“MR. ZANE WOULD LIKE TO SEE YOU, MR. HENDERSON.”“MR. ZANE WOULD LIKE TO SEE YOU, MR. HENDERSON.”
“Me?” inquired Sid.
“Yep,” was the sententious answer.
Saying nothing further, the second baseman got up, and, as the messenger went down the hall, he followed slowly.
“He’s in for it, I’m afraid,” remarked Tom dubiously.
“Looks so,” agreed Phil. “It’s about that item in the paper, of course. Too bad it leaked out.”
But what took place at the interview with the proctor, Sid’s chums did not learn until long afterward. All that became known was that Dr. Churchill was summoned, and that Sid was in the proctor’s study a long time. He returned to his room a trifle pale, and with unnaturally bright eyes. Throwing himself on the creaking sofa he stared at the ceiling moodily, while Phil and Tom maintained a discrete silence.
“Why don’t some of you fellows say something?” burst out Sid finally. “Think this is a funeral?”
“We didn’t think you wanted to have a talk-fest,” observed Tom.
“What in blazes am I to do?” asked Sid desperately.
“What about?” inquired Phil.
“You know—Miss Harrison. I don’t want to have her think I’m a gambler. I’m not—I——”
“Then why don’t you tell her why you were inDartwell the night of the raid?” suggested the captain.
“I—I can’t,” burst out Sid. “It’s impossible!”
Tom shrugged his shoulders.
“Oh, I know what you mean!” burst out Sid. “It looks as if I wasn’t telling the truth. But I am—you’ll believe me—some day.”
“Forget it,” advised Phil. “Let’s talk about baseball. Have you seen the loving cup trophy?”
“It’s a beaut!” declared Tom. “I saw it in the doctor’s study. We’re going to win it, too!”
“Hope so,” murmured Phil. “If we have a few more games like to-day, we may. But speaking of games——”
He was interrupted by a knock on the door. Sid started and leaped up from the sofa.
“I’ll go,” he exclaimed. “If it’s a message——”
He did not finish, but Tom and Phil looked significantly at each other. Clearly Sid expected another mysterious summons. But, as he opened the portal there stood the Jersey twins.
“Hello, fellows,” began Joe, “do you want to see some sport?”
“Fine sport,” added Jerry, who sometimes echoed his brother, a trick that was interchangeable with the twins.
“We’re always ready for sport,” replied Tom.“What is it: baiting a professor, or hazing some freshies?”
“Professor,” replied Joe.
“Pitchfork,” echoed Jerry, that name, as I have explained, being applied to Professor Emerson Tines.
“What’s up now?” asked Phil.
“Oh, he’s been particularly obnoxious of late,” went on Joe. “Some of us had a little smoker the other night, strictly sub-rosa, you understand, but he smelled us out, and now some of us are doing time for it. To-day Bricktop Molloy evolved a little scheme, and we thought we’d let you fellows in on it. Want to come, Sid?” for Sid had gone back to the sofa.
“No, I guess not,” he answered listlessly.
“What’s the matter—sick?” inquired Joe, in a whisper of Tom and Phil. They shook their heads, and motioned to the twins not to make further inquiries.
“What’s the game?” asked Tom. “We’ll come.”
“We’re going to get back at Pitchfork,” went on Jerry. “Come along and you’ll see. I’ll just explain, though, that he has quietly been ‘tipped off’ to the effect that another smoker is in progress, and if he does as we expect him to, he’ll try to raid the room.”
“And if he does?”
“Well, he won’t find what he expects to. Come on, and keep quiet. What’s the matter with Sid, anyhow?” for by this time the four were out in the corridor, leaving the moody one in the room.
“Hanged if we know,” replied Phil, “except that there’s a girl mixed up in it.” He refrained from saying anything about the accusation, thinking that would be noised about soon enough.
“Oh, if it’s only a girl he’ll soon be over it,” declared Joe with a professional air.
“Of course,” echoed his brother. “Come on.”
Phil and Tom soon found themselves in the midst of a number of choice spirits, who moved silently about the lower end of the corridor, near a room that was sometimes used for student meetings, and where, more than once, it was whispered, smokers had been held, in violation of the rules. The reason for the selection of this apartment was that it had an open fireplace, which carried off the fumes of the tobacco.
“Did he get the tip?” asked Jerry, as he and his brother, together with Phil and Tom, came up.
“He sure did,” answered Bricktop. “Reports from the front are that he is on the warpath.”
“Is everything working all right?” asked Joe.
“Fine. Can’t you smell it?”
Tom and Phil sniffed the air. There was an unmistakable odor of tobacco.
“But if there’s a smoker going on in there, why was Pitchfork tipped off?” inquired Tom.
“Wait an’ ye’ll see, me lad,” advised Bricktop in his rich brogue. “I think he’s coming now. Pump her up, Kindlings!”
Then, for the first time Tom and his chum noticed that Dan Woodhouse had a small air pump, which he was vigorously working, as he stood in a dark corner.
Footsteps sounded down the corridor. There were hasty cautions from the ringleaders, and the lads hid themselves in the dim shadows of the big hall. The footsteps came nearer, and then they seemed to cease. But the reason was soon apparent, for Professor Emerson Tines was now tip-toeing his way toward the door of the suspected room. By the dim light of a half-turned down gas jet he could be seen sneaking up. The only sound from the students was the faint sound of the air pump. Tom and Phil could not imagine what it was for.
Professor Tines reached the portal. Then he gave a sudden knock, and called:
“I demand to be admitted at once, young gentlemen! I know the nefarious practice that is going on in there, and it must stop at once! Open the door or I shall summon the janitor and have it forced! Open at once!”
