The Guarded Heights
"Seems to me I've seen his name in the papers," George said.
Bailly stared.
"Without doubt, if you read the public prints at all. He exerted much
useful cunning and strength in the Harvard and Yale games last fall. He
was on everybody's All-American eleven. I got him into college and
man-handled him through. Hence this scanty hair, these premature
furrows; for although he had plenty of good common-sense, and was one of
the finest boys I've ever known, he didn't possess, speaking relatively,
when it came to iron-bound text-books, the brains of a dinosaur; but he
had the brute force of one."
"Why did you do it?" George asked. "Because he was rich?"
"Young man," Bailly answered, "I am a product of this seat of learning.
With all its faults--and you may learn their number for yourself some
day--its success is pleasing to me, particularly at football. I am very
fond of football, perhaps because it approximates in our puling, modern
fashion, the classic public games of ruddier days. In other words, I was
actuated by a formless emotion called Princeton spirit. Don't ask me
what that is. I don't know. One receives it according to one's concept.
But when I saw in Bill something finer and more determined than most men
possess, I made up my mind Princeton was going to be proud of him, on
the campus, on the football field, and afterward out in the world."
The hollow, wrinkled face flushed.
"When Bill made a run I could think of it as my run. When he made a
touchdown I could say, 'there's one score that wouldn't have been made
if I hadn't booted Bill into college, and kept him from flunking out by
sheer brute mentality!' Pardon me, Mr. Morton. I love the silly game."
George smiled, sensing his way, if only he could make this fellow feel
he would be the right kind of Princeton man!
"I was going to say," he offered, "that while I had never had a chance
to play on a regular team I used to mix it up at school, but I was
stronger than most of the boys. There were one or two accidents. They
thought I'd better quit."
Bailly laughed.
"That's the kind of material we want. You do look as if you could bruise
a blue or a crimson jersey. Know where the field house is? Ask anybody.
Do no harm for the trainer to look you over. Be there at three o'clock."
"But my work? Will you help me?"
"Give me," Bailly pled, "until afternoon to decide if I'll take another
ten years from my life. That's all. Send that fellow Rogers in. Be at
the field house at three o'clock."
And as George passed out he heard him reviling the candidate.
"Don't see why you come to college. No chance to make the team or a Phi
Beta Kappa. One ought to be a requisite."
The shrill voice went lower. George barely caught the words certainly
not intended for him.
"You know I wouldn't be a bit surprised if that fellow you brought me,
if he had a chance, might do both."
II
George, since he had nothing else to do, walked home. Bailly could get
him in if he would. Did it really depend in part on the inspection he
would have to undergo that afternoon? It was hard there was nothing he
could do to prepare himself. He went to the yard, to which the landlady
had condemned Sylvia's bulldog, and, to kill time, played with the
friendly animal until luncheon. Afterward he sat in his room before
Sylvia's portrait impressing on himself the necessity of strength for
the coming ordeal.
His landlady directed him glibly enough to the field house. As he
crossed the practice gridiron, not yet chalked out, he saw Bailly on the
verandah; and, appearing very small and sturdy beside him, a
gray-haired, pleasant-faced man whose small eyes were relentless.
"This is the prospect, Green," George heard Bailly say.
The trainer studied George for some time before he nodded his head.
"A build to hurt and not get hurt," he said at last; "but, Mr. Bailly,
it's hard to supply experience. Boys come here who have played all their
lives, and they know less than nothing. Bone seems to grow naturally in
the football cranium."
He shifted back to George.
"How fast are you?"
"I've never timed myself, but I'm hard to catch."
"Get out there," the trainer directed.
"In those clothes?" Bailly asked.
"Why not? The ground's dry. A man wouldn't run any faster with moleskins
and cleats. Now you run as far as the end of that stand. Halt there for
a minute, then turn and come back."
He drew out a stop watch.
"All set? Then--git!"
George streaked down the field.
"It's an even hundred yards," the trainer explained to Bailly.
As George paused at the end of the stand the trainer snapped his watch,
whistling.
"There are lots with running shoes and drawers wouldn't do any better.
Let's have him back."
He waved his arm. George tore up and leant against the railing,
breathing hard, but not uncomfortably.
"You were a full second slower coming back," the trainer said with a
twinkle.
"I'm sorry," George cried. "Let me try it again."
Green shook his head.
"I'd rather see you make a tackle, but I've no one to spare."
He grinned invitation at Bailly.
"My spirit, Green," the tutor said, "is less fragile than my corpus, but
it has some common-sense. I prefer others should perish at the hands of
my discoveries."
"You've scrubbed around," the trainer said, appraising George's long,
muscular legs. "Ever kick a football?"
"A little."
Green entered the field house, reappearing after a moment with a
football tucked under his arm.
"Do you mind stepping down the field, Mr. Bailly, to catch what he
punts? I wouldn't go too far."
