Barry Locke, half-back
bedroom.”
“You and Allen are pretty chummy, then,” said Jones.
“Yes. Well, I don’t know, either. We’ve known each other a long while
and we live only three houses apart. Clyde was a year ahead of me at
school, though, and for the last two years we haven’t been quite so
thick. And then, last fall, he came here, and last summer, at Orchard
Bluff, he took up with an older crowd. But of course we’re pretty good
friends.”
“I see. Listen!”
Through the darkness, from the lighted window across the way, came the
strains of the “tiddly-widdly” air, played very softly. As the player
neared the dangerous stage Jones turned to Barry with a little smile
and held up a finger. But now the bow didn’t falter. It went swiftly
through a maze of tiny notes, unerringly, triumphantly, paused over a
thin, silvery tone, and descended to the lower notes for a repetition
of the opening movement and was still.
“That’s fiddling, young Fessenden!” murmured Jones. He clapped his
hands softly and Barry joined him. A form darkened the lighted window,
stood there a moment as though peering across, and then vanished.
“That was his amende,” said Jones, gravely. “And his thanks. A decent
kid, I guess, but brought up wrong. I’ll bet he couldn’t toss a ball
from first base to second! Or boot a football, or――or clean a fish,
always supposing he could catch one. That’s no way to bring a fellow
up, Locke. And if he is that sort, the last place to send him to is a
boarding-school. There are too many rough-necks here who don’t know
a――an andante from a――you say it, Locke.”
“Anduncle,” said Barry, gravely.
“Huh? Well, anyway, you get the idea. That kid’s in for a lot of hard
knocks in the next few months, and he won’t know how to take them
because about all he knows of life is keeping his feet dry and his
fiddle tuned! Let’s go up.”
“Come in and see my antique,” said Barry, when they had climbed the
stairs. “That is, if you have the time.”
“I’ll take time,” Jones replied, and, when the light was on: “Well! a
gen-oo-ine Chippendale! Or is it Sèvres?”
“Real Ming,” said Barry.
“Ming, eh? One of our best little designers.” Jones took the arm-chair
and surveyed the desk approvingly. “I knew him well. Also his uncle,
Grand Rapids. Say, Locke, where’d you find that relic? Is there a
public dump around somewhere?”
“I like your nerve!” exclaimed Barry, indignantly. “What’s the matter
with it?――except that it’s a bit more modern than the rest of the
stuff.”
“Maybe that’s it,” said the other, grinning. “I hope you’ve got it
clamped to the floor so Toby won’t pinch it! Joking aside, though, it’s
not half bad. Has lots of room, too. I suppose you didn’t pay anything
for having it delivered.”
“I didn’t, as a matter of fact, but what of it? Go on and spring it.”
“Nothing of it. Only, if any one gave me a nice desk like that I’d
expect him to deliver it.”
“You’re insulting. I paid six dollars for that desk, Jones, and I’ll
bet you wish you owned it.”
“I’ll bet I wish I were the fellow who got the six dollars! Well,
getting to love your little home, are you? You look quite fixed up.
Photographs and everything! Mind if I look?”
“Help yourself. Just the family, mostly.”
“This must be your father. Looks rather like you. And this is Allen,
isn’t it? Makes him look quite noble.” Jones completed the inspection
of the photographs and lounged back to his chair. Then, looking over
at Barry with a smile, he said, “I suppose he warned you against me,
Locke.”
“Warned me?” Barry repeated, confused. “What makes you think that?”
Jones chuckled.
“Oh, I just knew he would! He doesn’t approve of me, doesn’t like me.
And I don’t like him. You mustn’t mind that, because I dislike lots
of persons and things――like Napoleon and Pansy Chester and vanilla
ice-cream――that other folks admire hugely. So my taste isn’t any
criterion.”
“I guessed that you didn’t,” answered Barry. “Like Clyde, I mean. Would
you mind telling me why?”
“Not a bit, if I knew. But I don’t. Perhaps it’s more the gang he
travels with than he. Oh, I could state objections to your friend, just
as he could to me, but they wouldn’t be enough to explain it. We’ve
never spoken to each other more than a couple of dozen times, probably;
and then we just growled.”
“Well,” said Barry, after a moment, “of course Clyde isn’t perfect. No
one is――”
“Thanks be!” said Jones, fervently.
“But I’ve known him a good while, and so――” Barry broke off and his
smile deepened. “You know it would be a lot nicer if you two fellows
didn’t growl at each other, because I like Clyde and I――” He stopped
abruptly this time, looking uncomfortably embarrassed.
Jones grinned.
“And you don’t think I’m so bad. Go ahead and say it. Never mind my
blushes.”
“I don’t believe you could blush!” laughed Barry. “Anyway, I give you
fair warning that I’m going to get you and Clyde better acquainted,
so――”
“I know,” sighed the other. “You’re going to have a lingering illness
and die with an angelic smile on your face, while Allen and I clasp
hands across your bed.”
“I am not!” denied Barry, vigorously. “I don’t intend to have even a
toothache on your account. Neither of you is worth it. But I don’t
intend, either, to have a couple of decent chaps whom I――like――act so
silly. There’s no sense in it.”
“Noble sentiments, me Lud! They does you credik. Just the same and
notwithstanding――” and Jones yawned, stretched, and pulled himself out
of the chair――“before you have Allen and me shaking hands, one of two
things has got to happen: either he must change a lot or I must. I bid
you good night.”
