AN UNFORTUNATE COMPACT.
Don’s hand dropped instantly and he fell back a step, gasping and
trembling, startled and abashed.
The slender left hand of the girl rested on the breast of her brother,
while her right was lifted with the open palm toward his angry enemy,
upon whom her eyes were turned with an appealing look in their
gold-flaked depths.
“Don’t!” she said, shrinking a little before the clouded face of the
angry lad.
“Zadia!” exclaimed Dolph. “This is no place for you!”
She would not let him put her aside. “No, no!” she almost panted; “you
shall not fight! Please, Mr. Scott, don’t fight with Dolph! Promise me
you will not--for my sake.”
Renwood flushed with shame, thinking the others might fancy he was
seeking protection from his enemy behind his sister’s skirts; and he
begged her to go away, but she remained firm.
“I am sure it is all a mistake, and there is no reason why you should
be enemies,” she said. “Anyhow, you must not fight. You must promise
me, Dolph, that you will not fight with him.”
“I can’t do it,” muttered Renwood. “If he’s bound to fight, I shall not
run away. He’ll get all he wants.”
Immediately the girl turned appealingly to Don.
“Then you must give me your promise,” she said. “Please do!”
It was hard to resist such an appeal from such a source, and Don stood
there biting his lip, silent and uncertain. She stepped up to him
boldly, and placed her hands on both his arms, looking up into his
flushed face in supplication.
“Please promise me!” she breathed.
He drew a long breath. “All right,” he said, “I’ll promise; but don’t
ask any more of me--don’t expect anything more!”
“Thank you.”
“Oh, I don’t deserve any thanks! I shall take care to avoid your
brother, as the easiest way to keep from breaking my promise to you.
I--I’m sorry anything happened--for your sake.”
His voice that had been harsh seemed to soften with the final words,
but he gave his head a toss as he turned away; and then, without
stopping or heeding anybody, he hurried from the field.
“I suppose they’ll all say I’m to blame,” he muttered to himself, as he
walked swiftly past the academy and hastened down the hill. “I don’t
care if they do! I couldn’t stand it from that fellow, and that’s all
there is to it.”
He had gone some distance before he noticed that he was wearing the
football suit and had left his own clothes in the dressing-room beneath
the grand-stand. When he made this discovery, he paused a moment,
tempted to go back at once.
“No,” he finally said, shaking his head; “they’d be there, and some of
them would be changing their clothes. I don’t want to see any of the
fellows now--I don’t want to talk it over.”
So he went on.
Had he returned, he might have arrived at the gate in time to hear an
interesting bit of conversation between three girls. Zadia Renwood was
talking with the two companions who had accompanied her to the field,
Dora Deland and Agnes Mayfair.
“I’m sorry,” said Agnes, with genuine sympathy expressed on her sweet
face and in her dark eyes. “I’m sorry your brother should have trouble
with any of the boys, Zadia, and I’m sure Don Scott will be sorry when
he gets over being angry.”
“I’m not very sure about that, myself,” Dora laughed, with curling
lips. “He has a frightful temper, which he never tries to restrain, and
I think he’s just perfectly horrid. I can’t bear him. Of course he was
entirely to blame, and I think----”
“Perhaps he was not wholly to blame,” interrupted Zadia, generously.
“Even though Dolph is my brother, I know he is not perfect.”
“I think he’s perfectly splendid,” smiled Dora; “and I know Don Scott
must have been to blame, for he always is. So there!”
“I shall tell Dolph that you were his champion.”
“Oh, don’t--not for the world! But I don’t like Don Scott; I never did.
He scowls so, and he looks as if he’d bite anybody.”
“Now,” said Zadia, with a little laugh, “if I were to confess the
truth, I’d tell you that I think him a handsome fellow--really and
truly I do! Ana he looks the handsomest when he is angry. I don’t
believe he’d be afraid of anything, and I’m sure he’d become a natural
leader if he could master his temper.”
“Goodness, Zade!” cried Dora. “I really believe you are struck on him!”
“Oh, no!” protested Dolph’s sister, though she flushed betrayingly.
“But I can’t help liking him, for some reason.”
Little did Don dream how the sister of the lad he so disliked felt
toward him, and he was convinced in his heart that she must despise
him, which, although he would not confess it even to himself, made him
all the bitterer.
Concealed by a thick hedge near his home, he saw the boys trooping down
the street from the football field, chatting and laughing. They seemed
to have forgotten about him, and he clenched his hands and ground his
heel into the ground as if crushing out a life beneath his foot.
“They’re a lot of soft things!” he muttered. “Not one of them has a
mind of his own or any real spirit. I despise them all!”
