2 A.M.2 A.M.However, after saying good night ... he would sneak off to his room, tie a wet towel around his head, and pole....
However, after saying good-night yawningly to the other fellows, he would sneak off to his room, tie a wet towel around his head, and pole until 2 a.m. He utilized half-holidays when the others were reading or were off running hare and hounds, or taking long rambles across country, or canoeing up the Millstone, or shooting with the gun club,or paying visits to the neighboring cities; also he had dropped out of literary Hall work entirely, took little exercise, and devoted to his curriculum studies even the spare time he had formerly put in at miscellaneous reading. That was the way he kept up his high stand in class.
So, as the fellows would see him with the idlers until bedtime at night, and then heard of his making recitations as good as "Poler" Barrows in the morning, it was no wonder that some began to think him a "phenomenon" like Todd. That was what Young wanted them to think. He thought a great deal about what others thought about him—a great deal too much, some of his more intimate associates decided one evening, while waiting for him in Minerva Powelton's room.
"No, don't begin yet," Powelton was saying. "I promised the Deacon we'd wait for him."
"I don't see why he is always so anxious to get in the game," said Billy Drew, inhaling cigarette-smoke. "I don't believe he really enjoys it very much."
"The trouble with the Deacon," said Todd, "is that he is too much afraid of your opinion. If he hadn't got so bored when we called him dignified he wouldn't have made the mistake in the first place of trying to be a dead-game, you know. It isn't his style to be that, so he was guyed and laughed at. But instead of bracing up and being like himself, he sticks it on all the harder. He thinks to win favor that way. That's the plain English of it."
"Aw, you make me tired!" said Lee, good-naturedly. "Somehow, lately, you're always preaching. The Deacon wants a little recreation, like the rest of us. That's all. He has plenty of good stuff in him."
"Plenty," said Todd. "Trouble is, he doesn't let it out."
The door opened.
"Yea! Deacon," said the others.
"Been doing the poler act on the sly again, have you?" asked Powelton, throwing a sofa cushion at him.
"Naw. Hello there, Lucky! You here? Going to get in the little game this evening,hey?" said Young, smiling. "Toddie, you are, aren't you?"
"No, thanks," said Todd, arising and stretching himself.
"'Fraid, are you?" asked Young.
Todd laughed contemptuously. "I'm not afraid to have you think I'm afraid, if it gives you any pleasure; it doesn't hurt me. Lucky, are you coming with me?"
"No," said Lee, looking at the Deacon, "I reckon I'll stay awhile."
"Come on, Lucky," Todd said.
Lee shook his head.
Todd turned, watched the others a moment, while they got out the cards and chips, and drew up their chairs to the table; then, smiling quizzically at Young, he took his hat and left the room.
Now Young may not have been poling just before he arrived, but together with late hours and lack of exercise, he looked as pale and haggard as the hardest poler in college. And by the strong light opposite him, as he sat playing at the table, a fellow like Linton might have fancied he saw other lines in hisface—unpleasant lines that meant something besides hard study and lack of exercise.
Somehow, at this game, he did not look like the same Deacon Young who trotted home from football practice last fall, glowing and glad to be alive.
The attitude of most of the club toward the class at large was very much what Young's was toward Barrows and Wilson and those fellows. The Invincibles had been frowned upon by the class for being "sporty"; consequently they hated the class. Instead of changing their conduct, they became "sportier" than ever, and they were fast gaining a reputation throughout the college world, and they considered themselves very dangerous.
The poker game went on. It was getting late, but nobody noticed that.
"Whose deal is it?"
"Mine," said Lucky, picking up the cards with a nervous hand; he began to shuffle them.
Powelton smiled in his superior way. "Look at Lucky's fingers twitch," he said. The others laughed, and Young added, indulgently,"The little boy will get over that in time."
Lee was dealing, and he was too much excited to hear or reply to this sally; it was 1a.m. of the first night he had ever played cards for money in his life, and with a beginner's luck he had been winning all evening.
"Can you open it, Tommy?" asked Lee, the dealer.
"Nope," said Stevens.
"I can't," said Powelton.
"Can you, Deacon?"
"No, of course not."