CHAPTER VI
“PEACHES”
Barry settled down to school routine and in the course of a few days
made several discoveries. One was that he would have to study a
good deal harder than he had studied the previous year, for all the
instructors whose classes he graced were believers in labor――for the
students. Still, he didn’t have Doctor Clode this year, and that was
something to be thankful for if he was to credit reports. The doctor,
whose first name was Julius and was popularly known as “Julie,”
besides attending to the duties of being principal, taught first- and
second-year Latin. There were many who believed that he would have been
even a greater success as a slave-driver. In spite of that, however, he
was popular.
Another discovery was that gymnasium work under Mr. Peterson was a
bore. Jones pointed out to him that to escape it he had only to sign
up for one of the major sports. That called for a confession, since,
naturally, Jones suggested baseball. Barry explained rather awkwardly
that he had decided, at Clyde’s suggestion, not to try for baseball
until spring. Jones looked as though he wanted to ask a question, but
he didn’t.
“Well, that’s all right,” he said. “Fact is, we aren’t crazy about new
candidates in the fall, for the Major has his hands full of football
and we have to get along without a coach. Of course in your case, since
you’ve played some already, Jody wouldn’t mind taking you on. Well,
what about football? Ever tried it?”
Barry nodded.
“Yes, but I didn’t seem to get the hang of it, or something. At high
school we had three teams, and I was on them all, last fall or the fall
before that, and never managed to stick. I’m rather light-weight, I
guess. Besides, I never got awfully interested in playing. Baseball’s
my stuff, although I don’t pretend to be much at that, either.”
“Your modesty becomes you,” said Jones, gravely. “Well, how about track
work? Ever run or hurdled or anything?”
“No, I haven’t. I thought some about trying the sprints last fall, but
our trainer didn’t give me any encouragement. He told me to come around
in the spring, but then I was playing baseball on the junior team. I
guess I’ll just have to wait for hockey or basket-ball to start.”
The friendship with Jones progressed apace, to Clyde’s frequently
expressed disgust. But Clyde had to confess that it would be extremely
difficult to reside in the same house with a chap and have nothing to
do with him.
“Just the same, though,” he insisted, “if you let Jones get you in with
his gang, you’ll be ditched. You show up this evening, Barry, and we’ll
call on a couple of corking guys over in Meddill. One of ’em’s in your
class, too.”
So Barry went, but nothing came of that call. Barry was content that
nothing should. By the end of the week Clyde’s efforts in Barry’s
behalf dwindled. He said he couldn’t see why the other didn’t follow up
some of the many introductions. Hal Stearns nodded vigorous assent. He
appeared even more disgruntled than Clyde. Barry offered every reason
save the right one, which was that none of the fellows to whom he had
been introduced by Clyde appealed to him in the slightest degree. Hal
as good as signified his intention of washing his hands of the business
of getting Barry “started right,” and Barry was secretly very much
pleased.
Barry’s day began at seven o’clock, at which hour Betty Lyle set a
chipped pitcher of hot water outside his door and roused him from
slumber. At approximately seven-twenty-five he set forth, usually with
Jones, sometimes with Jones and Toby Nott, by a short cut to Croft Hall
and chapel. Sometimes, too, the roomers in the house opposite joined
them. These were Fessenden and Millington. Millington, known as ‘Mill,’
was a Second-Class boy and a member of the baseball squad. Barry liked
him from the first. Fessenden, whose first name was Alonzo, was dubbed
“Zo” by Jones. Which was quite all right with Fessenden, since anything
that Crawford Jones did was perfect in his eyes. After a few days Jones
himself wasn’t “Jones” to Barry; nor was he “Crawford.” He became
“Peaches,” a nickname that had been his since some mad wag had, years
before, thought of the association of that word with Crawford.
Chapel lasted fifteen minutes and breakfast began at eight o’clock.
The first recitation was at nine, the last at three. Dinner was at
twelve-thirty, supper at six. Such was the routine of every week-day,
although, as Barry’s recitation-hours varied, all days were not just
alike for him. His afternoons were spent at tennis or golf when he
could find an opponent, or in looking on at baseball or football.
Save on Saturday and Sunday afternoons Peaches was busy on the diamond
and Barry couldn’t count on him for companionship. On Saturdays there
was no practice for the baseball candidates, and on those afternoons
Peaches was at liberty to follow the fortunes of the Broadmoor
eleven. On the second Saturday after the beginning of the term Barry
accompanied him.
The game, the first of the schedule, was not an important one, but
it offered an opportunity to compare the home team with the previous
year’s defeated eleven and there was a generous attendance of students
and townsfolk. Peaches had tried to induce Toby Nott to go along with
them, but Toby, appearing at his door with an agitated beetle between
his fingers, had shown no enthusiasm. He stared quite blankly through
his spectacles while Peaches repeated the invitation. Then, “You mean
see a football game?” he asked, with a puzzled air.
“You’re certainly quick,” acknowledged Peaches. “I tell you only twice
and you grasp it immediately.”
Toby blinked and grinned uncertainly.
“Well, but――what for?” he asked.
Peaches looked at Barry hopelessly.
“It’s no use,” he muttered. “Come on.”
With evident relief Toby started to withdraw, but then, fearing he had
failed to show proper interest in the event, he put his head out again
and called after them:
“Say, Jones, who’s playing?”
“Broadmoor School,” answered Peaches, from the foot of the stairs.
“Oh,” said Toby. He seemed quite satisfied as he closed his door again.