The professor tried the knob. To his surpriseit at once opened the door, and he almost stumbled into the apartment. He uttered an exclamation of delight, probably in the belief that he had caught the students red-handed, but the next moment he gave a gasp of dismay.
For, as Tom, Phil, and all the others could see from their vantage points in the shadowy recesses, the room was empty. It was lighted, however, and in plain view on a table in the middle of the floor was a large flask. In the top of this there was a receptacle which contained a pile of burning tobacco, and it was glowing as though some giant was puffing on the improvised pipe. From a glass tube extending from the flask there poured out volumes of the pungent odor, and, as the puffs came, Tom and Phil could hear the air pump being worked. It was a “studentless smoker,” the air pump, attached to a rubber hose which exhausted the air from the flask, producing exactly the effect of some one puffing a pipe. The room was blue with the haze of tobacco, and as the astonished professor stood and gazed at the strange sight more smoke arose from the flask. Then, from somewhere in the dark recesses of the corridor came a voice.
“Stung!” it ejaculated, and there was a hurried movement as the students fled in the darkness.
Plunging on through the darkened corridors Tom and Phil reached their room. They found Sid still on the sofa.
“Say, that was great!” cried Tom, venturing to laugh, now that there was no danger of being caught. “You should have been along, Sid. Pitchfork got his to-night, all right. I’ll never forget the blank look on his face.”
“I either,” agreed Phil. “That was a smoker as was a smoker. I hope none of us are caught. The twins and Bricktop outdid themselves this trip.”
Sid began to show some signs of interest, and the trick was told of in detail to him. Of course a faculty inquiry followed, but the hose and air pump had been taken from the school laboratory, and there were no clues to the perpetrators. Professor Tines was furious, and demanded that the guilty ones be dismissed.
“Willingly, my dear professor,” agreed the venerableDr. Churchill, “if I can only find them,” and there was a twinkle in his deep-set eyes, which he took care that Mr. Tines did not see.
Baseball practice went on for several days. One afternoon, as the lads were dispersing, Ed Kerr was seen coming over the diamond, holding in his hand a letter.
“We can’t play Fairview Saturday,” he announced.
“Why not?” asked Tom quickly.
“They say they’re not quite ready to open their season,” went on the manager. “They ask me to put the opening game off a week.”
“Are you going to do it?” inquired several.
“Well, what do you fellows say?” asked the manager.
“Oh, well, they probably have a good reason. We’ll let it go a week,” assented Tom. “But can we get another game in place of it?”
“Yes, I can fill in with the Layton Preparatory school for this Saturday, and we can go to Wescott University the following Saturday, and then tackle Fairview, if you fellows say so.”
“Sure,” came in a chorus.
When Tom and Phil returned to their room Sid was not there.
“What do you think about it, anyhow, Phil?” asked the pitcher, and there was no need to be more explicit.
“Oh, hang it all, I don’t know. It looks funny; about Sid not wanting to tell. And he sure is cut up over Miss Harrison. I wonder who sent her that newspaper clipping?”
“Give it up. But I heard that there was a raid all right, and a lot of college fellows were caught. Some of ’em were our chaps, but they managed to keep their identity hidden. I don’t see how Sid’s got out.”
“Then you think he was there?”
“No, I didn’t mean that. But it looks mighty funny. I do hope he isn’t going to cut loose, just at the opening of the ball season,” and Tom sighed, as though he had the weight of worlds on his shoulders. And, indeed it is no small task to be captain of a lively college team, struggling to win the championship trophy, and the pitcher was beginning to realize this.
“Oh, maybe he just wanted a fling,” suggested Phil. “Now he’s had it he’s ashamed to admit it, and wants to cover it up.”
“But he denies that he was caught,” said Tom.
“I know it; but what good will that do him, if he doesn’t tell where he was that night? He admits that he was in Dartwell, and he must have been somewhere near the place of the raid, or his name would never have gotten in the papers.”
“Unless some one gave his name out of spite.”
“By hookey! That’s so!” admitted Phil. “Inever thought of that. But no—no college fellow would be as mean as that.”
“Unless it was Langridge or Gerhart. Gerhart is in parts unknown, and Langridge——”
“I understand none of the Boxer Hall fellows were in it,” went on Phil. “Only some of our boys and a few from Fairview—more fools they! But it sure has put Sid on the blink as far as Miss Harrison goes. Ruth was telling me her family, as well as she, has a horror of gambling in any form. Poor old Sid. I wish we could help him; don’t you?”
“I sure do,” agreed Tom. “We need him on the nine, and we need him in good condition. First thing I know I’ll have to put a sub on in Sid’s place.”
“Oh, I hope not. But, say, I’ve got to do some studying if I’m to play on the team myself. I’m getting to low water mark in Latin and maths. Here goes for some hard boning.”
It was about a week after this, in which time Randall had met, and beaten, Layton Preparatory school, that Phil, Sid and Tom were taking a trolley ride one evening.
“Where shall we go?” asked Phil.
“Let’s take the Tonoka Lake car,” suggested Tom.
“Which means let’s go to Fairview,” asserted Phil. “Well, I don’t mind.” Sid said nothing.
Of course it was only a coincidence, but a little later the three lads were walking down toward the co-educational institution, and of course, I suppose, it was also only a coincidence that Miss Tyler and Miss Clinton should shortly come strolling over the campus.
“There’s Ruth,” announced Phil carelessly, though he was not looking at her, but at Miss Tyler.
