RELATES HOW NELSON BORROWED A LEAF FROM BOB, AND HOW DAN CRIED QUITS
There wasn’t much about gas-engines that Nelson didn’t know, for ever
since he was old enough to walk his family had spent a portion at least
of every summer at the shore, and of late years a gasoline-launch had
been a feature of the vacation program. To be sure, a power-dory was
rather a trifling thing after a thirty-six-foot cruising-launch, and
the engine left much to be desired, but it got along pretty well, and
Nelson wished he didn’t have to return to camp, but might turn the
dory’s head up the lake and go cruising. But perhaps they would let him
take the dory some other time. Tom Ferris was on the pier when the boat
came within easy hail.
“Where’s Dan?” he asked.
“Coming back by road.”
“_Road?_”
“Yes; he decided to walk.”
“What for?” asked Tom incredulously.
Nelson shook his head. “Exercise, I guess,” he answered, as he steered
the dory in under the boom. “Here! catch the bag, will you?”
It was evident that Tom was far from satisfied with the information
supplied, for all the way up the hill he shot suspicious glances
at Nelson, and stumbled over numerous roots and stones in his
preoccupation. But he didn’t discover anything more, at least from
Nelson.
After the mail was distributed in Birch Hall the two boys got their
rackets and balls and climbed the hill, past the spring and the
little sunlit glade where church service was held on Sundays, until a
tiny plateau was reached. Here was the tennis-court, fashioned with
much difficulty and not altogether guiltless of stones, but not half
bad for all that. It was well supplied with back-nets--a fortunate
circumstance, since the woods closed in upon it on all sides, and balls
once lost in the undergrowth would have been difficult to find. Tom,
considering his bulk, played a very fast and steady game, and succeeded
in securing one of the three sets which they managed to finish before
the assembly sounded at eleven o’clock and they fled down the hill to
the lake.
The morning bath, or “soak,” as it was called, was compulsory as
regarded every camper. Nothing save absence or illness was allowed to
excuse a fellow from this duty. Tom and Nelson donned their bathing
trunks and pushed their way out onto the crowded pier. Two of the
steel boats were occupied by councilors, whose duty it was to time the
bathers and keep an eye on adventurous swimmers. The boys lined the
edge of the pier and awaited impatiently the signal from Mr. Ellery.
Presently, “All in!” was the cry, and instantly the pier was empty,
save for a few juniors whose inexperience kept them in shallow water
along the little sandy beach. The water spouted in a dozen places, and
one by one dripping heads bobbed above the surface and their owners
struck out for the steps to repeat the dive. Nelson found the water far
warmer than he was accustomed to at the beaches; it was almost like
jumping into a tub for a warm bath. When he came to the surface after
a plunge and a few vigorous kicks under water he found himself close
to the boat occupied by Dr. Smith. He swam to it, laid hold of the
gunwale, and tried to wipe the water from his eyes.
“What’s the trouble, Tilford?” asked the councilor smilingly.
“I guess my eyes are kind of weak,” Nelson answered. “The water makes
them smart like anything.”
“Better keep them closed when you go under. It isn’t the fault of your
eyes, though; it’s the water.”
“But they never hurt before, sir.”
“Where have you bathed--in fresh water?”
“No, sir--salt.”
“That’s different. The eyes are used to salt water, but fresh water
irritates them.”
“I should think it would be the other way,” said Nelson, blinking.
“Not when you consider that all the secretions of the eye are salty.
Tears never made your eyes smart, did they?”
“No, sir; that’s so. It’s funny, though, isn’t it?”
“Well, it’s like a good many other things, Tilford--strange until you
get used to it. I suppose you swim pretty well?”
“Oh, I don’t know, sir. I’ve swam all my life, I guess, but I don’t
believe I’m what you’d call a dabster.”
“I wouldn’t think of calling you that, anyhow,” laughed the Doctor,
“for I don’t think I know what it means. But how about diving?”
Nelson shook his head.
“I’ve never done much of that. I’ve usually bathed in the surf, you
see. I’d be scared silly if I tried what those fellows are doing.”
The fellows referred to were standing on a tiny platform built up a
good ten feet above the floor of the pier. One by one they launched
themselves into the lake, at least eighteen feet below, some making
straight dives, some letting themselves fall and straightening out just
as they reached the surface, and one, who proved to be Dan Speede,
turning a backward somersault and disappearing feet first and hands
high over head.
“That was a dandy, wasn’t it?” asked Nelson with enthusiasm.
“Yes; I guess Speede’s the star diver here. But he takes mighty big
risks sometimes. If you want to try a dive I’ll watch you and see if I
can help you any with criticism.”
“All right, but I just jump off when I dive,” said Nelson. “But I’d
like to learn, sir.”