"Can you, Billy?"
Drew shook his head.
"No," said Jones, without waiting to be asked.
"Sweeten it up, then," said Powelton.
"Wait a minute," said Lee. "I can. Who's coming in?" He giggled excitedly.
Three of the six simply laid down their hands hopelessly. "I never saw such luck," one of them said.
Young hesitated a moment "I guess I'llcome in," he said finally. "Four cards please." He puffed on an extinguished cigar-butt.
"Well, well! the Deacon's got nerve," said Drew.
"Oh! he's getting to be an old hand," said Minerva Powelton, winking.
"See how coolly he picks up his cards," remarked Billy Drew.
Young paid no attention to these remarks. He was cool outwardly, but it was the coolness of desperation. He had been losing all the evening as steadily as Lucky had been gaining. But you see he was not a beginner now; he had played five or six times and felt himself, as they said, an old hand at it, and he too had laughed at Lucky's greenness—early in the evening. But now Lucky, who was never persuaded to play poker until the Deacon played, was winning away all his money.
Young did not know how much he had lost; he would not let himself think. But he knew it was more than he could afford, and he made up his mind that if he lost this time he would not give himself a chance tolose again. He picked up the four cards he had drawn in place of the discarded ones, and looked at them. His heart gave a bound. He covered the cards for a moment, and then looked at them again.
"Yes, it's really true," he said to himself. "Surely this hand can't be beaten."
"Well, what do you do, Deacon?"
For answer Young simply laid down a large bet.
"Hully Gee!" whispered Powelton to Drew. "Big bluff the Deacon is throwing, eh?"
Lee overheard it. He meant to show the Deacon that he could not be bluffed out, even if he were a beginner. Besides, he had a hand he was willing to stake a good deal upon. He put down twice the amount of Young's bet.
"Hoho! the bluff didn't work," laughed Drew. "Now, then, Deacon, let's see what you can do."
"Shut up!" said Young. "Don't bother us!" He puffed on his cold cigar a moment, and then put down another large bet.
"I'm with you!" said Lucky Lee, and heincreased the stake again. His eyes were glistening.
For several minutes they kept on increasing the amount in the centre of the table, one thoughtfully, the other excitedly. The older players now left off making patronizing remarks, and became interested. Finally Young said, "No, I won't make it any higher. What have you got?"
Lee slapped down his cards. His voice trembled a little as he asked, confidently, "Can you beat that?"
"Yep," said Young, and he coolly laid down his victorious hand. The others all looked at it. "It's about time I was winning," he said, calmly enough; but his heart was thumping.
"Why didn't you keep on raising him?" asked Powelton, sneeringly.
"I wish I had," thought Young, as he gathered in what meant a large winning for one swoop. Lee was laughing loudly to show he did not care. He was excited, and would have gone on betting for a long time, Young thought.
That was the turning-point. Had Young lost, he might have stopped; but to stop now would look mean, he reflected.
"The luck has turned," he whispered to himself. "I'll play a few more hands." And when the game broke up at dawn, he had lost his winnings, and more.
That night he tossed in his bed, and said: "I must stop; that's all there is about it; Imuststop."
The next time they met to play, Young said, "Go ahead without me; I don't feel like it to-night."
"The Deacon hasn't any sporting blood. He's afraid of his own pupil," Powelton said, and the others laughed. Lucky laughed, too; he was the pupil. Young played.
That night Young won handily. He felt especially pleased to win that night. He thought, "I'll stop the minute I have won back what I lost." But he did not win back what he had lost, and so played on the next night, and on the next. And so it went until he was brought to a stop with a jerk.
It came near the end of the term and of theyear, shortly before the final examinations. The crowd had been playing nearly every night, and of late, somehow, Young had been losing nearly every time he played; but he said: "I can't afford to stop now. Surely this bad luck can't continue. I must win! I will win next time!" He could not stop. It is called "gambler's fever."
He could not sleep; he was neglecting his studies. He had used up all his allowance of "absences." He did not mind that, but he had within these few weeks lost—he would not allow himself to reckon how much! He had borrowed from the fellows, and he had been steadily drawing from the bank the precious money for which he had worked so hard, and which meant so much more to him than money meant to boys with monthly allowances from home. One morning he made out another check to his own order. "This is positively the last time," he said to himself. He had said that before, but this time it was true.
