Barry Locke, half-back
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BARRY LOCKE
HALF-BACK
BARRY LOCKE
HALF-BACK
BY
RALPH HENRY BARBOUR
Author of “THE CRIMSON SWEATER,” “HARRY’S ISLAND,”
“TEAM-MATES,” “THE TURNER TWINS,” Etc.
ILLUSTRATED BY
C. M. RELYEA
THE CENTURY CO.
_New York & London_
COPYRIGHT, 1925, BY
THE CENTURY CO.
PRINTED IN U. S. A.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I BARRY LOCKE ARRIVES 3
II JONES LENDS A HAND 22
III BARRY MAKES A PURCHASE 37
IV “PUP NIGHT” 46
V FESSENDEN FIDDLES 59
VI “PEACHES” 71
VII DRAFTED 84
VIII WITH THE SQUAD 97
IX BARRY SHOWS HIS STUFF 109
X STATION W.L.L.O. BROADCASTS 122
XI MURRAY SCHOOL THREATENS 137
XII CLYDE ASKS A FAVOR 146
XIII BETTY CONFIDES 156
XIV BARRY SEEKS ADVICE 172
XV CLYDE LOSES HIS TEMPER 181
XVI MR. BENJY LOSES INTEREST 193
XVII CLYDE APOLOGIZES 204
XVIII UNDER COVER 213
XIX THE NEW TYPEWRITER 229
XX THE OLD DESK REPAYS KINDNESS 248
XXI A MYSTERY SOLVED 261
XXII UP THE MOUNTAIN 275
XXIII EVEN-STEVEN 284
XXIV “LOCKE BACK!” 299
XXV ZO PLAYS 310
XXVI THE RIGHT SORT 321
ILLUSTRATIONS
FACING
PAGE
“I THOUGHT I’D BETTER WAIT AROUND AND GIVE YOU A
HAND” _Frontispiece_
“KEEP YOUR HEAD, BOY, LOCK YOUR LEG, AND WHAM IT!” 146
“ALL RIGHT, DAVY,” CALLED PEACHES, SOFTLY 220
“EVER SEE THAT BEFORE?” 270
BARRY LOCKE――HALF-BACK
BARRY LOCKE
HALF-BACK
CHAPTER I
BARRY LOCKE ARRIVES
Barry didn’t wait for the conductor’s announcement. He was at the car
door before the little Connecticut village came into sight. There was
a glimpse of South Street, shaded, asleep in the afternoon sunshine,
and then the freight-shed interposed a blank yellow countenance. Barry
shifted the light overcoat on his arm――he had wanted to put it in
the trunk, but his mother, suspicious of September in the hills, had
overruled him――and picked up his suit-case just as the conductor bawled
past him, into the hot, dusty interior:
“Wessex! Wessex! Change for Sanborn Mills, Mount Sippick, and Alden!
_We-e-essex!_”
The station threw a welcome shadow and the train stopped. Barry
descended, his brown eyes alight, a smile, slightly shy, already
curving his lips. Others, crowding about him, sent him deeper into the
shade of the platform, his gaze still questing. At least a score of
boys had alighted, and these, mingling with almost as many previous
occupants of the platform, made for sound and confusion. Friends parted
since June sighted one another with loud hails and plowed determinedly
toward a reunion, heedless of all between.
No one, however, took notice of the fifteen-year-old boy who, puzzled
and disappointed, still viewed the fast thinning throng. He was worth
notice, too. Very straight he was, and rather slender; although the
slenderness suggested the process of development rather than the lack
of it. He had brown hair, and eyes that may have been intended to
match it but didn’t because they were very much warmer in tone. Rather
arresting eyes they were, and perhaps the best feature of a countenance
which, while in no way suggesting the classic beauty of Apollo, was
undeniably attractive. The nose was a perfectly good nose, but you
had to stop there; and the mouth was all right, too, and had a nice
smile; and there was the usual chin and forehead, and a coating of tan,
and――well, that’s about all there is to tell――and I haven’t made you
see John Barry Locke as he really looked, after all.
I fancy it was Barry’s expression rather than his features that made
folks warm to him and want to know him and do nice things for him, and
expressions are difficult to portray in print. Perhaps the simplest
way to describe him is to say that Barry looked, in his boyishly eager
yet shy fashion, as though he were ready to like everybody else! Yes,
I think that was the secret of his attraction――just friendliness. And
yet there was something beyond that, too; something promised in those
deep-brown eyes that looked at one so straightly. Maybe it was loyalty.
The last flivver had honked off into silence and the afternoon’s event,
the arrival and departure of the four-eighteen train, had passed into
history. Barry gave up his quest and followed the route taken by the
others, along the platform to the corner of the station and thence
across an area of sun-smitten gravel to the main thoroughfare of
Wessex. His suit-case wasn’t heavy, and he wasn’t going to mind the
walk; only, he didn’t understand why Clyde hadn’t met him as he had
promised. And then, quite abruptly, Clyde was there.
Clyde was rather warm of face and a trifle breathless, a condition
that caused him to voice his greeting in tones of resentment rather
than apology:
“Well! Got here, eh? Gosh, but it’s warm! How are you?”