So he swam over to the steps, reaching them just ahead of Dan, and
walked along the pier to a place where there was no danger of striking
the steam-launch which was tied alongside. He had just reached a
position that suited him and was standing sideways to the water, when
there as an exclamation, some one apparently stumbled into him, and he
went over like a ninepin, striking the water in a heap and going so
far under he thought he would never come up again. But he did finally,
his lungs full of water and his breath almost gone from his body--came
up choking and sputtering to see Dan looking down with that maddening
grin on his face, and to hear him call:
“Awfully sorry, Tilford. I tripped on a knot-hole!”
Nelson coughed and spat until some of the water was out of him--and it
was odd how disagreeable it tasted after salt water--and turned to swim
back. Dr. Smith was smiling broadly as Nelson passed, and the latter
called, “We won’t count that one, sir.”
Dan was awaiting him on the pier, apparently prepared for whatever
Nelson might attempt in the way of revenge. But Nelson took no notice
of him. This time he made his dive without misadventure, and then swam
out to the Doctor to hear the latter’s criticism.
“That wasn’t so bad, Tilford. But you want to straighten out more and
keep your feet together. And I wouldn’t try to jump off at first; just
fall forward, and give the least little bit of a shove with your feet
at the last moment.”
“I’ll try it again,” said Nelson.
This time Dan did not see Nelson as the latter came along the pier.
He was standing near the edge, daring Hethington to go over with his
hands clasped under his knees, and knew nothing of his danger until
he found himself lifted from his feet. Then he struggled desperately,
but Nelson had seized him from behind and his hands found no clutch on
his captor’s wet body. The next instant he was falling over and over
in a most undignified and far from scientific attitude. He tried to
gather himself together as he struck the water, but the attempt was
not a success, and he disappeared in a writhing heap. Like Nelson, he
came up choking and gasping, trying his best to put a good face on
it, but succeeding so ill that the howls of laughter that had greeted
his disappearance burst forth afresh. But, thought Nelson, he was
a wonderful chap to take a joke, for, having found his breath, he
merely swam quickly to the steps and came up onto the pier looking as
undisturbed as you please.
“That puts us even again, doesn’t it?” he said to Nelson.
Nelson nodded.
He kept a watch on Dan the rest of the time, but the latter made
no attempt to trouble him again. He profited to some extent by Dr.
Smith’s instructions, and when the cry of “All out!” came he believed
that to-morrow he would have the courage to try a dive from the
“crow’s-nest,” as the fellows called the little platform above the
pier. He walked up the hill with Bob and Tom.
“I don’t see why that silly idiot of a Speede wants to be forever
trying his fool jokes on me,” he said aggrievedly.
“That’s just his way,” answered Tom soothingly.
“Well, it’s a mighty tiresome way,” said Nelson, in disgust.
“He has an overdeveloped sense of humor,” said Bob Hethington. “It’s a
sort of disease with him, I guess.”
“Well, I wish he’d forget it,” Nelson grumbled. “I’m afraid to sit down
on a chair now for fear there’ll be a pin in it.”
“Oh, he gets tired after a while,” said Bob. “He was that way with me
for a day after camp began.”
“What did you do?” asked Nelson curiously.
Bob smiled; so did Tom.
“I gave him some of his own medicine. I filled his bunk with
pine-needles--they stick nicely to woolen blankets, you know--tied
knots in every stitch of clothing he had, and put all his shoes in a
pail of water. He’s never bothered me since.”
“Did he get mad?”
“Mad? No, you can’t get the idiot mad. Carter says he laughed himself
to sleep that night--Dan, I mean.”
“I wonder if all the St. Eustace fellows are like him,” Nelson mused.
“If they are, life there must be mighty interesting. Perhaps they have
a course of practical joking there.”
Dinner was at twelve-thirty, and it was a very hungry set of fellows
that dropped themselves onto their stools and attacked the soup, roast
beef, potatoes, spinach, beets, apple pie, and cheese. Nelson marveled
at first at the quantity of milk his neighbors got away with, but after
a day or so he ceased to wonder, drinking his own three or four glasses
without difficulty. After dessert the history of the preceding day was
read by one of the councilors, while the historian, a very small youth
known as “Babe,” grinned sheepishly and proudly as he listened to his
composition. Nelson’s hazing was referred to with gusto and summoned
laughter, and “Babe” was loudly applauded when the history was finished
and the reader had announced “George Fowler.”
At one-thirty the bugle blew for “siesta,” the most trying part of
the day’s program. Every boy was required to go to his bunk and lie
down for half an hour with closed eyes and relaxed body. By the
middle of the summer custom had enabled most of them to accept this
enforced idleness with philosophy, and to even sleep through a portion
at least of the terrible half hour, but at present it was suffering
unmitigated, and many were the pleas offered to escape “siesta.”
