CHAPTER XX
GOSSIP AND A MEETING
HARRY and Dick were sitting on the lower step of the little flight leading to the Cottage porch. It was between ten and eleven of a perfect May morning. The crumbling red bricks paving the short path which led to the curving drive glowed warmly in the sun, and the little blades of grass springing up between them were very green and pert. The campus looked vastly different to-day from what it had that January afternoon when Harry had introduced Dick to Ferry Hill. To-day there was the bluest of blue skies overhead, and instead of the waste of snow the grass stretched away on every side fresh and verdant. The Grove was fast clothing itself in new, tender green, and beyond, at the foot of the long hill, the river dimpled and shone in the sunshine. Something of this occurred to Harry, I think, for she stopped pulling Snip’s ear—an operation which that member of the group, half-asleep in the sunlight, thoroughly approved of—and asked:
“Dick, do you remember the day I brought you up here to show you the school? And how cold it was? And how nasty and dismal everything looked? After you’d gone I never thought for a minute that you’d come back.”
“Neither did I,” answered Dick with a little laugh. “I guess I’d have stayed at Hammond and liked it all right if I hadn’t got there before school opened. It seemed so beastly lonesome over there, and the fellows who stayed during vacation were such a ghastly bunch, that I just had to get out. It was a toss-up whether I’d come over here and try this or hit the trail for home.”
“Are you sorry you came?” asked Harry anxiously.
“Not a bit,” replied Dick with convincing heartiness. “I like it, and I like you and Chub and Roy. You’ve all been so decent to me, you know. You’re all three mighty good fellows, Harry.”
Harry flushed and looked pleased.
“I—I guess we liked you,” she said. “I’m glad you like Roy and Chub,” she continued. “I just love them! They’re—they’re the nicest boys I ever knew, I guess; and you too, Dick.”
Dick shook his head sorrowfully.
“I’m jealous,” he said. “You put Roy and Chub first.”
“Well, you see, I’ve known them longer, Dick,” answered Harry earnestly. “You don’t mind, do you?”
“Not a bit,” he laughed. “Besides, next year they won’t be here, and you’ll have to like me best.”
Harry looked grave.
“That’s the trouble,” she sighed. “When you get to like a boy he goes and graduates and then you never see him again. I don’t know what I’ll do when Roy and Chub go.”
“Don’t know what I’ll do, for that matter,” growled Dick. “It’ll be beastly lonely at first. Maybe I won’t come back myself.”
“Oh, Dick, you must!” cried Harry. “Why, then there wouldn’t be any one! You’ve got to come back! You will, won’t you, Dick?” “Maybe.”
“No, promise!”
“All right, I’ll come, Harry. You and I’ll have to comfort each other, eh? Say, isn’t this a dandy day? Hope it’ll be like this Saturday, eh?”
“It’s going to be,” said Harry decisively. “John says we’re in for a spell of settled weather, and he knows all about it; he never misses.”
“Well, I hope he’s right. I want a good hard track on Saturday.” “Do you think we can beat them?” asked Harry.
Dick hesitated, then shook his head slowly.
“Honestly, I don’t. But I’m not telling the fellows that. It doesn’t help any, that sort of talk. I tell them we can win if we do our level best; and we can; the trouble is that every fellow can’t do his level best when the time comes. Lots of them will be nervous, you know; can’t help it. I may be myself. By the way, Sid got a note from their manager yesterday asking if we would mind changing the order of events so that the mile run will come last; he says two of their men who are going to run the mile are in the low hurdles and they wouldn’t have time to get their wind. I told Sid to write and say it would be all right. It doesn’t matter to us, although I suppose if we insisted on having the things run off the way we first agreed to we’d have a better chance to win the meet.”
“But it wouldn’t seem quite fair, would it, to make those boys run in the mile just after they’d been hurdling?”
“Well, it would be fair enough, I guess; that’s their lookout, you know; only—well, I don’t want to win that way. I say let every fellow have an even chance, and then the one that wins is the best man.”
“Are you going to practise this afternoon?” Harry asked.
“No, on account of the ball game with Whittier. But to-morrow we’ll have a good stiff afternoon of it. Then Friday we’ll rest up. That reminds me: Sid’s trying to get up a meet with Prentice Military Academy for some time the last of June. I hope he fixes it, for if he doesn’t the fellows won’t keep in training; and if they don’t it will be all the harder to get in form again next year. I wish we were sure of having a decent track here next spring. If only the dormitory business had turned out better I guess the Doctor would have been willing to spend some money on the field and track.”
