Barry Locke, half-back
footsteps in the hall and then Betty knocked and said, “Barry, Major
Loring is here!”
After a minute Peaches dragged Toby with him out of the room, Toby
going most unwillingly and with many backward glances.
“Say, Barry, if you find him don’t try to get him, will you? Let me
know, will you? I want――”
“Shut up, and say good night!” hissed Peaches.
“Yeah,” responded Toby confusedly. “Good night.”
Then the door closed and the Major, slightly amused, turned his gaze to
Barry. The latter, still too surprised by the visit to be at ease, gave
a halting explanation of the disordered appearance of the room. Major
Loring listened smilingly but absently, his gaze traversing the barely
furnished quarters. When Barry had ended, the Major said:
“I see you don’t use a typewriter, Locke.”
“Sir? A typewriter? No, sir, I don’t.”
“A good many of the fellows do,” said the coach. “It seems to be coming
to be the style to have them. I suppose you can write on them.”
Barry shook his head apologetically.
“No, sir, I can’t. I’ve never owned one.”
“Still,” persisted the visitor, “I suppose Jones has one you could use
if you wanted to. Or this Nott boy.”
“Toby has one. He bought it a little while ago from some fellow who’s
selling them here in school.”
“Ever tried it?” asked the Major.
Puzzled, Barry again shook his head.
“No, sir.” Then, with a weak smile: “I don’t believe he’d let me,” he
added.
“Still, it wouldn’t be difficult to do a little writing on it if he
happened to be out, I suppose?” the Major persisted.
“I――I suppose not,” answered Barry, slowly; “only, he almost never is
out.”
“I see. Well, to come down to cases, Locke, here’s what brought me
around to see you.” The Major took an envelop from a pocket and drew
forth two folded sheets of paper. “I’m very glad to hear you say that
you don’t use a typewriter, for this letter is typewritten. Know what
it is?”
“No, sir.” Barry stared, his eyes rather round by now.
“I didn’t think you did. You mustn’t mind my asking, though; nor about
the typewriter, either. I was merely trying to――well, strengthen my own
conviction. Here, just read this.”
Barry took the missive and perused it with frowning brow. It was neatly
written on a single sheet of school paper with a typewriter such as
Toby owned and with a black ribbon. It ran as follows:
MR. GEORGE PRINCE,
HOSKINS ACADEMY,
FAIRMOUNT, CONN.
DEAR SIR:
If you want some inside dope on Broadmoor football I am in
position to supply it. I can tell you signals to be used
against your team and explain several new plays that our coach
is teaching. This is strictly confidential, so if you are not
interested kindly destroy this letter and say nothing about it.
I am not looking for money or other reward, but just to get
square with persons who have treated me mean. Address X. Y. Z.,
104 Bridge St., Wessex, Conn.
CONFIDENTIAL.
Barry’s mind was in strange confusion as he ended.
“Why――why,” he stammered in amazement, “that’s this house!”
The Major nodded.
“Yes. That’s why I’m here. You see, Locke, you’re the only one here
that could possibly supply that sort of information. Hold on! Let me
finish, please. You haven’t been under serious suspicion, my boy.
Of course for a moment I was forced to consider you, but only for a
moment. I showed the letter to Captain Buckley and he simply echoed my
own opinion. ‘It’s a silly hoax,’ he said. ‘Locke wouldn’t have any
purpose in doing a thing like that, and he isn’t the sort to do it,
anyway.’ So I just dropped in to talk it over with you. Whether it is
a hoax or not――and surely it must be――it’s unpleasant, and I’d like to
find who wrote that letter. Do you happen to know?”
Barry was staring again at the sheet in his hand, noting now something
that had at first escaped him. At four places in the course of the
writing a letter stood slightly above the level of the line, and that
letter was always a B. He shook his head, glad that the coach had
formed his question as he had.
“No, sir, I don’t,” he answered gravely.
“You had no hand in it? I mean, you knew nothing of it? Some one might
have written it as a joke, of course, and I wondered if you mightn’t
have had an inkling, Locke.”
“No, sir, I know nothing about it. You spoke of Toby Nott’s typewriter.
I was in his room a few days ago and he was using it and I noticed that
his ribbon was purple. He may have a black ribbon, of course, but we
could find out, sir.”
“Let’s not bother,” was the reply. “I’ve already accepted your word,
Locke. Now, one more thing. Suppose this was not intended as a hoax,
to get a laugh on the Hoskins people. In that case it would look like
an attempt to get you in wrong, wouldn’t it?”
“Why――yes, sir; I suppose it would,” answered Barry, unwillingly, “but
I don’t see――I don’t know――”
“That’s what I’m getting at. There’s no one you know of who might have
taken this means of evening up a score, Locke?”
“I――I just can’t imagine any fellow doing anything like that, sir, no
matter what――no matter how sore he might be!”
“Hm! that hardly answers my question, Locke. I’ll put it this way:
Since you’ve seen that letter, has it occurred to you that it might be
written by any one you know?”
Barry’s gaze dropped.
“I’d hate to suspect any fellow――” he began.
“Locke!” Major Loring’s voice had a ring that almost made Barry jump.
“Answer my question!”
Barry met the Major’s stern gaze steadily for a moment. Then he shook
his head.
“That isn’t fair, sir,” he said.
