CHAPTER XXIVTHE FELLOW WITH A GROUCH.
Jack Kenny was sore. He had been out of humor for a long time—to be exact, ever since the football election last year, in which Don Tempest had been chosen captain of the varsity—but he had done his best to hide this feeling from those about him.
Dick Merriwell, himself the best all-around athlete in college, had more than once expressed his belief that many of the triumphs of the very satisfactory season of a year ago had been due to Kenny’s amazingly clever headwork.
But the quarter back was not a fellow to foster a long-continued grouch if he could help it. He had a decided strain of real sporting blood in his make-up, and, after the first flare-up of rage and disappointment when he learned the result of the election, he had calmed down and tried to take things philosophically.
But with the return of Don Tempest to the helm just before the Princeton game, the old feelings of doubt and resentment came back with renewed force, in spite of the plucky efforts on Kenny’s part to take his medicine like a man.
Tempest himself was not a fellow to help matters much. He was a splendid player, and, what was more, a born general in his ability to plan out a game and play it scientifically; but, like many generals in the bigger game of life, he had a supreme belief in his own ability, an intolerance of criticism and advice, and a certain lack of sympathy and tact in his handling of the other players, which resulted in his being far from popular.
Men recognized his ability and appreciated the value of his generalship, while they did not care for him personally, which was well enough so long as everything went along without a hitch and there were no fall-downs.
All this did not help Jack Kenny in his effort—quite determined and sincere—to conquer the feeling of resentment and sense of having been used unfairly, which kept constantly cropping up in his mind. Hearing now and then little jibes and flings against the captain from other fellows only confirmed his own impression that Tempest was unfit for the position.
This belief was fostered by his own keen observation during the progress of a game or on the practice field. More than once he saw opportunities which Tempest seemed to miss. Latterly they had had several run-ins about certain plays and formations, of which Kenny could not see the value, but which Tempest insisted should be used.
The result was that the quarter back’s usually even temper had become more and more rasped as time went on, until he reached a point when the slightest admonition from Tempest irritated him almost beyond endurance, and a decided coolness had developed between the two men.
This afternoon had been a particularly trying one. Tempest had seemed even more unreasonable and domineering than usual, compelling Kenny to exercise every bit of will power he possessed to refrain from flaring up and causing an open outbreak.
He did not want to do this. He knew the fatal nature of a team playing at loggerheads, and the great game of the season—the contest with Harvard—was too close at hand to run any chances. But he felt that if Tempest continued in his present course very much longer no power on earth could prevent an explosion.
“He’s so darned thick-headed and set in his ways that it makes a fellow wild,” he grumbled to himself as he crossed the field toward the track house. “If it wasn’t for the game Saturday, I’d have let him have a piece of my mind to-day, and he could have done what he liked about it. Maybe it wouldn’t be a bad thing for him to hear what some of the boys really think about him.”
Still scowling fiercely, he entered the house and found several of the fellows there ahead of him. They were gathered in a little group on the farther side of the locker room, and had evidently been discussing something with a relish; but as Kenny entered they all stopped abruptly and glanced swiftly toward the door.
“Oh, it’s only Ken,” remarked Phil Keran, who had taken Hollister’s place at right end. “He’s all right. We were just talking about the crazy stunts Tempest went through this afternoon.”
“Yes,” chimed in Rudolph Rose; “did you ever see anything more senseless than that fool double pass he wasted half the afternoon on. Why a child would catch on to it, and it couldn’t be used more than once during the entire game.”
“And that crisscross play with Baxter and Merriwell,” spoke up Bud Baulsir, who played centre. “You didn’t like that for a cent, did you, Ken? I heard you kicking about it to Tempest, but a fellow might as well argue with a stone wall as to try and convince him he’s wrong.”
“He’s so thick-headed and stuffed full of conceit that it drives a man wild!” Kenny burst out, unable to contain himself any longer. “He seems to think nobody but himself knows anything about the game. It was all I could do to keep from giving him some talk straight from the shoulder, when he spent the whole afternoon on those two pet stunts of his.”
“Why didn’t you?” Rose asked quickly. “Might have done him good.”
Kenny’s lip curled.
“Him—good!” he exclaimed sarcastically. “Take another guess, Rudie. Bah! The only thing that would do him good would be to have Harvard wipe up the field with us, and then he’d blame it on some one else. I’m sick of his high and mighty airs, and I tell you one thing, fellows, if he nags me to-morrow the way he did to-day there’ll be something doing.”
“That’s the way to talk!” Baulsir said approvingly. “What business had he got interfering with the quarter, anyhow?”