“That’s so,” replied Tom, as if it was the queerest thing in the world.
“They’re headed this way—no use to turn back, I suppose?” asked Phil, as if there was some doubt of it.
“No,” agreed Tom. “Besides, I want to ask your sister what she thinks of the chances of Fairview beating us.”
“Oh, she’ll tell you her college will win, of course,” asserted Phil. “Well, come on,” and they walked to meet the girls who had pretended not to notice the approach of the lads.
“Oh, why hello, Phil!” called his sister. “Glad to see you; aren’t we, Madge?”
“Of course,” replied Miss Tyler, with a merry laugh.
“I’ll see you fellows later,” murmured Sid, who was very sensitive, and he was about to swing away.
“Don’t go,” urged Tom. “We’ll soon be going back.”
But Sid turned aside. As he did so there came around the corner of the main college building two figures, who strolled over the campus. It needed but a glance to disclose to Tom and Phil who they were—Miss Harrison and Fred Langridge. The couple were chatting and laughing merrily. Instinctively Tom turned to see if Sid had observed them. The second baseman had, and, for an instant he stood staring after the two, who had not seen him. Then, without a word, he kept on his way.
“Beautiful evening,” remarked Miss Tyler quickly, and she began to talk rapidly about the weather, as if to cover Sid’s retreat.
As Tom and Phil walked along the corridor leading to their room a little later that night, they saw a light streaming out of the cracks around the portal.
“Sid’s in there,” said Tom.
“Yes,” agreed Phil, “I wonder——” But he did not finish the sentence. Awkwardly he and Tom pushed in. They started back at the sight of their chum.
He was bending over a table on which he had placed a portable electric lamp, the college rooms being illuminated with both gas and the incandescents.Holding a paper in the glow of the bulb, Sid was examining the document with the aid of a magnifying glass. At the same time he seemed to be comparing other pieces of paper with the one he held.
“Studying?” asked Tom.
“Yes,” replied Sid shortly.
“Something new?” inquired Phil. “I didn’t know you were qualifying for a course in identifying handwriting,” for he saw that the papers Sid was looking at contained writing.
“Do you see this?” asked Sid suddenly, holding up an envelope.
“Why—er—yes,” answered Tom. “It’s addressed to Miss Harrison, and—but—are you going over with a microscope a letter you’ve written to her, to see if it will pass muster? She’s not as particular as that, you old bat.”
“I haven’t been writing to her,” replied Sid coldly. “This is the envelope containing that clipping with my name in it—the report of the gambling raid—I picked up the envelope—that afternoon,” and he seemed struggling with some emotion.
“What about it?” asked Phil, who did not exactly catch the drift.
“This,” answered Sid quickly. “Look at this note,” and he showed them a missive containingsome reference to baseball matters. It was signed “Fred Langridge.”
“I got that from Langridge last term,” went on Sid, “and I saved it, for some unknown reason. I’m glad, now, that I did.”
“Why?” inquired Tom, who began to see what was coming.
“Because, look at that!” and Sid placed side by side the note from Langridge and the envelope that had contained the damaging clipping. He held the magnifying glass first over one and then the other. “Do you notice any similarity?” he asked.
“Looks to me as if the same person wrote both,” said Tom.
“That’s right,” agreed Phil.
“They did!” cried Sid, as he held up the envelope. “Fred Langridge sent to Miss Harrison that lying clipping about me, and to-day he was out walking with her!”
Sid stood facing his two chums, and his breath came quick and fast. He was much worked up over his discovery, as were also his roommates.
“From the time I picked up this envelope, after that day when we had lunch with your sister, Phil,” he went on, “I’ve been trying to think in whose handwriting it was. Perhaps I had no right to take the envelope, but I couldn’t help it after she—Miss Harrison dropped it. To-night, after I saw him—saw Langridge out walking with her—I came back here, and I had a suspicion. I knew I had an old note of Langridge’s somewhere around. I found it, and compared it with the envelope. You see what it shows.”
“He must have sent her the clipping,” agreed Tom. “But why?”
“Easy enough to see that,” answered Sid. “He was mad because I—er—I happened to go with her a few times, and he is taking this course to give me a bad name, though if she only knew it Langridge is no white-ribboner.”
“Maybe that was a fake clipping,” suggested Phil. “I’ve heard of such things being done before. Langridge might have hired a printer to set that item up so that it looked as if it was cut from a newspaper.”
“No,” answered Sid quietly. “The item was genuine. I have a similar one I cut from the HaddonfieldHerald.”
“But it isn’t true?” inquired Tom.
“No—that is—well, I can’t say anything about it,” and Sid looked miserable again. “But I’m glad I found out who sent it to Miss Harrison.”
“What are you going to do about it?” asked Tom.
“I’m going to have it out with Langridge the first time I meet him. I’ll punch——”
“Better go slow,” advised Phil. “Take it easy, old man. Langridge is a slick article. We know that of old. If you try a rough-house he’ll have you at a disadvantage.”
“I can’t help it. I’m not going to let him get ahead of me this way.”
“Oh, forget it and play ball,” advised Tom with a laugh, for he felt that the subject was getting too serious, and his heart was wrapped up in his team, despite a certain pretty girl.
“I only wish I could—forget it,” answered Sid.
It was several days after this, and a few days before the game with Wescott University, whichwas to be played on the latter club’s grounds, that Phil, Tom and Sid journeyed to the town of Haddonfield to get some things to take with them on the trip. For it was quite a journey to play Wescott, a college with whom Randall had clashed in football, losing the game because Phil was taken sick and a new quarter back had to go in. It took a day to go and a day to come, and the lads would need to take some baggage with them.