The three girls seemed to have found companions suited to their tastes,
for they had paired off with three of the boys. In advance were John
Smith and Agnes Mayfair, the tall lad looking rather awkward beside the
graceful, dark-eyed girl. Just behind them were Dolph Renwood and Dora
Deland, Dora seeming very well satisfied with her conquest, if conquest
it was.
“They make a good pair,” declared Don to himself, with curling lips.
“She’s called the prettiest girl in the village, and it has spoiled
her, for she thinks every fellow who sees her is struck on her. She
has an idea that the village boys are not good enough for her, so she
always smiles on strangers. Just because Renwood comes from Boston she
has an idea that he’s a superior sort of person. Bah! He is welcome to
her, and she’s welcome to him.”
Following Dolph and Dora were Dick Sterndale and Dolph’s sister. The
lips of the watching lad tightened and his brows lowered.
“So she has taken up with Sterndale,” he whispered. “I expected she
would, for he has a way of getting round any girl; but she’s too good
for him, even if she is Renwood’s sister. If she’d ever heard him joke
about his mashes, as I have, she’d take care. She’d better keep away
from him if she values her good name.”
For all that Dora Deland was the belle of the village, in Don’s eyes
she did not compare at all favorably with the city girl, who carried
herself with more grace and whose clothes had a certain something
about them that bespoke better taste. In fact, there was that marked
difference between the two girls that always distinguishes the
city-bred from those reared in the country.
Dick’s hearty laugh rang out as his companion made some observation.
“Yes, that is where he lives,” said the captain of the eleven, with a
motion toward Don’s home.
The boy behind the hedge neared Dick’s words, and then Zadia said
something he did not hear, but Sterndale laughed again in his hearty
way.
“Talking about me!” grated Don, his teeth clenched. “She is laughing,
too! I suppose she thinks I’m a common country fool! What do I care for
what she thinks!”
Still he watched them as they passed onward down the tree-lined street,
and his heart was hot in his bosom.
“Perhaps she’ll not think so much of herself after she’s been round
with Sterndale a while,” he muttered; “for just as sure as she lets
him hang round her she’ll discover people are talking. Everybody knows
Sterndale, and still it’s the strangest thing in the world that almost
any girl in the village would be glad to take up with him. He has a
way about him that makes them like him, no mater what he does; while
something about me makes folks dislike me, no matter what I do. It’s my
luck to be just as I am! I can’t help it! It’s no use for me to try!”
His father drove up to the door, having just returned from his
afternoon calls; and Don took pains to keep out of sight while Dr.
Scott surrendered the horse and carriage to Pat and entered the house,
for he was in no mood to meet his father just then.
When he was satisfied that all the boys had passed, he went round to
the back of the house and threw himself on the ground beneath the sweet
apple-tree, giving himself up entirely to bitter thoughts.
He was mistaken, however, about all the boys having passed, for he had
not been reclining beneath the tree two minutes before Leon Bentley
appeared, slowly following the others.
At sight of Bentley, Don sprang up, calling sharply:
“Look here, Bent, I want to see you. Come over here, where we can talk.”
Bentley crossed the street and vaulted the fence. The expression on his
sallow face was anything but pleasant.
“Yes, and I want to see you, too,” he said, apparently paying no
attention to Don’s scowl of anger. “This is our chance to have a little
talk where no one will hear us.”
“I want to know one thing,” said Don, “and that is if you meant what
you said to me here before we went up to the field to practice.”
“Of course I meant anything I said,” declared Leon, flinging himself
in a comfortable position on the ground. “What are you driving at, old
man?”
“You said you did not fancy Renwood’s style of lording it over us.”
“Well, I’ll stand by that, you can bet your life!”
“You spoke about combining against him.”
“Don’t you think it about time to do something of the sort?”
“And yet,” flared Don, “when he gave me a call-down on the field and we
had our little trouble, you never opened your head. You kept closed up,
like a clam, and it looked as if you sympathized with him. Why didn’t
you stand by me? Why didn’t you show your colors? What ailed you?”
“Now don’t fly off the handle,” grinned Leon, producing a package
of cigarettes, “You need something to soothe your nerves. Have a
cigarette?”
“No! I don’t smoke them.”
“I know; but you’ll find them mighty soothing to the nerves, and you
need something of the sort. Try one.”
“No; I don’t like the smell of them.”
“You will after you smoke a few. They’re great, old man. Just try one,
now.”
“I’m too mad to smoke or do anything else but fight. Take the things
away! Why don’t you answer my question?”