“He hasn’t any, if I show results,” retorted Kenny. “It’s all right to tell me what he wants before we start, but I can’t stand this nag, nag all through the playing. If he’s so crazy about deciding every play himself, why doesn’t he take my place?”
“I notice things went pretty well while Brad was at the helm,” Rose commented; “and he didn’t try any tricks like that. He played the game as it should be played, and not——”
“’Sh!” interrupted Keran. “Here they come.”
The thud of feet sounded on the turf outside, and a moment later the rest of the team appeared, filling the room with the sound of talk, argument, and discussion. The group by the window melted away, and Kenny made haste to appropriate one of the showers before they were all taken.
At the training table that night the football squad was not in the liveliest sort of humor. Kenny still retained symptoms of his grouch of the afternoon, and, besides that, there was a subtle undercurrent of discord which made itself felt insensibly.
Dick Merriwell noticed the symptoms at once. He had, in fact, realized for some days past that things were not as they should be with the team, and that afternoon he had quite expected an outburst from Kenny over the rather exacting ways of Tempest.
When it had not come, he was rather sorry, though he gave the quarter back full credit for his admirable self-control. An angry outbreak or open flare-up is much easier to contend with than the grudge which is nursed and fostered in secret, ever gaining in strength and volume like a snowball rolling downhill, until at length it proves a serious menace to discipline and effectiveness.
He had noticed Tempest’s methods of running the team and had observed with regret some of the mistakes the fellow made in handling the men. But he realized that it was Tempest’s way of doing things. It was as much a part of his make-up as his admirable executive ability, and quite as impossible to change.
Merriwell’s keen sense of observation took in what Kenny either would not or could not see—that Tempest was the better man of the two for the place. His judgment was sounder and his knowledge of the tactics and stratagem of the game better than Kenny’s. It was only his methods of handling the men which were at fault and which prevented him from obtaining perfect results.
Dick had worried a good deal over the matter, for he knew how much depended on there being perfect concord among the members of the team. To do their best, it was necessary for each individual to throw aside all personal feelings and subordinate himself to the general good. The slightest rift in the lute showed itself promptly in the loweredesprit de corpsof the organization.
As yet he had not said anything definite to Tempest. He knew the fellow was doing his best to secure results. His whole heart was fixed on gaining a victory in the great game of the season, and to that end he strained every effort. Merriwell had tried several times by means of gentle hints to bring about an improvement in the condition of affairs, but he was afraid that he should very soon feel like seeking recourse in other methods.
Thinking the matter over at the table that night made him, too, rather silent, and added to the general impression of uneasiness and disquiet which prevailed.
Kenny was one of the first to finish supper and leave the table. Phil Keran caught up with him as he was walking back through “Grub Alley.”
“What’s your hurry?” he questioned.
“Oh, nothing special,” the quarter back returned shortly. “I just didn’t feel like hanging around there and hearing Tempest shoot off his face.”
Keran laughed.
“I should think you had had about enough of him for one day,” he rejoined. “Got anything on to-night?”
“No. What’s up?”
“I just thought you might like to come around to our rooms and meet Clarence Carr, Archie’s brother,” Keran answered. “You remember Archie Carr, who graduated two years ago, don’t you?”
“Surest thing you know,” Kenny returned, brightening up a little. “He substituted on the varsity the year I was captain of the scrub. I don’t ever remember his brother, though.”
“Nice chap,” commented Keran. “Broker, I understand, and is taking a few days off to rest up after a bear raid on the market. He’s stopping at the New Haven House.”
“Yale man?”
“Nope, Brown. But he’s all for old Eli on his brother’s account. Crazy about football, and is going to stay over for the game Saturday.”
They crossed Elm Street and struck into the campus by Durfee. Keran and Kenny both had quarters in Vanderbilt, and five minutes later they were settled in the latter’s comfortable sitting room on the third floor. Carr had not yet arrived, but presently a couple of other fellows strolled in, and about half-past seven there came a brisk knock on the door.
Keran at once sprang up, and, opening it, ushered in a slim, erect man of about thirty, with keen, dark eyes, rather good-looking features, and fairly bubbling over with vim and good spirits.
“How are you, old fellow!” he exclaimed, shaking Keran’s hand. “Great of you to have me here. Archie said I mustn’t lose any time in looking up ‘Old Phil,’ as he calls you, the minute I set foot in New Haven.”
“Glad to see you again, Mr. Carr,” Keran returned cordially, as he took his guest’s coat and hat. “I recognized your voice perfectly over the phone this morning.”
“Really?” exclaimed Carr. “You’ve got a good memory. Why, we only met once, and that was three years ago.”
He greeted Kenny and the other men with a smile and hearty handclasp, and then settled down in an easy-chair and pulled out a cigar case.