That night he began to lose with the first hand. He laughed, he played recklessly, helost. He went home, and found a letter in his pocket while undressing which he had forgotten to open, in hurrying to the game. This letter said, "We beg leave to call your attention to the fact that your account seems to be overdrawn to the amount of seventy-five cents." It was from the Princeton Bank.
This meant that William Young owned not a cent in the world, and was a debtor even to the bank besides owing various sums to his companions. He was bankrupt. It was pretty bad. But that was not the worst of it. That was not the reason he stood by the table letting his lamp smoke while he kept staring at the letter in his hand.
He had kept with his personal account the fund of his class, and every cent of it was gone with the rest. He had held it in trust as treasurer. It had amounted to something over one hundred dollars.
But he had drawn it out unconsciously? No; he knew he had used all his own money long ago.
But surely he had meant to return whathe had borrowed from the class fund? Oh, yes; but this kind of "borrowing" is called embezzlement—an ugly word. It really means theft and breach of trust combined.
Young could not take it all in at first. For awhile he stood there, saying to himself, "Isn't it funny this letter was in my pocket all the evening while I was playing—isn't it funny?"
Then he looked up, sniffed, and said, "That lamp is smoking." He turned it down, and stared at the flame for nearly a minute. Then suddenly he blew it out, and was alone in the darkness.
Oh, yes, it was all true. There was no way of getting out of it. He realized it all now vividly. He, William Young, a member of the church, son of honest old Farmer Young, was a gambler and—yes, he might just as well call it by its right name—a thief!
He was the one of whom the others at home used to stand in awe because he was going East for a higher education. He was the one for whom the minister predictedsuch great things. He was the one who had his tuition remitted in consideration of "high moral character." He was the one whose letters from college were read aloud at the sewing society by a proud little mother, who thought he was the best son in the world.
Why hadn't he stayed at home and remained an honest man, working hard in the bank or as a plain farmer, like good little Charlie? Oh, how did he ever sink so low? If he only had a chance to do it all over again—if he could only wake up and find it all a dream—if he could only wipe it all out of existence, how joyous and sunny would be life and duty and hard work again!
But it wasn't a dream! It was all very real, indeed. None of it could be wiped out. It was all there and staring him in the face, real, horribly real. And that was not all; matters could not remain only as bad asthis. He was an out-and-out embezzler, liable to be found out and exposed as such at any moment—and then what?
Leave college with a disgraced name—butthat would not be all. The news would go home; it would get there before he did. Everyone in the county would hear it, and talk about him. Some of them would laugh and sneer, and say, "Too bad!" and really be secretly glad.
Perhaps the authorities would send and—it made him weak and sick to think of it—have him arrested—by an officer of the law—and put in jail. This would kill his honest, old gray-bearded father. And as for his mother—but that hurt too much! He shut his eyes; he simply would not let himself think of that.
But what could he do? Time was flying. Just now he had heard Old North strike four in the dark, silent distance—good Old North, on whose steps he had hoped to sing as a Senior some day. Every moment brought him nearer to ruin. Something must be done.
He took hold of his head to quiet its buzzing. "It will do no good to think about it any more," he said aloud. "Act, act, act—you must!"
First, he spent a few bitter moments on his knees by the bed It is no one's concern what he said to God. Then he arose, quite calmly struck a match, and with an almost steady hand lighted the lamp. Then very deliberately, in a matter-of-fact way, he drew up the rocking-chair so that the light would come over his left shoulder. He dragged over another chair to put his feet upon. He sat down. He did a little figuring at first on the envelope in his hand. Then he opened his trigonometry and studied furiously until chapel-time. There was, you see, good stuff in Will Young yet.
It would do no good to tell himself any longer how low he had fallen; but it would do a great deal of good to win the Freshman First Honor prize; and he had no time to lose.
To win was not a mere ambition now—it was a grim necessity. It was the one way of keeping from being disgraced in the eyes of the world as deeply as he was in his own and God's.
