasped the allusion. “Maybe,” continued Dick, “you’d like to see
them.” He fished the two cents from his pocket and held them forth.
Stanley viewed them interestedly and so did Rusty.
“What’s the idea?” asked the former. “Do you mean that you’re down to
those? Stony broke, Dick?”
Rusty’s innocent, uncomprehending expression remained and Dick began to
think his suspicions wrong. “No, those are just--just pocket-pieces,”
he answered flatly.
“Wouldn’t be very useful to you in a pinch,” observed his host. “Well,
find seats, fellows. Hope you didn’t mind the reception, Bates. But I
guess you didn’t. You look like a fellow who can take a joke.”
“No, I didn’t mind,” said Dick. “Guess I was too surprised to mind!” He
looked about the room. “This is pretty comfortable, Crozier.”
“Not bad. I’ve had these rooms ever since my first year. Got two
nice windows in front and one on the side there, and two more in the
bedroom. Mrs. Spooner is a corking old soul, and doesn’t mind a bit of
noise now and then.”
Stanley chuckled, and when Dick looked across inquiringly he explained.
“Mrs. Spooner’s as deaf as a haddock, Dick. If she wasn’t she couldn’t
live in the same house with Rusty!”
“Run away! I’m not noisy. Sometimes my guests are, but I do all I can
to restrain them. Haynes gives me more trouble than Mrs. S. He has the
room under this on the floor below, Bates, and insists on studying at
the times I feel playful. There are four other fellows in the house and
you couldn’t pry any of us loose. You chaps can have your dormitory
rooms. I don’t want them, thanks.”
“Do you take your meals here?” Dick inquired.
“No, Mrs. S. doesn’t give meals. She used to, but that was before my
time. I eat around. Usually at ‘The Eggery.’ Sometimes at Thacher’s.
Stan says you’re out for the football team. Going to make it all right?”
“I don’t know, I’m sure. I’m going to try to. Do you--are you----”
“No, I’m not athletic, Bates. My favourite sport is mumblepeg. Besides,
my studies prevent. Oh, shut up, Stan! Let me make a good impression on
Bates, can’t you? What time is it, anyway? Look here, let’s go to the
movies. What do you say?”
“Not for me,” answered Stanley. “I’ve got to beat it back and do some
work tonight. Besides, the last time----”
“Oh, that!” laughed Rusty. “Wasn’t it silly? Such a fuss about so
little, eh?”
“Oh, yes, very little!” Stanley turned to Dick. “He and Blash stretched
a rope across the aisle and tied it to the arms of the seats ahead of
them. Being fairly dark, some confusion ensued!”
“During which, if I remember correctly, you and Joe and Blash sneaked
out. Just shows what a guilty conscience will do, Bates. I remained,
secure in my innocence, and saw the show through.”
“Yes, you rotter!” said Stan indignantly. “You put the blame on us, and
every time I go there now the doorman looks at me unkindly.”
“Well, you were out of the way and I wasn’t. Besides, I wanted to see
the rest of the picture.”
“Rusty, if you got your deserts,” said Stanley, feelingly, “you’d be
shot at sunrise. Well, I must beat it. Coming along, Dick?”
Dick went, in spite of Rusty’s pleas. They left by way of the bedroom
and Dick watched the hall door very, very carefully. It proved to be a
perfectly normal door, however. Rusty told Dick to call again and held
conversation with them over the banister until they had reached the
street door, while from a second floor room came howls of “Shut up,
Rusty! Shu-u-ut u-u-up!”
“It’s only Haynes,” called Rusty reassuringly. “Don’t mind the poor
fish. Come again, fellows! Good night!”
In the letter rack in Sohmer was another envelope addressed to Dick and
within was a third penny.