“Great,” answered Barry, with an enthusiasm the other considered quite
uncalled for. “What time did you get here, Clyde?”
“About a quarter-past two. We had a flat, and lost ten minutes, I
guess. That new chauffeur of Dad’s is a dumb-bell. All thumbs.”
“Dumb-bells are like that,” chuckled Barry. Clyde Allen glanced
questioningly at him and then frowned. Barry had an irritating way
of making jokes that Clyde didn’t fathom. The boys were proceeding
unhurriedly along Main Street, Barry still in possession of bag and
overcoat. Clyde had made a none too emphatic reach for the suit-case,
but Barry had shaken his head and tightened his grasp on it. Now the
latter asked:
“How far is this room of mine, Clyde?”
“Oh, just a little way. Not quite out to the school. You understand how
it was about the other place, don’t you?”
“Why, yes, I guess so,” replied Barry. “Anyhow, it’s all right. I
mean――oh, of course I’m disappointed, Clyde, because I did want to get
into a dormitory, but if I can’t, I can’t.”
“Sure!” agreed the other, with evident relief. “Anyhow, you aren’t
missing anything. Lots of the fellows would be glad to be where you
are. Being outside gives you a heap more――more freedom. And Mrs. Lyle’s
is the best of all the private houses. Gosh! I was disappointed, too,
old top, when Hal sprung it on me! I thought of course he was going in
with Pete Johnston, but Pete fixed up a deal with another chap so he
could get into Meddill, and so――well, Hal had no place to go and the
least I could do was to tell him to stay. I thought of course you’d be
able to get on the campus. But everything’s chockablock this fall. A
whole bunch of chaps have had to go outside, I hear.”
“Are there any other fellows at Mrs. Lyle’s?”
“Yes, I believe she said she had two others. You’ll like it there.
She’s a good scout――Mrs. Lyle. I knew a fellow who was there last year
and he was crazy about it.”
“Is he there now?” asked Barry.
“No, he’s in Dawson this year. He’s in the First, and of course
First-Class fellows want to be on the campus. Last year, you know,
and――and all that.”
“I suppose so,” Barry responded. “Well, I dare say I’ll get along fine
at Mrs. Lyle’s, Clyde, and you mustn’t bother about me.”
“Sure! And you must use our room like it was your own, Barry. Hal said
I was to tell you that. Lots of times you won’t want to go back to
Lyles’ between recitations, and you can come up to Forty-two and make
yourself at home.... That’s the Town Hall over there. Looks like a
relic, doesn’t it? And that’s the Methodist church.”
“Sort of a pretty town,” said Barry.
“Well, yes, but it’s a dead old hole. Only one movie, and that’s
upstairs over the post-office! But the school’s all right. Corking lot
of fellows. I’ll take you around to-morrow and show you the ropes. It’s
a bit late to-day. Say, why didn’t your folks bring you over in the
car? I was sure surprised when you ’phoned me yesterday that you were
going by train.”
“Dad had to go to Hudson on some business and needed the car. He wanted
me to take it, but I didn’t see any sense in that. Besides, the train
was pretty good fun. I hadn’t been on one for a couple of years.”
“I haven’t, either. I’ve got no use for them. Give me an auto every
time. Say, I shouldn’t be surprised if there weren’t any railroad
trains pretty soon! Almost every one has some sort of a car. Oh, well,
for long trips, like out to Chicago, or to San Francisco, maybe. But I
guess we’ll be doing that by airships before long.... You can see Croft
Hall now, if you look past the end of that barn. Dawson’s this side of
it, but it’s behind the trees. The Lyles’ house is beyond this one.
This is Stimson’s. He’s our math instructor.”
Barry wasn’t following Clyde’s chatter very closely. For one thing,
the lightest suit-case will become a burden toward the end of three
quarters of a mile, and an overcoat on a warm day is no comfort, even
if hung over the arm. Besides, Barry found more interest in the scene
than in his friend’s remarks. There were times when he thought Clyde’s
talk a trifle vapid, and this was one of them. He always tried to
banish that thought, however, for he liked Clyde, and, too, owed him a
debt of gratitude. They had left the town well behind and were going
southward on a well-paved road beside which, at intervals, modest
houses, usually flanked by barn and stable, stood back of neat shaded
lawns.
On the right stretched a wide meadow. Now and then Barry caught the
glint of sunlight on the surface of a little river that wound through
it, and, far ahead, a cluster of farm buildings well away from the
road dozed in the shade of four giant elms. What interested him more,
though, was the white dwelling that presently emerged to view beyond
the end of an old red barn.
As they neared it Barry experienced a sense of disappointment. It was
two stories in height, and the peaked roof presented so many warped and
broken shingles that it was difficult to credit it with efficiency. But
the white paint was fresh, there were flowers about the low veranda
across the front, and the windows, between their green blinds, were
hung with clean muslin curtains. Rather a box of a house, thought
Barry, and one promising few luxuries. Not that he demanded luxuries,
exactly; but, until a few days since, he had looked forward to being in
Dawson Hall, and this was very unlike what he had pictured Dawson to be.