The prize would not come until commencement. Before that time the classmight vote to use its money. They might instruct their "honorable treasurer" to expend the funds on decorations and a brass band, as was sometimes done at the close of examinations to celebrate their Sophomorehood; and what would he do then! He decided that he must not let himself think about that now. It made his heart stop so short it fairly hurt; besides, it interrupted his work.
He had figured it all out in his neat businesslike hand on the envelope. On one side, under assets, he wrote, "Freshman prize, if won, $200;" on the other side the following list:
The Princeton Bank overdraw$0.75Henry Powelton, borrowed10.00Carey H. Lee, borrowed25.00William Sinclair Drew23.35The class of Ninety-blank debt117.20———-Total$176.30
Two hundred dollars would "square" him, and just leave enough to buy a ticket back to the old farm—that is, if he wanted to go there.
Many times that huge, dark thing in the background of his thoughts jumped into the foreground and interrupted his work; but he accomplished a good deal. He felt a glow of hope. It was only ten days to the examinations, but it had only been during the past month of madness that he had neglected his studies. He could soon make that up.
Just as he started for chapel, he suddenly began to wonder if he had been mistaken about that prize. Wasn't it only $100 after all? He took down a catalogue and looked it up. He was right, the prize was $200.
"A prize of $200, part of the income of the J. S. K. fund;" but what was this?—"To be paid in quarterly instalments during the following year"! He had never noticed that before. For a moment it made him feelsick at the stomach. Then he decided that it was not so bad after all, for if he only won the prize he could borrow money on the certificate of it that would be presented the winner at commencement.
For the first day or two the club guyed him for turning poler, and they thought his serious and grave demeanor was very funny when he declined to join with them in their pursuits. At first he paid no attention to their jeers; he had no time. Then came the day he got angry and said. "It makes no difference to me what you fellows think. I've quit my foolishness for good, and that's all there is to it. Now let me alone."
He struck the table a heavy blow, and looked as if he meant everything he said; and no one felt inclined to guy him again. He looked like the old Deacon who had done up Ballard.
"The Deacon must have an attack of R. E. Morse," Billy Drew said, as he left the room.
"I think he's pretty hard hit financially," said Lucky Lee, who had been pretty hardhit of late himself. "He's working his way through college, you know. I wish he hadn't lost so much money."
"He had no business playing, then," said Powelton.
"I respect him for stopping, anyway," said Todd, who seldom played cards; recently he had not played at all; he had been doing some studying, "just for fun," he said.
"So do I," said Lee, in a low voice, and the others agreed—in lower voices.
Meanwhile, Young was studying as if his life depended upon it, and the strain was telling. He had lost twenty-four pounds since the football season.
The fellows saw nothing of him now except at meals, where he kept his white face turned down to the book beside his plate. They had left off guying him, and were worrying about him instead.
They began saying: "See here, old man, you've got to quit this. You'll kill yourself if you keep on this way. The prize isn't worth it." But it did no good. Finally a number of them came up to his room oneevening to see what they could do about it. They were headed by Lucky Lee.
"I wish you would let me alone," was all that Young would say. "I've simply got to win that prize."
"Why have you got to?" asked Lucky, in his nice, refined voice.
At that Young only smiled queerly, and turned to the table where his books were.
"See here, you old chump," said Lucky. "I believe you've got a notion—say, fellows, the Deacon's got a notion that just because he owes some of us a couple of dollars or so we are in a hurry to be paid back. If he thinks that, he's an old ass, isn't he, fellows?"
"Why, certainly," said Powelton.
"Thank you," said Young, curtly; "but as I said before, I intend to square up at commencement."
"Why, we can get along just as well till next fall," Lucky went on, although he had pawned some of his clothes as well as his bicycle last week. "In fact, if you're worrying about it, why—well—they were gambling debts, Will, and——"
"Lucky," said Young, flushing, "that's no way to talk. I'm an honest man and"——then he stopped suddenly; he was not an honest man, and this was the first time he had been called "Will" since he left home, and home was what he hated most of all to think of in these days, and this was Lucky Lee, who never would have had gambling debts, if it had not been for him, and whose kind mother he had promised—— Altogether he felt very queer and wrought up, and for a wild moment he had a notion to tell them all about it, and make a clean breast of it.
