The Boy Scouts Book of Stories. Various

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СКАЧАТЬ saw the kindly motive under the exaggerated bluffness. Being touched by it, he said gruffly:

      "Well; come on, then, you old billionaire!"

      The Big Man felt a great movement of sympathy in him for his big comrade. He would have liked to slip his little fist in the great brown hand and say something appropriate, only he could think of nothing appropriate. Then he remembered that among men there should be no letting down, no sentimentality. So he lounged along, squinting up at the Butcher and trying to copy his rolling gait.

      At the jigger-shop, Al lifted his eyebrows in well-informed disapproval, saying curtly:

      "What are you doing here, you Butcher, you?"

      "Building up my constitution," said Stevens, with a frown. "I'm staying because I like it, of course. Lawrenceville is just lovely at Easter: spring birds and violets, and that sort of thing."

      "You're a nice one," said Al, a baseball enthusiast. "Why couldn't you behave until after the Andover game?"

      "Of course; but you needn't rub it in," replied the Butcher, staring at the floor. "Give me a double strawberry, and heave it over."

      Al, seeing him not insensible, relented. He added another dab to the double jigger already delivered, and said, shoving over the glass:

      "It's pretty hard luck on the team, Butcher. There's no one hereabouts can hold down the bag like you. Heard anything definite?"

      "No."

      "What do you think?"

      "I'd hate to say."

      "Is any one doing anything?"

      "Cap Kiefer is to see the Doctor to-night."

      "I say, Butcher," said the Big Man, in sudden fear, "you won't go up to Andover and play against us, will you?"

      "Against the school! Well, rather not!" said the Butcher, indignantly. Then he added: "No; if they fire me, I know what I'll do."

      The Big Man wondered if he contemplated suicide; that must be the natural thing to do when one is expelled. He felt that he must keep near Butcher, close all the day. So he made bold to wander about with him, watching him with solicitude.

      They stopped at Lalo's for a hot dog, and lingered at Bill Appleby's, where the Butcher mournfully tried the new mits and swung the bats with critical consideration. Then feeling hungry, they trudged up to Conover's for pancakes and syrup. Everywhere was the same feeling of dismay; what would become of the baseball nine? Then it suddenly dawned upon the Big Man that no one seemed to be sorry on the Butcher's account. He stopped with a pancake poised on his fork, looked about to make sure no one could hear him, and blurted out:

      "I say, Butcher, it's not only on account of first base, you know; I'm darn sorry for you, honest!"

      "Why, you profane little cuss," said the Butcher, frowning, "who told you to swear?"

      "Don't make fun of me, Butcher," said the Great Big Man, feeling very little; "I meant it."

      "Conover," said the Butcher, loudly, "more pancakes, and brown 'em!"

      He, too, had been struck by the fact that in the general mourning there had been scant attention paid to his personal fortunes. He had prided himself on the fact that he was not susceptible to "feelings," that he neither gave nor asked for sympathy. He was older than his associates, but years had never reconciled him to Latin or Greek or, for that matter, to mathematics in simple or aggravated form. He had been the bully of his village out in northern Iowa, and when a stranger came, he trounced him first, and cemented the friendship afterward. He liked hard knocks, give and take. He liked the school because there was the long football season in the autumn, with the joy of battling, with every sinew of the body alert and the humming of cheers indistinctly heard, as he rammed through the yielding line. Then the spring meant long hours of romping over the smooth diamond, cutting down impossible hits, guarding first base like a bull-dog, pulling down the high ones, smothering the wild throws that came ripping along the ground, threatening to jump up against his eyes, throws that other fellows dodged. He was in the company of equals, of good fighters, like Charley De Soto, Hickey, Flash Condit, and Turkey, fellows it was a joy to fight beside. Also, it was good to feel that four hundred-odd wearers of the red and black put their trust in him, and that trust became very sacred to him. He played hard—very hard, but cleanly, because combat was the joy of life to him. He broke other rules, not as a lark, but out of the same fierce desire for battle, to seek out danger wherever he could find it. He had been caught fair and square, and he knew that for that particular offense there was only one punishment. Yet he hoped against hope, suddenly realizing what it would cost him to give up the great school where, however, he had never sought friendships or anything beyond the admiration of his mates.

      The sympathy of the Big Man startled him, then made him uncomfortable. He had no intention of crying out, and he did not like or understand the new emotion that rose in him as he wondered when his sentence would come.

      "Well, youngster," he said, gruffly, "had enough? Have another round?"

      "I've had enough," said the Big Man, heaving a sigh. "Let me treat, Butcher."

      "Not to-day, youngster."

      "Butcher, I—I'd like to. I'm awfully flush."

      "Not to-day."

      "Let's match for it."

      "What!" said the Butcher, fiercely. "Don't let me hear any more of that talk. You've got to grow up first."

      The Big Man, thus rebuked, acquiesced meekly. The two strolled back to the campus in silence.

      "Suppose we have a catch," said the Big Man, tentatively.

      "All right," said the Butcher, smiling.

      Intrenched behind a gigantic mit, the Big Man strove valorously to hold the difficult balls. After a long period of this mitigated pleasure they sat down to rest. Then Cap Kiefer's stocky figure appeared around the Dickinson, and the Butcher went off for a long, solemn consultation.

      The Big Man, thus relieved of responsibility, felt terribly alone. He went to his room and took down volume two of "The Count of Monte Cristo," and stretched out on the window-seat. Somehow the stupendous adventures failed to enthrall him. It was still throughout the house. He caught himself listening for the patter of Hickey's shoes above, dancing a breakdown, or the rumble of Egghead's laugh down the hall, or a voice calling, "Who can lend me a pair of suspenders?"

      And the window was empty. It seemed so strange to look up from the printed page and find no one in the Woodhull opposite, shaving painfully at the window, or lolling like himself over a novel, all the time keeping an eye on the life below. He could not jeer at Two Inches Brown and Crazy Opdyke practicing curves, nor assure them that the Dickinson nine would just fatten on those easy ones. No one halloed from house to house, no voice below drawled out:

      "Oh, you Great Big Man! Stick your head out of the window!"

      There was no one to call across for the time o' day, or for just a nickel to buy stamps, or for the loan of a baseball glove, or a sweater, or a collar button, scissors, button-hook, or fifty and one articles that are never bought but borrowed.

      The Great СКАЧАТЬ