When Nelson approached his bunk he was confronted by a square of
brown wrapping-paper on which in black letters, evidently done with a
blacking-brush, was the inscription:
+--------------+
| HILLTON IS A |
| BUM SCHOOL |
+--------------+
He felt his cheeks reddening as the snickers of the watchers reached
him. There was no doubt in his mind as to the perpetrator of the
insult, for insult it was in his judgment, and his first impulse was
to march down the aisle and have it out with Dan there and then. But
he only unpinned the sheet, tossed it on the floor, and laid down on
his bunk. Presently, when his cheeks had cooled, he raised his head
cautiously and looked around. The dormitory was silent. One or two
fellows were surreptitiously reading, a few were resolutely trying to
obey orders, and the others were restlessly turning and twisting in
an agony of inactivity. Mr. Verder was not present, and the dormitory
was in charge of Dr. Smith, whose bunk was at the other end. Nelson
quietly reached out and secured the obnoxious placard, laying it clean
side up between his bed and Bob’s and holding it in place with a shoe.
Then he found a soft pencil, and, lying on the edge of the bunk,
started to work. Bob looked on dispassionately. Nelson wondered if he
ever really got interested in anything.
After a while the task was completed. Nelson looked warily down the
room. Dr. Smith was apparently asleep. Finding two pins, he crept off
the bed and secured the sheet of paper to the rafter where it had hung
before. Up and down the dormitory heads were raised and eager eyes were
watching him. This time the placard hung with the other side toward the
room, and the new inscription read:
+---------------------+
| 1903 |
| HILLTON 17 |
| ST. EUSTACE 0 |
+---------------------+
Nelson scuttled back to bed. Faint whispers reached him. Then:
“Where are you going, Speede?” asked the Doctor’s voice suddenly.
Dan, creeping cautiously up the aisle, paused in his tracks.
“I left something up here, sir.”
“Get it after siesta, then.”
Dan went back to bed. The whispers grew, interspersed with chuckles.
“Cut that out, fellows,” said the Doctor, and silence reigned again.
For the next quarter of an hour the score of last autumn’s football
game between Hillton and St. Eustace flaunted itself to the world. The
fellows, all save one or two who had really fallen asleep, wondered
what would happen after siesta. So did Nelson. He hoped that Dan would
make trouble, for it seemed to him then that that insult could only be
wiped out with blows; and although Dan was somewhat taller and much
heavier than Nelson, the latter fancied he could give a fairly good
account of himself. And then the bugle blew, fellows bounded onto the
floor, and the ensuing racket more than made up for the half hour of
quiet. Dan made at once for the placard. Nelson jumped up and stood
under it. Dan stopped a few steps away.
“That’s my piece of paper, you know,” he said quietly.
“Get it,” answered Nelson.
“Cut it out, you two,” said Bob.
Nelson flashed a look of annoyance at the peacemaker.
Dan viewed him mildly. “Look here,” he said, “if you’ll take that down
and tear it up, we’ll call quits.”
“I don’t know,” said Nelson. “How about Hillton being a bum school?”
Dan grinned.
“You take that down,” he said.
“I will when you take back what you wrote on the other side.”
“Don’t you do it, Dan,” advised a snub-nosed chap named Wells.
“You shut up, Wells,” said Bob; and Wells, who wasn’t popular, was
hustled out of the way by the others who had gathered.
“Well, ain’t she pretty bum?” asked Dan innocently.
“Not too bum to lick you at football,” answered Nelson hotly.
“Pooh!” said Dan. “Do you know why? Because they wouldn’t let me play.”
That aroused laughter, and Nelson stared at his antagonist in deep
disgust. “What an idiot he was,” he said to himself; “he couldn’t be
serious even over a quarrel.”
“Well, she did it, anyhow,” he said rather lamely.
“Well, it’s over now, isn’t it?” asked Dan calmly. “So let’s take the
score down,” and he moved toward the placard.
“No you don’t!” Nelson exclaimed, moving in front of him; “not until
you’ve apologized.”
Dan smiled at him in his irritating manner.
“Don’t you believe I could lick you?” he asked.
“Maybe you can,” said Nelson, “but talking won’t do it.”
“Well, I can; but I’m not going to. There isn’t going to be any row,
so you fellows might as well chase yourselves. It was just a joke,
Tilford. Hillton’s all right. It’s the best school in the country,
barring one. How’ll that do for an apology, my fierce friend?”
“It isn’t quite truthful,” answered Nelson, smiling in spite of
himself, “but I guess it’ll answer. Here’s your old paper.”
Dan accepted it and tore it up. Then he stuffed the pieces in the first
bunk he came to.
“War is averted,” he announced.
Then he went out, followed by most of the inmates of the dormitory, who
were laughingly accusing him of “taking water.”
“He’s a queer chump,” said Nelson, with something of unwilling
admiration in his tones. But Bob didn’t hear him. He was back on his
bed, absorbed in a magazine.
“And you’re another,” added Nelson under his breath.