If he had done so they might have helped him out and sworn secrecy; but Young was not the sort that could do it. "Please go away, fellows, and leave me alone. You're mighty good, but—you don't understand," he said.
They could see something was troubling him greatly. They did go away, and they did not understand, but they felt very sorry. After that Todd, without telling the reason, left off studying hard and took to rambling in the woods again.
"Aren't you going to try for the prize, then?" they asked him.
"I wouldn't stand any chance against Young," he answered. But the others were not so sure about that.
Meanwhile every hour brought final examinations sixty minutes nearer, and Young, all alone in his little bake-oven of a room, was studying as probably no student had ever studied in that old room before. Sometimes he felt that even his powerful constitution would not stand the strain much longer; but he could not afford to break down or die until after commencement, until after disgrace had been averted from his family name. It was that thought which kept his heavy eyelids open.
Examination week was like a long, hideous nightmare.
There were tasks that seemed superhuman to perform, and with them the sickening dread that he could not perform them. When the last paper was finished and handed in he had a horrible conviction that he had lost the prize. He felt sure of it.
But he could not be sure until commencement day itself, and before that came four days of preliminary commencement gayety. Each one of these contained for Young twenty-four hours of suspense, and these were worse than examination days—there was nothing to take his mind off what he did not want to think about. He could not sleep. His nerves were used up; and everybody else was so happy!
The campus was bright with hundreds of attractive girls in summer costumes, and alive with rollicking old graduates holding noisy reunions. But even at the baseball game, when the nine was beating Yale and everyone else was crazy with exultant joy, Young was saying to himself: "How should I break the news to mother? Should I let matters take their course, or—what are they all cheering for now? Oh, I see, Cap has made another hit!"
The worst of it was that he had no one to take him out of himself. Nearly all his classmates and all his intimates were packing up and going home, as Freshmen usually do,without waiting for commencement. Luckily they had not voted to celebrate their Sophomorehood! He wandered about all alone; and all alone he went in to hear his fate decided on commencement morning.
Near the door he stood, squeezed in beside some graduates he had never seen before, who wondered why this long, gaunt undergraduate started so when the clerk of the Board of Trustees arose and began to announce the fellowships and prizes.
The awards were read from a long list in the clerk's hand, and after each announcement there was a cheer from the members of the literary society to which the victor belonged. It delayed matters so. Sometimes they cheered several times. Then the clerk cleared his throat and went on slowly.
At last he came down toward the end of the list.
"Now, then," said Young, bracing himself. "I know I am going to lose." He did not dare look up. Just in front of him sat a good-looking girl. He saw her put her pretty orange-and-black-bordered programmeto her lips and suppress a yawn while the loud, monotonous voice of the clerk said, "The Freshman First Honor prize awarded to J. Milton Barrows, of Pennsylvania."
Young stood perfectly still. He did not move a muscle. He heard the loud cheering. He heard a man behind him say, "Well! well!" He heard the band strike up a lively air. Still looking at the girl, he saw her begin to beat time to the music with her programme against her pursed lips.
Then he shut his eyes tight for a moment and asked himself: "What was it I was going to do? I cannot remember somehow. What was it? Shall—shall I telegraph——"
In a few minutes the valedictorian had finished his oration, then the benediction was pronounced, and the audience flocked out laughing and talking while the band played with all its might. Commencement was over, and the college year was a matter of history.
A few hours later Young was speeding across the country at the rate of ever somany miles an hour toward the old prairie farm, toward the home he had disgraced.
He did not know why he was going home, unless it was because the watch he pawned brought just the right amount of money. Instinct made him do it, perhaps.
As the train started off down the grade he stood on the rear platform, and looked back at the green campus and the dear old brown building.
"Perhaps," he said to himself, "perhaps in time they'll forget that there ever was a fellow named 'Deacon' Young."
Then the car turned the curve, and the college was hidden from view.
She was standing beside the neatly painted horse-block, waiting to welcome her boy. Will had spied her from the road.