“Do you think we’ll ever get the money for the dormitory, Dick?” asked Harry wistfully.
“Sure to, sooner or later,” he answered stoutly. “But it’s slow going, isn’t it? Haven’t had any more letters, have you?”
Harry shook her head.
“Not one. I think some people are too mean for anything!”
“Well,” Dick laughed, “I dare say they’ve got plenty of uses for their money. We’ll get it yet. This summer I’ll strike dad for a thousand. If he’s had good luck he will give it in a minute. And when we’ve got two thousand pledged I guess your father will be willing to help us. He will see then that we’re in earnest.”
“I’m sure he will,” said Harry. “And isn’t it too funny for anything about his being honorary president and not knowing it? Oh, Dick! What time is it?”
“Twenty of eleven,” answered Dick, looking at his watch. “I’ll be late if I don’t go this minute! And I’ll have to run half the way anyhow!”
“I thought you didn’t have to go until two on Wednesdays,” said Dick.
“Eleven; it’s that awful music. ‘Do, re, mi, fa, sol—’ Good-by.”
“Good-by,” answered Dick, getting up and looking around for his books. “I’ll see you at the game this afternoon.”
“Yes,” called Harry from the door. “And I hope we win.”
“Oh, we can’t help it,” laughed Dick. “It’s a way we have at Ferry Hill!”
But they didn’t win; not unless the score lied. Seven to five it was when the last inning was over. Whittier Collegiate Institute had some good batters on her team and they had little trouble in finding Post and Kirby for twelve hits. Chub was inclined to be doleful after the game.
“Rotten!” he repeated over and over.
“Not a bit,” said Dick. “The trouble was only that you fellows haven’t been practising enough the last week. It’s my fault entirely. I’ve been after you for track work, and you can’t do two things at once and do them well. I’m sorry, Chub, but after Saturday I’ll let you alone.”
“Think that’s it?” asked Chub, more cheerfully. “Well, if it is, I don’t mind so much. Whittier isn’t Hammond, after all. And if we make a good showing Saturday I shan’t mind losing to-day’s game. What do you say, Roy?”
“Me?” asked Roy, trotting away to the shower-bath. “Oh, I’m not worrying about anything.”
Events proved John the gardener to be a real weather prophet, for Saturday dawned clear and warm. The track and field meeting with Hammond was to begin at half past two, and at half past twelve Harry, music-roll in hand, was hurrying back along the dusty road from her music-lesson, fearful that she wouldn’t get through luncheon in time to cross to Coleville on the first launch. Silver Cove was half a mile behind her and the tower of School Hall was already in sight above the tree-tops when the sound of wheels reached her from the road behind. A station carriage drawn by a dejected white horse and driven by a freckle-faced youth of seventeen or eighteen years was approaching unhurriedly from the direction of the Cove. In the rear seat, as Harry saw when the carriage overtook her, sat a gentleman in a neat gray suit, derby hat and brown gloves. The gloves were especially noticeable since they looked very new and were clasped tightly about the handle of a slenderly rolled umbrella which stood between his knees. He was about forty years old, had a round, smiling face, shrewd brown eyes and a short, bristly mustache which terminated at each side in a sharp, waxed point. As the carriage jolted past in its little cloud of dust the occupant of the back seat, who had been observing the pedestrian for several minutes, laid a hand on the driver’s shoulder.
“Stop,” he said.
“Whoa!” commanded the boy. “Whoa, I tell yer! Can’t yer stop nohow, yer pesky brute?”
The horse showed as little inclination to stop as before it had shown to go, and when the vehicle finally drew up motionless, with the driver still scolding fretfully at the steed, it was some little distance beyond Harry. But it was quite evident that the occupants were awaiting her, and so she hurried up to it under the smiling scrutiny of the passenger. She had been walking fast, the forenoon was quite warm and her face was flushed as a result. Also the dust had settled upon her shoes and half way up her ankles, and Harry was sensible of not appearing at her best, a fact which annoyed her since the immaculate appearance of the stranger seemed to set a standard of neatness. Then she was looking up into a pair of smiling brown eyes, and—
“How do you do?” said the man. “May I offer you a seat?”