Barry Locke, half-back
“It was summer before last, in Maine. His folks and mine have cottages
at Orchard Bluff. We were in swimming one day and I got sort of far
out. The tide’s kind of tricky there sometimes. There’s a current
that sets along the beach and swings out around Frenchman’s Head. I
didn’t realize I was so far from the beach at first, and when I did and
started back I couldn’t make much headway. I guess I got sort of scared
and nervous, and probably I didn’t get much of a stroke. Anyway, I
wasn’t making shore at all; just going down toward the Head. Clyde and
two other chaps were there, near the beach, and Clyde happened to miss
me and saw what was happening. So he swam out and――and helped me in.”
“I see,” said Peaches. “Allen must be a good swimmer. Better than you,
is he?”
“Why, I don’t know. I――I guess we’re about alike. Only, you see, I was
more tired that time.”
“Couldn’t have kept afloat much longer? Ready to give up when he
arrived?”
“Oh, no, but――I know what you’re getting at, Peaches. Of course I
mightn’t have drowned. I might have floated and worked my way in around
the Head. But I _was_ sort of nervous, and when you’re nervous――”
“You get over it if you’re any kind of a swimmer. Come on, tell the
truth. If Allen hadn’t ‘rescued’ you you’d have got ashore farther
along the beach. Only, he thought he was saving your life and you
didn’t like to tell him he wasn’t. Isn’t that about it?”
Barry looked pathetically uncomfortable.
“Maybe he didn’t actually save me from drowning,” he acknowledged, “but
he did come to my rescue, and he _thought_ I was drowning, and it would
have been just the same if I had been!”
“Oh, I’m not trying to detract from Allen’s stunt. What he did was
plucky, all right. But the main point, if you’ll only see it, is that
he _didn’t_ save your life, no matter what he thinks; and if he didn’t
you certainly don’t owe him a blamed thing!”
“Well, but――don’t you see――”
“Of course I do! He thinks he rescued you from death and takes good
care you don’t forget it. And you were too soft-hearted to tell him
then and――you never have. But if I were you I’d get rid of the notion
that I owed my life to him. I’d use my own judgment about things
instead of his. And if I wanted to play football, I’d play football!”
Barry sat silent but unconvinced. Finally: “You said yourself I
couldn’t tell Clyde the――the truth,” he protested. “And he thinks I owe
him something, naturally, so I’ve just got to show some gratitude!”
“All right,” answered Peaches, grimly. “But you’re not going to get out
of football to please him, my bucko, and you may take my word for it.
If you go to Major Loring with any cock-and-bull story like you tried
on me I’ll see him myself and tell him the facts.”
“That’s not fair,” Barry protested.
“Fair enough for me. If it comes to that, no one’s being fair. Allen
isn’t, and that’s a cinch! And you’re not, if you let the team down now
when it needs you. No, sir! you tell Allen that there’s nothing doing.
I suppose he’s afraid some of his swell friends will give him the
raspberry if he doesn’t get on the team. I hope they do. He’s trying
to train with a lot of sap-heads, anyway. I know the bunch. I started
in with them the first year I was here. They made me so sick I had to
quit. It would be the best thing in the world for Allen if they gave
him the shake. And you might tell him that, too.”
“He didn’t used to be so――so――” Barry sought unsuccessfully for a word.
“He’s been ‘so――so’ ever since I first knew him,” said Peaches,
harshly. “He’s been trying to make ‘society’ here right along. He and
that side-kick of his, Stearns. Either of ’em would lick my boot if
I’d asked ’em home for a week-end!” Barry looked decidedly shocked and
shook his head in remonstrance. “Let me tell you something,” pursued
Peaches. “The day you landed here and I saw you were under Allen’s
thumb I made up my mind to――well, get you out. You seemed a decent chap
and worth saving. That’s why I sort of haunted you for a day or two. I
could see that you didn’t quite approve of me and wondered why I didn’t
mind my own business.”
“I didn’t, really!” said Barry, earnestly. “I mean I didn’t wonder.”
“Anyway, you were perfectly polite,” chuckled Peaches. “Not that it
would have mattered to me if you hadn’t been. I’d have persisted in
my――may I say crusade? There were times when I was discouraged. I
acknowledge it. There were times when it seemed that Allen’s――let’s
see――domination was too much for me. And then the Major kidnapped
you for football and I could see a rift in the clouds. Several times
after that you showed a disposition――oh, faint, I own!――to act on
your own initiative and think for yourself. I began to have hopes for
you, Barry; I really did. But now――well, now you’re trying to have a
relapse.”
“It was very nice of you to interest yourself in me,” said Barry,
rather stiffly. Apparently he had not heard much of the latter part of
the discourse. “I’m afraid you’ve been badly bored at times.”
Peaches regarded him questioningly. Then, however, he smiled.
“Oh, well, I see what you mean, Barry. But you’re quite mistaken, and I
guess you know it. If you must have it, Mister Hoity-Toity, I have long
since fallen victim to your manly charms and――er――sterling character.”
“Shut up!” growled Barry. But he grinned, too. Then, hurriedly: “That’s
all right,” he went on, “but what am I going to do? I told Clyde I’d
see the Major and try――try to resign!”
“See him, then,” said Peaches. “Only, my young friend, don’t lie to
him.”
Barry sighed. “I don’t want to lie, Peaches, only――well――gee!――what can
I say?”
Peaches shrugged.
“Tell him you’ve decided to quit. If he asks you why, say it’s none of
his business.”