“It is fair!” answered the coach, firmly. “If this letter was not
written as a joke, it was written to compromise you. You are a member
of the team. Consequently the fellow who did that, deliberately
set out to cause trouble to the team, to interfere――maliciously
interfere――with my efforts. Why, just think a moment, Locke! Suppose
I took that letter to Doctor Clode. What would be the result? Some
one would get fired out of here mighty quick, and you know it. And he
deserves to be. Whether that was a joke or a piece of spite work, it’s
despicable. Fortunately, Prince thought it a hoax, but even so he must
think we have a strange sense of humor here at Broadmoor. Perhaps you’d
better read his letter, too.”
Barry accepted it in silence and read:
HOSKINS ACADEMY ATHLETIC BOARD
FAIRMOUNT, CONN.
_Tuesday._
MR. HARRIS LORING,
BROADMOOR SCHOOL,
WESSEX, CONN.
DEAR MR. LORING:
The inclosure reached me this morning and I’m forwarding it for
your interest. If you can discover the humorous youth who wrote
it you might tell him that we aren’t in the market for his
funny quips. Also, if you do get him, give him a couple for me!
Cordially,
GEO. A. PRINCE.
Barry handed the two letters back and the Major frowningly returned
them to the envelop and the envelop to his pocket. Then, more gently,
he said:
“You see, Locke, this doesn’t concern you alone. I’m convinced now that
the fellow who perpetrated this silly business meant to cause trouble.
Well, he deserves a lesson and I mean to see that he has it. I don’t
want to take this to the faculty, and I don’t propose to, but I do
propose to find this idiot and read the riot act to him if no more. So,
come clean, Locke, and let’s get it cleared up. Now then, do you or
don’t you suspect any one?”
After a long moment of silence Barry nodded his head:
“I do suspect some one, Major, but it’s only suspicion and I have no
right to say any more than that.”
“If your suspicion is wrongly placed, that fact will be proved, my boy.
But I think you know that it isn’t. Whom have you in mind?”
“I’d rather not say, sir.”
“You must!” The Major’s tone was sharp, but Barry only shook his head.
“No, sir,” he answered firmly. Their eyes clashed for a moment. Then:
“You are making a mistake,” said the coach, grimly. “As long as you
are on the team, Locke, I’m your superior officer, and I won’t stand
insubordination. Now think that over a minute.”
“This matter isn’t――isn’t――it doesn’t concern me as a football player,
sir.”
“It concerns the team. That’s sufficient. I want an answer, Locke.”
“I’m sorry, sir.”
There was a long silence. Barry, feeling very hopeless, stared at his
tightly clasped hands. Then he heard the Major arising and glanced up.
The Major’s countenance was very cold, very grim.
“You had better sleep on this, Locke,” he said as he moved toward
the door. “Until you can see clearly and decide to speak out, as you
should, your services won’t be required with the team. I’m sorry, my
boy.”
“I’m sorry, too, sir,” answered Barry, faintly.
Major Loring opened the door and went out. Barry listened to the sound
of his footsteps in the hall, on the stairs, and finally on the porch.
Then came the complaining creak of the gate.
“Some one,” thought Barry, “ought to grease it.”
For some minutes he stood where the Major had left him. Then something
light against a window-pane drew him across the room. It was Toby’s
moth, motionless, its lovely wings half spread. Barry placed a finger
before it and stirred it gently and the moth slowly climbed aboard.
With the other hand he opened the window at the bottom. Outside,
however, the moth showed no desire to accept his freedom and Barry had
to toss it into the dark.
“Sort of a mean trick on Toby,” he reflected as he closed the window
again. Then there was a knock at the door and Peaches sauntered in.
CHAPTER XX
THE OLD DESK REPAYS KINDNESS
“Did you find him?” asked Peaches, carelessly.
“Find who?” asked Barry, perplexed.
“Mister Moth.”
“Oh! Yes, I let him out.”
Peaches seated himself on an arm of the easy-chair and viewed Barry
shrewdly. After a silence he asked:
“Well, going to let anything else out?”
“Huh?” Barry was not, it seemed, very quick-witted this evening. “What
do you mean?”
Peaches shrugged.
“Oh, nothing, nothing at all. Only, if the head coach paid me
a visit I’d be telling all about it. But I dare say I lack
what-you-call-it――er――reticence.”
Barry began to lift the desk drawers and slide them back into place. He
performed the task very slowly, very thoughtfully. When the last one
was in he perched himself on the edge of the desk, studied his hands a
moment――rather scratched and scarred they were these days――and finally
said:
“Well, I guess I’d like to tell you, only――”
“Since I’m being consumed by curiosity,” said Peaches, when the other
paused, “I might perhaps be prevailed on to listen. You were about to
say――?”
“It’s no joke,” answered Barry, rather plaintively. “He――I――he said I
needn’t report again.”
“’Cause why?” asked the audience, after a surprised instant.
So the story came out and Peaches listened, without comment, to the
end. Then he said:
“It’s hard to say which of you is right, Barry. I see your position,
and his, too. I can’t blame him for wanting to get his hands on the
moron who sent that letter, and I can see that you’d naturally hate to
get Allen into trouble.”
“Allen!” exclaimed Barry. “Why, I didn’t say―― What makes you think――”
“Of course you didn’t say, but he’s the only chap in school you’d lose
your job on the team for, isn’t he? Don’t be worried. I’m as deaf as
the grave. No, I mean dumb. Well, what are you going to do about it?”
“Nothing,” muttered Barry.
“All you can do, I guess,” said Peaches, after some thought. “I don’t
quite get the Major’s view, though. Near as I can make out, he’s been