As the buggy turned in through the gate he began to brace himself for meeting her. This was going to be harder, he knew, than had been the meeting at the railroad station a little while before, with his father, whose honest old eyes had looked at him so searchingly.
He was coming nearer and nearer. She was smiling. It was the same motherly smile he had known he would see. Now she was speaking his name. The next moment he was out of the buggy, and she was kissing him just as when he was an innocent little boy. She was frightened at her son's pale, haggard face, but she did not want him toknow it, and only said, patting his cheek laughingly, "Why didn't you take better care of yourself, child?"
THE MEETINGTHE MEETING"I don't know, mother," he said slowly, "I don't know...."
They were walking up the path. Will looked down at her. The tears were forming in the little mother's eyes. He looked away again. "I don't know, mother," he said, slowly, "I don't know why I didn't take better care of myself."
"There, don't talk. You must rest after your long journey. Keep still now. You can tell me all about everything later on." They opened the screen door and went in.
Even Mr. Young had been alarmed when he saw his son step off the train. At least he treated him very considerately and said, as he shook his hand: "I guess you've been studying too hard there at school, ain't you? 'All work and no play'—you know the rest of it."
Will dropped his eyes as he thought of the kind of playing he had been doing. Then he said, abruptly: "Well, I'll have plenty of time to get well in," looked up the street and remarked that everything seemed the same.
"Yes, everything's the same with us," his father replied, unhitching the horse.
"Hello, Molly," Will said to the mare, "do you remember me?"
He was embarrassed in his father's presence, and Mr. Young seemed to notice it, for as they got into the buggy he said, in an uneasy manner: "Mother got your telegram, but I had to come to town anyway, so I thought I might just as well drive you out home myself. Had a pleasant trip?"
Indeed, his father, who had never once written him a letter during the nine months' absence, was the last one Will expected to meet at the station, but that was not what caused Will's constraint. It was the queer searching way he looked at him every now and then.
"Could he have heard about it!" Will kept asking himself. "No, hecan'tknow. If he knew—if he knew, he would be taking me to jail instead of home. He would say it served me right for going against his wishes."
At supper-time his father and his brother Charlie came in from the cornfields together."Hope you'll bring us rain," said Mr. Young. "We need it." Charlie was brown and big, and he gave Will's hand a hearty grip and said, "Glad to see you back, Will, blamed if I ain't."
Charlie never had ambitions for higher education. "Lucky Charlie!" thought Will, remembering how he used to look down on him.
"They must make you study a lot, though!" Charlie added, looking at Will's face.
Mr. Young disappeared for a few minutes into the next room; when he returned he interrupted the conversation with, "By the way, mother, Will says he don't think he'll go back there to school any more."
Mrs. Young did not want the matter discussed just now, for she saw a pained look come over Will's face at the mention of it. "Whatever he does," she said, in her bright, quick manner, "he must get well and strong and happy again. Cheer up, Will, cheer up, look happy—my goodness! just see his face," she went on laughing. "Don't you know you're home, anyway, boy?"
Yes, he was home, anyway. But what a way it was; not very much like the proud homecoming he had pictured long ago.
Mr. Young did not like to be switched off the subject. He went on, in a queer tone: "Yes, I thought you'd come around to my way of thinking. I thought you'd get tired of putting yourself through college, as you called it. I ain't surprised, not a bit."
Will did not feel piqued or indignant. He only asked himself how much longer he would wait before telling them all that he, William Young, son of his father, member of the church, and the boy who had his tuition remitted in consequence of a "high moral character," was a gambler and a thief, and was liable to be exposed as such at any moment. Even now at this hour somebody there in the East might be making inquiries as to his whereabouts.
This load was becoming more than he could bear. Why not tell them all, right then and there, and have it over with? "Listen, father," said Will, his voice breaking a little. "You little understand themeaning of my actions. Listen, everybody. I have something important to say."
"Shissh, Will, keep quiet, you're nervous," interrupted his mother. "Father, don't let the poor boy try to talk. He's sick. He's all wrought up; look at him."
"But I must explain—Iwillexplain. You all must know. Now listen: the reason I'm not going back—the reason I had to study so——"
"Keep still, Will," said his father, in a grave tone; "you needn't go on. I know all about it."