The three chums had made their purchases, and were on their way to take a car back to Randall, when Sid grasped the arm of Tom.
“There he is!” he exclaimed.
“Who?” asked Tom, who was critically examining a new tie he had purchased.
“Langridge!” cried Sid. “I’m going to have it out with him.”
“Don’t,” begged Phil, but it was too late, for Sid had crossed the street to where the former pitcher for Randall was walking with another chap, as sportily attired as was he.
“I want to speak to you!” called Sid to his enemy, as he came up behind him, Tom and Phil following at a distance.
“What’s that?” drawled Langridge, turning. “Oh, it’s you, is it Henderson? Well, I don’t know that I care to talk to you. I’m not used to associating with chaps caught in gambling raids!”
Sid was fairly trembling with rage, but he managedto take from his pocket a duplicate of the clipping which Miss Harrison had received.
“Did you—did you send that to her?” spluttered Sid.
“Send it to whom?” asked Langridge insolently.
“Miss Harrison? That lying clipping about me? Did you send it, I ask?”
“Well, supposing I did? It’s a free country; isn’t it? Besides, I’m not so sure that the clipping doesn’t tell the truth.”
“Then you sent it!” cried Sid. “You don’t dare deny it!”
“Dare you deny that you are the person referred to in it? Dare you deny that you were in that gambling hall the night of the raid? Dare you deny that?” fired back Langridge.
Sid seemed stunned.
“I—I—er—how—how did you——” he was stammering.
“I see you don’t dare deny it,” went on Langridge with a sneer. “Your manner is answer enough. Come on, Perkins. I don’t care to prolong this discussion.”
“But I do!” cried poor Sid, now beside himself. “I’ll get even with you for this dirty, sneaking piece of work! You dare send that clipping to her—to her! I’ll——” he sprang forward, with clenched fists, and before Tom or Phil could stop him, he had struck Langridge. The latter,with a snarl of rage, jumped toward Sid, but his friend clasped his arm.
“Not here! Not here!” implored Perkins. “You can’t fight here, Langridge.”
“No, that’s right,” admitted the other with a shrug of his shoulders, as he calmed himself with an effort. “And I don’t know that I care, after all, for the notoriety of fighting him.” He turned aside. Sid was about to spring forward again, his face distorted with rage, but Tom and Phil held him back.
“Come on,” whispered the pitcher in his ear. “You don’t know what you’re doing, Sid. You’re only making matters worse.”
With something like a sob in his throat, Sid allowed his chums to lead him away.
“By Jove, but I’m glad we’re going out of town for a game,” remarked Tom to Phil the next morning.
“Why?” inquired the first baseman, as he critically examined his favorite mushroom bat, which he had mended with wire and tape.
“Because of Sid. It may put him on his feet again, after this business of Langridge, Miss Harrison, and the newspaper clipping. Hang it all! girls can sure mix things up when they want to, can’t they?”
“Yes, but it isn’t her fault. She merely doesn’t care for a fellow that gambles, and Sid can’t say that he doesn’t.”
“I don’t believe Sid gambles,” said Tom quickly. “I was going to add,” he went on, “that I’d ‘gamble’ on that. After the way he acted with Langridge last night, almost coming to a fight, I think there is something more in this than we’ve thought of.”
“Probably there is; but why doesn’t Sid comeout and say he wasn’t in the raid, and clear himself? It ought to be easy enough to do, but he doesn’t do it.”
“I know; and yet he may have a reason.”
“Very likely. But things look suspicious. Mind you, I don’t say to us, for I’d stick to Sid, no matter what he did. But there’s the fact of him suddenly being broke, being out late several times, going off after getting mysterious notes, and coming in smelling strongly of tobacco. It looks bad, and I don’t see why Sid doesn’t own up and confess, or else clear himself.”
“Maybe he can’t. But that’s neither here nor there. I’m glad he and Langridge didn’t fight. Now we’re going out of town to play Wescott, and maybe get beaten, for they have a fine nine. But, anyhow, it will do Sid good. He may come back entirely different.”
“Let’s hope so, for there’s no fun living with him, as he is now. I was glad when he got so infatuated with Miss Harrison, even going to the length of taking up hammered brass work because she had a fad that way. But since she turned him down poor Sid chucked all his brass stuff out of the window the other day. Well, maybe it will come out all right.”
“It’s got to,” declared Tom fiercely. “Well, I’m going down to see Kerr and Leighton, to learn if everything’s all ready for the trip.”
The next day the team started for Wescott University, accompanied by as many of the students as could cut their lectures. It was a day’s trip to the big college, one day would be devoted to the game, which was an annual affair, and the return trip would be made the third day.
The Randallites were accorded an enthusiastic welcome as they were escorted to their hotel by the Wescott lads.
“Remember how sick I was when we were here last year to play ’em football?” asked Phil, as he and his chums went to their rooms.
“I sure do. Please don’t repeat the experience. We want to beat these fellows if we can.”
The morning of the game did not prove very auspicious, as it had rained in the night, and was still threatening. But when the two nines went out to the diamond the sun broke through the clouds and it cleared off.
“Now, fellows,” said Coach Leighton, as he gathered the captain and his men about him, “you’ve got to play fast, snappy ball to win. We’re up against a better team than either Boxer Hall or Fairview, and I want to see what you can do.”
“If they don’t do what’s right they’ll answer to me,” said Tom, with a grim smile.
“And if you fellows lose you’ll have to walk home,” added Manager Kerr.