“Thanks,” muttered Barry, with deep sarcasm. Then, after a moment’s
silence: “Look here; how’d you know Clyde wanted me to quit? I didn’t
tell you that.”
Peaches viewed him pityingly.
“By the simple process of putting a couple of twos together. For a
fortnight I’ve seen it coming. You’ve been traveling fast and Allen’s
been standing still. The whole school knows that Major Loring’s
training you for the big event. Allen having the strangle-hold on you
that he has, I knew it wouldn’t be long before he’d begin to use it.
I’ve been looking for your tongue to protrude for several days. A while
ago I saw you coming out of Dawson looking like a pinch-hitter who has
just struck out. Then you tell me that owing to the failure of the
Canadian wheat crop or something, you’ve decided to quit playing. I
may have a slanting forehead and a weak chin, Barry, but somewhere a
faint spark of intelligence still glows.”
“Well――well, will you come with me to see the Major?”
Peaches reflected. Then he nodded.
“Yes,” he assented, “I’ll do that much for you. You shall have my moral
support in your hour of tribulation. Shall we go now? I think we’ll
find him in. This is the hour of the day he sharpens his knives and
heats his jolly vat of oil for the entertainment of innocent youths
desiring to resign from the football team.”
“I thought maybe I’d see him this evening,” said Barry, a trifle
faintly.
“Never put off until evening what you can do in the afternoon,” replied
Peaches. “That has been my guiding rule through life and to its strict
observance I attribute much of my success.” He arose with what seemed
to his companion indecent eagerness. “Take one last look at the dear,
familiar scene, Barry, and let us be gone. ‘And so, whate’er befalls
me, I go where duty calls me! Farewell, farewe-e-e――’”
Peaches’ vocalization ended abruptly as he dodged the waste-basket.
CHAPTER XV
CLYDE LOSES HIS TEMPER
To Barry’s palpable disappointment, the Major was at home. He occupied
two rooms in Mr. Banks’s residence, directly across the road from
the school grounds, and Mrs. Banks, who answered the bell, smilingly
admitted the two boys and indicated the door on the left. Barry’s knock
was timorously soft, yet the ogre heard it, and called, “Come in!” with
a heartiness that brought to the mind of one of the visitors a vision
of boiling oil.
Major Loring had the front room and the one behind it, the latter
displaying through a broad arch a Spartan simplicity. In it there
were a cot bed covered with brown army blankets, a chiffonier, a
wash-stand, two chairs, and a trunk. But the front room was almost
luxurious, with a big couch and several deep leather-covered chairs, a
round mahogany table littered with books and papers and magazines and
smoking articles, some bookcases across one wall, and a cheerful rug
of golden-brown hues. Although the afternoon was far from cold, some
hickory chunks burned in the fireplace, and it was from an arm-chair in
front of the hearth that the host arose, book in one hand and pipe in
the other, to welcome the callers.
“Hello, you chaps!” he exclaimed. “Glad to see you. The more so as I
was bored stiff with this.” He tossed the book on the table and pulled
a chair toward the hearth. “Bring that other one along, Jones. Sit
down, Locke. That fire isn’t really needed to-day, but I’m sort of an
old granny about fires. I love to sit and toast my shins. Well, Jones,
how’s life treating you?”
“Almost as well as I deserve, sir.”
Major Loring chuckled.
“You leave me to draw my own conclusions, eh? Oh, well! I dare say you
aren’t getting many hard knocks. You look chipper enough. Of the two of
you I’d say Locke is the one who’s discovered a crumpled rose-leaf. No
ill effects from yesterday’s argument, I hope?”
“No, sir,” answered Barry, trying to smile as naturally as his
companion.
“That’s good. Did you see the game, Jones? Our chaps showed a little
more class, don’t you think? Oh, we’ve got some way to travel yet, but
it looks as if we’d got started! Locke, here, did a pretty good job,
by the way. There’s a fellow who told me only three weeks ago that he
didn’t care for football!”
The coach laughed and Barry managed to grin.
“I thought our team played pretty good football, sir,” said Peaches.
“Looks to me as if we’d round out all right by the end of the season.
Some of the new fellows are showing up pretty well, aren’t they?”
“Yes, they are. We’ve got a lot of clever substitutes, Jones; and, take
my word for it, nothing makes a coach feel more snug than plenty of
good second-string material. He has next year in mind as well as this,
you know. And the year after that, too. I’d like to keep twice as many
fellows going as I do, but there’d be no use in that, as I couldn’t
look after them. I’ll have some help after this week. Graham and Jonah
Mears are coming up to help out. Graham will take over the third squad
and give us some real practice games. You remember him, Jones. He was
here last fall.”
“Very well, sir. Little wiry chap. Mr. Mears, too, although he was up
only a few days, I think.”
“Yes, but he’s going to give us two full weeks this time. He’s a
corking good hand with the backs.”
The football talk continued. Barry, perched on the edge of a big chair,
listened, smiled perfunctorily when the Major glanced his way, and
wished himself back at home. How would he ever manage to do what he
had come to do? Football finally became exhausted as a topic and the
conversation turned to baseball and the Major and Peaches discussed
plans for the spring. The fire crackled and hissed softly and the
sunlight became ruddy outside the open windows. Finally Peaches looked
at his watch and, “Hello!” he said, glancing at Barry. “’Most six!
We’ll have to be traveling.”
Barry took a long breath.
“Major, I――” Perhaps he hadn’t really spoken out loud, for the Major
evidently hadn’t heard.
“Well,” the latter was saying, “I’m glad you dropped in, Jones. You,