“I won’t offer you one, Keran,” he smiled, “because I know you shouldn’t take it, but perhaps your friends will indulge. I’ll guarantee they’re pretty good.”
He extended the case to Kenny, who sat nearest him. The quarter back shook his head.
“No, thanks. I’m in Phil’s class.”
“Don’t you believe it,” grinned Keran. “He’s a sight more important to the varsity than I ever could be. Why, I only got in after the Princeton game by the skin of my teeth, whereas he’s been quarter back for two years running.”
Mr. Carr seemed much interested. Proffering the case to the other two men, who each took a cigar, he selected a weed himself and returned the rest to his pocket.
“Well, well,” he remarked briskly. “Quarter, eh? That’s a pretty responsible job. In my day the quarter back was the brains of the team.”
“So he is to-day,” Keran said quickly. “He would be at New Haven if we didn’t have a fellow like Tempest trying to——”
He stopped abruptly, and his face flushed a little. In his haste he had said rather more than he had intended, considering that Carr was a comparative stranger.
The latter held the lighted match suspended in the air about six inches away from his cigar, while he surveyed Keran’s embarrassed face with his keen black eyes.
“Tempest?” he questioned. “He’s the captain, isn’t he?”
Keran nodded.
There was a momentary pause, during which Carr applied the match to his cigar and took a puff or two to make sure that it was well lighted. Then he leaned back comfortably on his chair.
“It’s always a mistake for the captain to butt in too much with the quarter back,” he remarked casually. “Of course, if the quarter isn’t onto his job he should be coached; but if he can’t stand on his own legs at this stage of the game he ought to be dropped and some one found who could. Constant nagging of the quarter back has been the cause of a good many defeats. Why, I remember just such a case in my last year at Brown. I was one of the subs in the game with Cornell. The captain had a grudge against the quarter, and his continual interference got the fellow so on his ear that we lost the game. Ballard—that was the captain—certainly got his when it was all over with. Coaches, alumni, and about all the team landed on his neck and roasted him good and plenty. He never repeated the trick.”
Kenny felt a sort of warming toward his new acquaintance. He seemed to be a man of a good deal of understanding, and the instance he had cited fitted Kenny’s own case exactly.
“Of course, a fellow doesn’t mind suggestions, or even orders, when they’re given at the proper time and place,” he put in hastily. “I hope I haven’t got such a case of swelled head as to think that nobody can give me points; but what’s the use of being quarter if you can’t do a little thinking now and then on your own hook?”
Carr nodded understandingly.
“Exactly my point of view,” he returned quickly, exhaling a cloud of smoke as he spoke. “I fancy the trouble with this Tempest is that he wants to have his finger in everything.”
There was a momentary pause. Neither Kenny nor Keran seemed inclined to pursue the subject farther. Presently Carr looked up at the latter.
“Of course you boys are going to wipe up the gridiron with Harvard on Saturday?” he smiled.
Keran grinned.
“Oh, sure,” he returned quickly. “There won’t be anything left of them to carry back to Cambridge.”
Carr laughed heartily; then his face sobered.
“But honestly, haven’t the crimson boys got a crackerjack eleven this year?” he questioned seriously. “The splendid game they put up the other day got me a little worried. I certainly don’t want to see old Yale thrown down.”
“I don’t think you need have any fear of that,” Keran said slowly, “unless——”
He hesitated. Carr’s bright eyes were fixed questioningly on his face.
“Yes?”
“Unless—— Oh, well, you can’t tell what might happen,” Keran finished with an attempt at carelessness. “When Bob Hollister dropped out just before the Princeton game it was the very last thing that any of us expected.”
A gleam of comprehension flickered across Carr’s mobile face and was gone.
“True,” he murmured, “one never can tell what might turn up. But we’ll certainly hope nothing does. If I were betting on the game, I think I should have no hesitation in putting my money on the blue.”
The talk drifted to other subjects, and for half an hour Carr entertained the fellows with stories and amusing anecdotes. He was a good talker and had apparently had all sorts of interesting experiences, but he also knew when to leave off. As the clock struck half-past nine he arose briskly to his feet.
“Well, boys, I must be running along,” he said, with a smile. “Had a bully evening, Keran, and no end glad to meet these friends of yours. I’ll see you all again before Saturday, I hope.”
He slipped into his overcoat and started toward the door. At that moment Kenny recollected that he ought to do some studying that night, so he followed the older man out.
At the head of the stairs they said good night again, and, as they shook hands, the quarter back said carelessly:
“If you’d care to drop in and see me some night, I’d be awfully glad to have you. My rooms are on the next floor.”
“Thanks very much,” returned Carr. “I’ll take you up some night and smoke a cigar with you. By-by.”