“Sure, then we’ll not allow ’em a hit,” prophesied Bricktop Molloy.
“We’ll whitewash ’em,” added Dutch Housenlager, as he tried to trip up Joe Jackson, but failed.
It was a fast, snappy game from the very start, Tom doing some superb work in the box, but being fully matched by Marshall, the Wescott twirler, who was “a southpaw,” or left hander.
“He certainly’s hard to hit,” conceded Holly Cross, when the Randallites came to bat in the fifth inning, with never a run scored, while Wescott had two, one each having been garnered in the second and third innings.
“We ought to have some left-handed batters to sort of fool him,” remarked Tom.
“I can bat left handed,” said Sid, who had been unusually quiet during the trip and the game.
“Get out! Then it’s something new!” exclaimed Mr. Leighton.
“Yes,” admitted Sid, “and yet it isn’t either. I used to bat left handed before I came to Randall, but I gave it up. I’ve been practicing it on the quiet, lately, and if you like I’ll try it now.”
“It’s risky,” objected Tom. “Wait until we see what we can do this inning.”
But they couldn’t do anything, and after three men had gone down, one after the other, under the scientific twirling of Marshall, Mr. Leighton,Kerr and Tom, after a consultation decided to let Sid try, as he was to bat first in the next round.
Wescott managed to get two more runs, as the players were “finding” Tom, and things began to look black for the visiting team.
“See if you can’t rap out a home run,” begged the captain, as Sid went to the plate in the sixth. There was manifest surprise when he took the left-handed position, and Marshall and Bradshaw, the latter being the Wescott catcher, held a whispered consultation.
Whatever line of play they decided on availed them nothing, however, for Sid caught a “beaut” on the end of his bat, selecting the first ball pitched, and he sent it away over in the right field bleachers, easily making a three-bagger of it. He could have come on home, except for ground rules, which allowed only three bases on a ball that went among the spectators, of whom there was an enormous crowd present, almost up to the base lines.
“Good!” delightedly cried the Randall supporters, and the record was soon bettered for Holly Cross came up next, and, though he batted right handed, he managed to whale out a two-bagger, which brought in Sid and made the first tally for the visitors. That gave them confidence and they made three runs that inning, coming within one of tying the score.
Tom, too, seemed to stiffen in his work, and he struck out three men in quick succession.
“Now if we can only do as well this inning,” remarked the coach, as Dutch Housenlager came up. Dutch knocked a pretty fly, and was off like the wind to first. He never would have reached it, but for an error on the part of the right fielder who muffed the ball, amid the groans of his fellows. Then, for a time, the Wescott team seemed to go to pieces, until, when the eighth inning opened, the score was tied.
Goose eggs were chalked up in the frames of both teams in the eighth, however, the pitchers both working hard. Then came Randall’s chance at the bat in the ninth.
“One run will beat ’em, if we can only hold ’em down when they come up,” muttered Kerr to Tom.
“I’ll do my part,” the nervy pitcher assured him.
It fell to Sid again, to do the trick. There were two men out, when he came up, and it looked hopeless, but he again batted left handed, and once more caught a “beaut” on the end of his bat. He got two bases on it, and, by great good luck Holly Cross, next player, whaled out what proved to be a triple, and Sid, as soon as he heard the crack of the ball, started home.
As he swung around toward third base theplayer there perhaps unintentionally got in his way. The baseman pretended that the ball was being fielded to him, in his endeavor to throw Sid out of his calculations, but the nervy Randall second baseman kept on. There was a collision between him and the man covering the bag, and, for an instant, Sid hesitated on third, and almost fell over, seizing his left foot in both hands, and hopping about.
“Sid’s spiked!” cried Tom. “The third baseman spiked him, just as he had a chance to score! Come on in, Sid. Come on in!” yelled the captain frantically.
There was a confusing chorus of yells, so much so that the fielder after the ball, which had gone past him, did not know what to do, after he had the horsehide. But by this time Sid was limping toward home, running fairly well, but with a look of agony on his face. Holly Cross was racing from second now.
“Home with that ball, you loon!” yelled the Wescott catcher, who saw Sid coming, for the Wescott fielder was stupidly holding it.
Then the fielder woke up, and threw to second, hoping to catch out Holly, who was somewhat undecided. But Sid kept on to home, and tallied the run, though he almost collapsed a moment later, while Holly leaped on to third.
“Hurt bad?” asked Tom, as he and several others hurried up to Sid.
“I should say so,” remarked Mr. Leighton, as he saw the blood running from Sid’s shoe.
Meanwhile Holly had reached third, though the decision was close. He died there, for the next man struck out, retiring the side, and making the score five to four, in favor of Randall, though with Wescott still to have a chance in the ending of the ninth.
The third baseman made all sorts of apologies to Sid, who indeed had a nasty cut, for a spike had gone through the outer, fleshy part of his foot. It was so evidently an accident, however, that nothing unpleasant was said, though Sid could not play, and had to be replaced by Pete Backus.
There was a grim look on Tom’s face as he took his place in the box, and it was justified, for he struck out two men. The third knocked what seemed was going to be a nice hit, but Pete Backus caught it, though he had to jump well for it, a feat for which his training stood him well in hand.
“Wow! We’ve done ’em!” cried Tom, when he realized that the third Wescott man was out, without a run having been scored by their rivals in the last inning.
“We sure have,” agreed Mr. Leighton. “Poor Sid, though. He’ll be out of it for a few days.”
“I don’t care, as long as we won the game,” spoke the plucky lad, as he limped along, his foot having been dressed, and peroxide applied, to prevent blood poisoning.
