CHAPTER VII
A NEW TIMEPIECE
"Anything on for to-night fellows," asked Tom Parsons, as he limped along with Sid and Phil.
"No. Why?" inquired the quarter-back. "Are you going to see a girl? If you are, I heard Ruth say that she and Madge had a date at some Fairview affair, or something like that."
"No, I'm not going to see a girl," retorted Tom somewhat savagely, and a spasm of pain shot over his face. "I'll leave that for you and Sid this time. I'm going to lay off and bone."
"What's the matter?" asked Phil, anxiously. "Sick?"
"No, but I'm tired, and some one stepped on my ankle in that last mix-up."
"By Hannibal! I hope you don't go lame," put in Sid. "The team is crippled enough as it is."
"Oh, I'll be all right," asserted Tom. "All it needs is a rest and some liniment."
"I wrenched my knee a bit," spoke Phil, "but it doesn't bother me now."
"And I'd like to get hold of the fellow who rubbed my nose in the dirt," came wrathfully from Sid. "I must have chewed up about an ounce of it."
"It's good for your digestion," asserted Tom, with a wry face. "But say, fellows, doesn't it strike you as rather queer that we didn't get a hint about our missing chair and clock?"
"It is sort of so-so," admitted Phil.
"You'd have thought," went on Tom, as he stopped for a moment in the shadow of biology hall to favor his bruised ankle, "you'd have thought that if it was some of the boys putting up a job on us that they'd have given it away."
"Yes, such as asking what time it was, or if we rested well in our room, or something like that," added Sid. "But there wasn't even a look to give us a clew."
"Which means," declared the 'varsity left end, as he limped on, "that either none of our fellows have had a hand in it, or that they can keep a secret better than we fellows could. If this bunch had done anything like that we'd be wanting to rig the victim. But I can't understand this silence."
"It means something," declared Phil. "There's some mystery about this that's deeper than we have any idea of."
And there was a curious mystery which was destined to have quite an effect on Randall College.
"Well, let's forget all about it for a while," suggested Sid. "Maybe if we do, it will be like one of those problems in solid geometry, and the solution will come to us when we least expect it. Many a time I've stared at the figures and letters until they did the Blue Danube waltzes up and down the pages. Then I've just chucked it aside, taken up something else, and, all at once, it's as plain as"
"The nose on Tom's face," interrupted Phil, for Tom was well blessed in that feature.
"Go ahead. Have all the fun you like," the pitcher invited, for his ankle was beginning to pain him more severely, and he did not feel equal to skylarking with his chums. "But as to forgetting about our chair, I can't do it. Queer, isn't it, how you'll get attached to an ordinary piece of furniture like that?"
"It wasn't an ordinary piece, you sacreligious vandal!" exploded Sid. "There isn't another chair like that in college. I have it on good authority that it was a family heirloom before we bought it of Hatterly, the big senior. It belonged in the Hess family, which was quite some pumpkins around here about the time of the wreck of the Mayflower."
"The Mayflower wasn't wrecked, you chump!" cried Tom.
"Well, what of it? Something happened to it, anyhow. It was stranded, or ran ashore, or else people landed from it. I never can keep those things straight in my head. At any rate, the chair is quite a relic, and I wish we had it back."
"I'm with you," declared Tom, feelingly. "I could just curl up in it in comfort to-night."
"Only you won't," retorted Phil.
"Nor yet listen to the clock tick," added Sid. "Now, let's talk of something else."
"Football," suggested Phil, quickly. "What do you fellows think about our chances, anyhow?"
"Not much," asserted the end. "Sam and Pete aren't doing as well as they used to do on the scrub."
"Stage fright, maybe," came from Sid.
"It's likely," admitted the quarter-back. "I remember when I first played on the 'varsity, I couldn't seem to see straight, I thought I was going to miss every tackle I tried for, and I was mortally afraid of dropping the ball. They'll get over it."
"I hope so," spoke Tom. "I wish Bascome wasn't playing on my end."
"Why?" asked Phil, quickly.
"Well, you know he rather stood in with Langridge and Gerhart when they were here, and, though he isn't as mean as they were, he isn't exactly in our crowd. I can't play with him the same way I can go into a game with the other fellows. I think I'll ask Kindlings to let me shift to the other end."
"Don't you do it!" cried Sid, quickly. "Look here, Tom Parsons, the surest way to have a team go to pieces is to have personal felings crop out among the players. We've got to play together, or"
"'Play separately,' as one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence said," interrupted Phil, with a laugh.
"No, I'm serious," protested Sid. "If we're going to act that way, Tom, we might as well give up the team now, and also all hopes of ever winning the championship this year. It's bad enough to have Bricktop and Ed off, without having you kicking up a fuss about Bascome."
"Who's kicking up a fuss, you old misogynist?" demanded the end, limping along. "I only said I couldn't play with Bascome as well as I could with Dan, and I'd like to shift."
"And if you do that it means that some one else will have to shift, and that will throw the whole team into confusion. No, you stick it out, Tom."
They walked on in silence for a few minutes, each busy with his own thoughts. The sun slanted across the campus, and glinted through the stained glass windows of Booker chapel, coloring the sward with a wonderful combination of violet and red. Back of the main college was a bank of purplish and olive tinted clouds, which Tom paused to gaze at in admiration.
"Look, fellows!" he exclaimed, softly. "It's just like one of those pictures of Venice, painted by what's his name."
"Yes, great artist," put in Phil. "Second cousin to 'who's this.'"
"No, but look at those colorings," protested Tom. "Did you ever see such cloud masses? The only thing about them is that they tell of fall coming on, and winter and leafless trees, and"
"Oh, for cats' sake cut it out!" groaned Sid. "You must be in love again. Got a new girl?"
"Shut up!" ordered Tom, peremptorily, as he started toward their dormitory. "The next time I try to elevate the minds of you fellows by pointing out the beauties of nature you'll know it!"
"All right, old chap," came in soothing accents from Phil. "Those clouds are worth looking at, for a fact. Sid has no soul for anything above the commonplace."
"Neither would you have, if you'd been chewing on mud," declared the other. "It strikes me that we are getting silly, or sentimental, in our old age. Come on up and get into a bathrobe and we'll take it easy. I have some imported ginger ale, and some prime cheese in the closet."
"You rat! And you never spoke of it before!" cried Phil, clapping his chum on the back. "Come on, let's see who'll get there first, as the wolf said to Red Riding Hood," and he started up the stairs on the run, followed by Sid, while Torn limped on more slowly.
When the end reached their apartment he found the door open, and his two chums standing on the threshold as though afraid to enter. It was dark inside, for the shades were drawn. Tom looked at his two companions in some surprise.
"What's the matter?" he asked. "Snake in there? Why don't you go on in?"
"Listen!" exclaimed Phil, softly.
They stood expectantly. Through the stillness there came to them a rhythmetic tick-tick, which floated out of their room and into the corridor.
"The clock!" gasped Tom.
"Our clock!" whispered Phil, as though to speak aloud would break the magic spell.
"It's come back," went on Sid, taking a step forward in a stealthy manner, as if he expected to surprise a burglar in the act. "Fellows, to all the gods that on Olympus dwell most everlasting praises be! Our clock's come back!"