Bailly nodded and walked a short distance away. The trainer gave George
the football and told him to kick it to Bailly. George stepped on the
grass and swung his leg. If the ball had travelled horizontally as far
as it did toward heaven it would have been a good kick. For half an hour
the trainer coached interestedly, teaching George the fundamentals of
kicking form. Some of the later punts, indeed, boomed down the field for
considerable distances, but in George's mind the high light of that
unexpected experience remained the lanky, awkward figure in wrinkled
tweeds, limping about the field, sometimes catching the ball, sometimes
looking hurt when it bounded from his grasp, sometimes missing it
altogether, and never once losing the flashing pleasure from his eyes or
the excitement out of his furrowed face.
"Enough," the trainer said at last.
George heard him confide to the puffing tutor:
"Possibilities. Heaven knows we'll need them a year from this fall,
especially in the kicking line. I believe this fellow can be taught."
Bailly, his hands shaking from his recent exercise, lighted a pipe. He
assumed a martyr's air. His voice sounded as though someone had done him
an irreparable wrong.
"Then I'll have to try, but it's hard on me, Green, you'll admit."
George hid his excitement. He knew he had passed his first examination.
He was sure he would enter college. Already he felt the confidence most
men placed in Squibs Bailly.
"Wouldn't you have taken him on anyway, Mr. Bailly?" the trainer
laughed. "Anyway, a lot of my players are first-group men. I depend on
you to turn him over in the fall for the Freshman eleven. Going to
town?"
"Come on, Morton," Bailly said, remorsefully.
Side by side the three walked through to Nassau Street and past the
campus. George said nothing, drinking in the scarcely comprehensible
talk of the others about team prospects and the appalling number of
powerful and nimble young men who would graduate the following June.
Near University Place he noticed Rogers loafing in front of a restaurant
with several other youths who wore black caps. He wondered why Rogers
started and stared at him, then turned, speaking quickly to the others.
Green went down University Place. George paced on with Bailly. In front
of the Nassau Club the tutor paused.
"I'm going in here," he said, "but you can come to my house at
eight-thirty. We'll work until ten-thirty. We'll do that every night
until your brain wrinkles a trifle. You may not have been taught that
twenty-four hours are allotted to each day. Eight for sleep. Two with
me. Two for meals. Two at the field. Two for a run in the country. That
leaves eight for study, and you'll need every minute of them. I'll give
you your schedule to-night. If you break it once I'll drop you, for
you've got to have a brain beyond the ordinary to make it wrinkle
enough."
"Thanks, Mr. Bailly. If you don't mind, what will it cost?"
Bailly considered.
"I'll have to charge you," he said at last, "twenty-five dollars, but I
can lend you most of the books."
George understood, but his pride was not hurt.
"I'll pay you in other ways."
Bailly looked at him, his emaciated face smiling all over.
"I think you will," he said with a little nod. "All right. At
eight-thirty."
He limped along the narrow cement walk and entered the club. George
started back. The group, he noticed, still loitered in front of the
restaurant. Rogers detached himself and strolled across. He was no
longer suspicious.
"You been down at the field with Mr. Green?"
"Yes."
"What for?"
"Running a little, kicking a football around."
"Trust Bailly to guess you played. What did Green say?"
"If I get in," George, answered simply, "I think he'll give me a show."
"I guess so," Rogers said, thoughtfully, "or he wouldn't be wasting his
time on you now. Come on over and meet these would-be Freshmen. We'll
all be in the same class unless we get brain-fever. Mostly
Lawrenceville."
George crossed and submitted to elaborate introductions and warm
greetings.
"Green's grooming him already for the Freshman eleven," Rogers
explained.
George accepted the open admiration cautiously, not forgetting what he
had been yesterday, what Sylvia had said. Why was Rogers so friendly all
at once?
"What prep?" "Where'd you play?" "Line or backfield?"
The rapidity of the questions lessened his discomfort. How was he to
avoid such moments? He must make his future exceptionally full so that
it might submerge the past of which he couldn't speak without
embarrassment. In this instance Rogers helped him out.
"Morton's bummed around. Never went to any school for long."
George pondered this kind act and its fashion as he excused himself and
walked on to his lodging. There was actually something to hide, and
Rogers admitted it, and was willing to lend a cloak. He could guess why.
Because Green was bothering with him, had condescended to be seen on the
street with him. George's vision broadened.
He locked himself in his room and sat before his souvenirs. Sylvia's
provocative features seemed clearer. For a long time he stared hungrily.
He had an absurd impression that he had already advanced toward her.
Perhaps he had in view of what had happened that afternoon.
His determination as well as his strength had clearly attracted Bailly;
yet that strength, its possible application to football, had practically
assured him he would enter college, had made an ally of the careful
Rogers, had aroused the admiration of such sub-Freshmen as were in town.
It became clear that if he should be successful at football he would
achieve a position of prominence from which he could choose friends
useful here and even in the vital future after college.
His planning grew more practical. If football, a game of which he knew
almost nothing, could do that, what might he not draw from one he
thoroughly knew--anything concerning horses, for instance, hunting,
polo? The men interested in horses would be the rich, the best--he
choked a trifle over the qualification--the financial and social leaders
of the class. He would have that card up his sleeve. He would play it