“It was a glorious victory,” sang Holly Cross, the others joining in, after cheers had been given for Wescott, and returned by those fine-spirited lads.
It was a jolly crowd that journeyed back to Randall next day, with the Wescott scalps hanging at their belts.
“It was just what Sid wanted,” decided Tom to Phil as he noted the lively look on the second baseman’s face, for he was jolly and laughing, in spite of the pain of his injured foot.
There was a great celebration in Randall when the victorious team marched up the campus that night, and bonfires galore glared all around.
“A feast to-night,” decided a crowd of the team’s most enthusiastic supporters. “Sid Henderson will be toastmaster, on account of his great work.”
But Sid, who had limped to his room to change his clothes, shook his head.
“Why not?” asked Tom and Phil in surprise.
“Because I—I’ve got to go away to-night,” and Sid tried to conceal a letter in his hand—a letter which he had found awaiting him when he returned from Wescott with his chums.
For a moment neither Tom nor Phil answered. There was an embarrassed silence, but it only affected the three chums, for all about them was a rollicking, shouting crowd of students intent on arranging for a celebration in honor of the nine, and Sid—the player who had done so much to help win.
“Have yougotto go?” asked Tom, in a low voice. “Can’t you put it off, Sid?”
“I’ve got to go. I can’t put it off,” was the reply, as Sid turned and limped away.
“Oh, I say! Where’s he going?” demanded Snail Looper. “We want to form a procession and carry him.”
“Oh, he’ll be back—later,” answered Phil, for both he and Tom wished to conceal, as long as possible, the growing mystery that seemed to be enveloping their chum.
There was no time for longer talk with Sid, as he had hurried off as fast as his injured footwould let him, though Mr. Leighton had advised him to stay in his room for a couple of days.
“Where do you s’pose he’s going?” asked Tom of Phil.
“Give it up, unless he’s going to call on Miss Harrison, and it doesn’t seem very likely. He’d be more cheerful if it was that. As it is he acts as if he was going to a funeral.”
“That’s right. He got another one of those queer letters, and, as usual, when he does, he scoots off somewhere. Do you know what I think?”
“You think of so many things, Tom, I can’t be sure.”
“No joking. I mean we ought to follow him, and see where he goes so mysteriously. Maybe we could help him.”
“Oh, we couldn’t do that, but I’d do anything else to help Sid.”
“No, of course it wouldn’t be fair to play the spy; but, just the same, I wish I knew what was worrying him.”
A moment later the two players were caught up in a rush of enthusiastic students that involved the whole nine except Sid, and were carried off to an impromptu celebration. Bonfires were blazing, and hastily-organized banquets were in order.
“Why, you’d think we’d won the championshipto see the way they take on,” remarked Holly Cross.
“Well, we’re in line for it, after the way we beat Wescott,” said Tom. “It’s the best nine Randall has had in many a year, if I do say it myself,” and Tom looked proudly on his team.
“My uncle says——” began a voice.
“Smother him!”
“Into the lake with him!”
“Make him eat soft soap!”
“Choke him with a double ice-cream cone!”
These cries, and many more, greeted the almost fatal announcement of Ford Fenton. Much abashed, he turned aside from the crowd into which he had made his way.
“I wouldn’t stand for that, if I were you,” remarked Bert Bascome to him. “Why don’t you go back at ’em.”
“Oh, I don’t know,” replied Ford hesitatingly.
“You’d have been manager of the team if some of the mollycoddles around here had had any spunk,” went on the sporty freshman. “I’m not done yet, either. I’ll make the team wish, before the season is over, that Ed Kerr hadn’t been manager.”
“You’ll not do anything rash, will you?” asked Ford, who was somewhat afraid of his wealthy chum, who proposed daring pranks sometimes.
“I don’t know,” answered Bascome with a superiorair. “If I had some one to help me I know what I’d do. Come over here, I want to talk to you,” and he led Ford off to where a number of freshmen of Bascome’s crowd were looking on at the celebration in honor of the nine, but taking no part. Tom saw Ford going off with Bascome, the enthusiastic welcome of the players having calmed down for a moment.
“I don’t like that,” he observed to Phil. “Bascome is a chap likely to get Ford into trouble. There’s a fast set in the freshie crowd this year.”
“Yes, we didn’t take enough temper out of ’em with the hazing last fall. Have to do the job over again, I guess. But come on, enjoy life while you can,” and the two were once more caught up in the happy rush.
The celebration went on the better part of the evening, and when Phil and Tom got to their room Sid was not there. He came in later, narrowly missing detection by the proctor, and said little. He was limping quite badly.
“How’s the foot?” asked Tom.
“Not much better,” answered Sid. “I shouldn’t have gone out to-night, only—I had to.”
He was dead lame the next day, and for two days after that had to stay in bed, his place on the nine, in practice games, being taken by Pete Backus, who did not do half badly.
The game with Fairview was approaching andit was likely to be a severely-contested one. Tom was a little anxious but seemed more at ease when Dr. Marshall, the college physician, gave it as his opinion that Sid could play, his foot having almost healed.
“And you’ve got to bat as you did before too, old sport,” insisted Tom, with a laugh. “Why didn’t you spring that left-hand racket before?”
“Well, you see I wasn’t at all sure of it. When I was a kid I always batted left handed. Then I broke my shoulder and I had to bat right handed after it mended, for it was stiff. Then later I found I could bat either way, but I favored right, until lately, when I began practicing left again.”
“We’ll keep you for a pinch hitter,” declared Tom. “I must revise the batting order, and get you up first, after this.”