Leon selected a cigarette and prepared it for lighting. Don found it
hard to restrain himself while the fellow was doing all this. When
Bentley had lighted the cigarette, he took a deep pull at it, inhaled
the smoke, and let it escape from his mouth in little puffs as he asked:
“What was your question?”
“I asked you why you didn’t show your colors and stand by me when I had
my quarrel with Renwood.”
“I didn’t consider it policy just then, Don.”
“But you saw I was all alone. Everybody seemed against me. If you had
put yourself openly on my side just then I’d appreciated it.”
“Sometimes it is best not to be too open in such affairs. The matter
with you is that you’re too open in everything. If you hate a fellow,
you let him know it right off, so he’s prepared for any move you make
against him. Now, I don’t believe in that. If I hate a chap, I just
keep still till I get a good chance to soak him, and then I can take
him by surprise.”
Leon said this with a foxy smile that was rather repulsive to the other.
“No, I don’t fancy that way of doing things,” admitted Don, promptly.
“If I hate a fellow, I want him to know it. It’s a satisfaction to have
him know just what I think of him.”
“And it puts him on his guard against you. That’s not my style. I’m
just as sore on Renwood as you are, but I felt that I might hit him
harder if I kept still. I’m onto him, and I know he’s down on me. He
wants to chuck me off the eleven, so I wasn’t going to play right into
his hands by siding openly with you and giving him a good excuse to
turn Sterndale against me.”
“Confound Sterndale! I’m sick of him! He is letting this city cad
manage him.”
“Of course he is, but he’d get hot in a minute if anybody told him so.”
“What makes you think Renwood wants to get you off the eleven?”
“Why, he’s been throwing out hints. He’s said there were some fellows
on the team who were no earthly good.”
“I heard him say that!” grated Don; “and he meant me, too!”
“He may have meant you for one, but I am the other.”
“How do you know?”
“Oh, I took pains to get near enough to overhear some things he was
saying to Sterndale after you left the field. They didn’t see me, but I
heard this sneak Renwood say outright that he thought the eleven could
be strengthened by filling my place with somebody else. I felt like
punching his head then and there, but I just kept still and didn’t let
anybody know what I had heard.”
“I couldn’t have kept still.”
“That’s where you’re foolish. He said I smoke too many cigarettes. Just
as if that had anything to do with my playing! What rot! And he even
declared that I lack nerve, so that I would weaken in a hard game.”
At another time Don Scott might have realized that he had entertained
similar convictions regarding Leon, but just now he exclaimed:
“And you never did a thing? Why, I’d walked out to him and showed him
if I lacked nerve!”
“And got chucked off the team for your pains. But I’ll show him! I’m
going to stay on the team, and I’ll bet ten dollars Mr. Dolph Renwood
will get kicked off.”
Don looked at his companion with new interest.
“How do you propose to bring that about?” he asked.
“Well, I don’t know just now, but I’ll do it. I have an idea that
Renwood doesn’t care a snap whether Rockspur beats Highland or not.”
“Then, why is he coaching the team?”
“Just to show off what he knows. I tell you, Don, if you and I stand
together, we can floor that fellow.”
“But I’m out of it; I’m no longer on the team.”
“I am, and I’ll report to you anything that may be of interest. I’m
going to lay some snares to trip Mr. Renwood, and I may need your help.
If I do, can I count on you?”
“I don’t know,” was the doubtful answer. “It makes a difference what
you are going to do.”
“I’ll let you know about that later,” said Bentley, rising. “I want you
to know that I’m your friend, and I sympathize with you in this affair.
We’ll stand by each other to the end. Here is my hand on it, Scott.
We’ll make a compact against Dolph Renwood, and we’ll throw him down,
too. Shake!”
He held out his right hand, the first two fingers of which were stained
a sickly yellow.
Don hesitated, something within him revolting against forming a compact
with a fellow so unscrupulous and crafty; but, for all that he would
not confess as much even to himself, he desired sympathy and friendship
from some one, and Leon seemed to be the only one to whom he could turn.
“Come,” cried Bentley; “I’ll stick by you through thick and thin, old
man, and you will come out on top, too. You’ll find me the best friend
you ever had, Don.”
The best friend! Never had he known what it was to have a real boy
friend, and now he felt that it would be churlish of him to refuse the
proffered friendship of this lad whose hand was extended to him in his
time of trouble. It was true there were many things about Leon that he
did not admire, but was there not about himself many things that almost
any other lad might dislike? In such a time as this he must not be too
particular.
Don took Bentley’s hand, but something like a shiver ran over him when
he felt Leon’s cold fingers rest in his hot palm. On the instant he was
almost sorry that he had formed such a compact, but he fancied it was
too late to withdraw. The die was cast, and he could not retreat then.