Sid got into practice a few days before the Fairview game, but was so stiff that it was decided to have some one run for him, after he had gotten to first.
The day before the game, when Sid, Phil and Tom were in their room, Sid putting some strips of adhesive plaster on his lame foot, there came a cautious knock at the door. Dutch Housenlager was at once admitted.
“Are you fellows game?” was his first question.
“For what?” asked Phil.
“For a joke on Proc. Zane?”
“Oh, we’re always ready for that!” exclaimed Sid. “He has caught me once this term, and nearly twice. What’s the joke?”
“I’ll explain,” went on Dutch, fairly bubbling over with mirth. “Only you fellows may have to stand for part of it.”
“How?” asked Tom. “We’ll do our share, of course.”
“We want to use one of your windows for part of the trick. May we?”
“Sure,” answered Phil. “We’ll stand for anything short of setting fire to the college, and we’ll throw in a hazing of Pitchfork if it’s possible.”
“Oh, he’ll get his some day,” replied Dutch, “but just now we’re after Zane. Here’s a cord. When you hear three tree-toad whistles down below, lower it from your window, and then at two tugs haul up.”
“You’re not going to pull the proctor up here, are you?” inquired Phil in some alarm.
“No, but I wish we could. He’s been on the job pretty brisk, lately. Just haul the cord, and then I’ll be back to explain more,” and leaving a stout string in Tom’s hands Dutch hurried away. The three chums tried to guess what was to follow, and made all sorts of wild hazards, inthe midst of which they were interrupted by hearing from below the cautious imitation of the trill of a tree-toad, thrice repeated.
“Lower the cord,” whispered Phil, and Tom dangled it from the window. In a few minutes he felt two tugs, which was the signal for hauling up, and he pulled until he had hoisted to his window sill a coil of strong wire. The inseparables were wondering what it was for, when Dutch reappeared.
“Anything heavy we can fasten this to?” he asked, as his eyes roved about the room.
“There’s the alarm clock,” replied Sid. “It wakes us out of a heavy sleep, sometimes.”
“Rotten joke,” commented Dutch. “Here, this will do,” and he approached the old sofa, holding the coil of wire.
“It won’t damage it; will it?” cried Phil in some alarm.
“Impossible, son! Impossible!” replied Dutch. “I only want to anchor the wire to the sofa. There we are,” and he rapidly made a loop in the wire, and strung it around the ancient piece of furniture. Then the other end of the wire was dangled out of the window. It was promptly pulled taut, and seemed to be stretched out for some distance.
“That’s the stuff!” commented Dutch. “Holly and the rest of the boys are on the job.”
“But what are you going to do?” asked Tom, much mystified.
“You’ll soon see,” answered Dutch, as he hurried from the room again.
When Dutch returned, after an absence of about half an hour, he seemed in considerable of a hurry. He went directly to the window, out of which there stretched away in the darkness the tight wire, and from the casement dropped a cord. Then he gave a whistling signal, which was answered. Dutch began to haul up on the cord.
“Say, look here!” burst out Phil. “What’s up, anyhow? Let us in on the joke, as long as you’re using our room to work it from.”
“Sure,” agreed Dutch. “It’s all ready now, as soon as I get the cord Snail Looper is fastening to this one.”
He hauled up a thin but strong rope, and once more gave some whistling signals. Then he closed down the window.
“Now we’ll have to wait about an hour,” he explained, “but I’ll tell you what’s up. You know the proctor has been unusually officious of late, and several of us have suffered.”
Sid nodded appreciatively.
“Well,” resumed Dutch, “some of us have rigged up an effigy, in the shape of a student in a dress suit, and at this moment the said imitation student is strung on this wire, which extends from your window across the campus, to the clump of elms just beyond Booker Memorial chapel. The effigy is a sort of trolley car, and this is the wire. This cord, which I just hauled up is also attached to the figure. Now at the proper time, when Proc. Zane goes out to catch some poor chap, who has been off to see his best girl, and has stayed too late, I’ll pull this string, the figure will slide along the wire, with the feet just touching the ground, and the proctor thinking it is a student, will rush up to identify him. There will be something interesting when the two meet,” and Dutch began to chuckle.
“But how can we see it?” asked Tom. “It’s as dark as a pocket to-night.”
“All the better. The fellows hidden in the clump of elms have an automobile search light, which they will turn on at the proper moment. Do you catch on?”
“Wow! It’s rich!” cried Phil.
“All to the mustard and the spoon, too!” decided Tom.
“A lallapaloosa!” was Sid’s comment.
“And not a bit of danger,” added Dutch. “Assoon as the search light flashes on the scene, and the proctor is made aware of the joke, I’ll cut the wire from your window, it will fall to the ground, be hauled in by the fellows in the elms, together with the figure, and not a bit of evidence will remain.”
“Great!” commented Tom. “But how can you be sure that the proctor will be out there?”
“Oh, we’ve arranged for that. Snail and Holly took pains to converse, rather loudly, in Mr. Zane’s hearing to-night, though they pretended not to see him. They intimated that they might try to sneak in about eleven o’clock.”
“Then the trick comes off then?” asked Phil.
“Exactly. We’ve got half an hour yet.”
The students sat and talked of many things while waiting, chiefly baseball, until a slight vibration of the wire and a tug of the cord warned them that the time for action had arrived. Dutch explained that he had arranged a code of signals with his chums so that he knew when to haul in on the cord which would pull the stuffed figure along the wire.
“There it goes!” he whispered finally. “Now watch the fun!”
He began to haul, and the sagging of the wire told of a weight on it. Listening, as they peered from the window into the darkness, Tom and hisfriends could hear some one running across the campus. Then came a challenge.
“Stop, if you please, sir! I see you, and it is useless to try and sneak into college at this hour! I demand your name, sir!”
“That’s Zane!” whispered Phil.
A moment later the wire was violently agitated.
“He’s caught him!” exclaimed Dutch. “Why don’t they turn on the light, so he can see it’s only a stuffed scarecrow?”
At that instant a dazzling pencil of light cut the air, wavered around uncertainly, and then was focused on a queer sight. The dignified proctor of Randall College held in his embrace the swaying figure of an effigy, attired in full evening dress, but with a caricature of a face. The image swayed from the overhead wire, and the proctor cried out:
“It is disgraceful, sir! I believe you are intoxicated! You will be expelled for this!”
Then, as the light suddenly became brighter the official was made aware that what he had grasped was only rags and straw in a dress suit. So bright was the light that the amazed anger on the proctor’s face was plainly depicted. Suddenly Mr. Zane leaped back from the image, looked up and saw the wire, and darted for the clump of elms, toward which it extended.
“Why don’t they turn off that light?” demanded Dutch, anxiously, and, as though in answer, it went out. Hurriedly he cut the wire, and closed the window.
“It worked like a charm,” he said. “Mum’s the word now.”
What happened outside in the darkness Tom and his chums could not see, but later they learned that the image and wire was safely hauled out of sight, and the students escaped from the group of trees before the proctor got there. Of course he made diligent efforts to find out who had played the trick, but it was useless.
“That puts us in good humor for the game to-morrow,” observed Tom, as, chuckling, he and his chums went to bed. But if they had known what was in store for them on the morrow, they would not have slept so peacefully.
For they suffered a severe drubbing at the hands of Fairview Institute when they met that nine on the diamond the next afternoon. How it happened they did not like to think of afterward, but it was mainly due to poor fielding. Tom pitched well, and Sid made some good hits, but his foot went back on him, even in the short spurt to first. Then, too, Dutch and Holly, usually to be depended on, disgraced themselves by making almost inexcusable errors.
Nor was Fairview’s playing anything to boast of, aside from the work of the battery. It was just one of those occasions when both teams seem to go stale, and probably on the part of Randall the prank of the night before, which kept several members of the team up late, had not a little to do with it. Sufficient to say, that though Tom managed to whip his men into some kind of shape for the last three innings it was too late, and they went down to defeat by a score of 3 to 10.
“And the girls watching us, too!” groaned Phil, as they were changing their clothes after the game.
“Are you going to see them when we get washed up?” asked Sid eagerly.
“I don’t feel much like it,” grumbled Tom, but, somehow, he and Phil did manage to gravitate to where Madge Tyler and Ruth Clinton were standing. Sid followed at a discreet distance, but when he saw Miss Harrison strolling about the grounds with Langridge, the second baseman took a trolley car for home.
Tom and Sid had to stand considerable chaffing on the part of their two pretty companions, but they didn’t mind so much, and Tom declared that his team was only practicing, and would eventually win the championship, and the gold loving cup.
“Oh, by the way,” remarked Phil, at parting, “Ruth, don’t you and Miss Tyler want to come to our doings next week?”
“What doings?” asked his sister. “See you defeated at baseball again, or go to a fraternity dance?”
“Something on the order of the latter,” replied her brother, making a wry face. “The sophs are going to have a little picnic on Crest Island, in Tonoka Lake, next Wednesday, and it will be one swell affair. Regular old-fashioned picnic—basket lunches, ants in the butter, snakes under the leaves, and all that. Holly Cross thought it up, and it’s great!”
“What a wonderful brain he must have,” said Miss Tyler, with a delicious laugh. “But it sounds nice. What do you say, Ruth? Shall we go?”
“I will, if you will. But—er—Mabel——” She looked questioningly toward her chum, who was strolling with Langridge.
“Oh, bring her along,” invited Phil. “This is an old-fashioned affair, and no special person will bring any one else. Tom and Sid and I will look after you girls.”
“But, Phil, you forget that Mr. Henderson and Mabel——” began Ruth.
“Oh, hang it all, don’t let that matter,” spokePhil. “I dare say Sid won’t be around. As soon as he gets in the woods or fields he’s always after bugs or animals—he’s a naturalist, you know.”
“I should say so,” agreed Tom. “Remember last fall how he went out after a picture of a fox, and got stuck in the bog, and how Zane caught him, all covered with mud, and thought poor Sid was a thief, and how we pretended we didn’t know our own chum, when the proctor brought him to our room for identification? Remember that, Phil?”
“I should say I did. Well, that’s probably what Sid will do this time, so Miss Harrison needn’t worry about having to accept him as an escort, though for the life of me I can’t understand what’s up between her and Sid?” and Phil looked questioningly at his sister.
“We don’t know, either,” answered Ruth, “except that Mabel is very miserable over it.”
“She can’t be taking it very hard, when I see her off with that chump, Langridge,” retorted Phil.
“Yes, I’m sorry she goes with him,” retorted Madge Tyler. “But she won’t listen to us. However, to change the subject—are we to go to the picnic, Ruth?”
“Oh, I guess so. How will we get there, Phil?”
“Tom and I will come for you, we’ll go to thesummer resort on the west shore of the lake, and row to the island. It will be sport. Now pray for good weather.”
“And you boys pray that there aren’t any snakes,” added Miss Tyler.
“Nor ants in the butter,” went on Ruth, as the boys bade the girls good-by.