Will's heart stood still.
"You know all about it, father?"
"Yes, the minister told us how hard you were working for the prize. And we read in the Chicago papers that another boy won it——"
"Oh, you don't understand; you don't know why I needed to win it. You don't know anything about it—anything about it."
"Yes, yes, I do, Will," said Mr. Young, fumbling in his pocket for something, "yes, I do."
Mrs. Young put in excitedly: "It was because you had to have the money to go back next year. That was the reason you worked yourself nearly into the grave and wrote such short, irregular letters home and——"
"Now, mother, keep still," interrupted Mr. Young, "I have something to say." He dropped his eyes as though ashamed. He had taken out of his pocket a slip of paper. There was some printing on it and some blank places filled in with writing. He cleared his throat in the way he was accustomed to do when he got up in prayer-meeting. "You had to have the money. It was a necessity. You worked hard for it, but you missed it. And I thought, seeing you missed the prize there at school, I would show my appreciation of your efforts there at school, that—now, Will, take this and stop looking at me in that way. You done your best. Now you won't have to change your plans. I hate to see people change their plans."
His father had put the slip of paper in hishand. Will looked at it. It was a check drawn on the Farmers' National Bank. It said, "Pay to the order of William Young Two Hundred Dollars ($200)." What did it all mean?
It meant that the obstinate will of good old Farmer Young, that could not be budged by the arguments of the minister or bent by the coaxing of his wife, had finally been melted away by his own full heart at seeing this poor sick boy of his, who bore the marks of having struggled so pluckily and so discouragingly to earn for himself what his father had refused to grant. Also it meant that Will Young could lift his head once more, a free man.
"Why, where are you going, Will?" asked his mother. He had got up from the table.
"I'm not hungry," he said, in a strange voice; "I'm going up to my room. I'll be down soon." Then as he opened the door he said, without turning around: "I don't deserve this, father. I can't tell you just now how little I deserve it, but I'm going to take it." The door closed.
"What on earth's the matter with the boy?" said Mrs. Young, sighing. "I suppose it's because he takes losing that prize so to heart. He's too conscientious. Don't deserve it!—nonsense!"
When Will came down he looked better.
"Did Charlie say he was going to drive to town," he asked.
"Yes," said his mother. "But you don't want——"
"No, but I've got some letters here I'd like to go East the first thing in the morning." And the next morning they were going East as fast as the United States mail-cars could carry them.
One of them was to the Princeton Bank, and it contained the check for $200, and an apology for overdrawing his account the month previous, which was "not likely to happen again," he said.
The other contained checks also, drawn on that very bank for various amounts to the order of Carey H. Lee and the rest, whose home addresses he had looked up in the college catalogue.
And then he had the first calm full night's sleep in over a month and came down to breakfast singing "The Orange and the Black," and all the family thought it a "real pretty song," and did not know that Will sang it to a tune of his own.
He felt like a new man. Perhaps he was.
"Father," said Mrs. Young, "look at Will; he's better already. I knew my cooking and a little home comfort would do worlds for him. And I guess," she added, in Mr. Young's ear, "you cheered him up more by giving him that money, father."
Mr. Young felt that he had been pretty generous, but he only growled.
They did not know the real reason Will was so exuberant this bright sunny morning.
Was it necessary for them to know? That was one thing left to worry about: whether it would be right to overwhelm his parents by telling them of what their son had been through, or would it be wrong to keep on taking their love and sympathy (as it seemed he had received his father's check) on false pretences? He kept on being perplexed untilhe finally confessed his whole story to the minister and asked him what to do about it.
The minister, in his straightforward way, asked, "Have you confessed it to God, Will?"
"Yes, sir," said Will, dropping his eyes.
"And has He forgiven you?"
Will paused a moment. "I think He has now."
"Then I think that is enough. In one sense it is certainly deceiving them not to tell them, but I think it is the lesser of two evils. It would do little or no good to tell your good old parents. It would only grieve them as much as it would amaze them. You can pay back what you owe your parents in love and kindness as well as in money. Don't you think so?"
Will thought so and he made up his mind to try.
It became a matter of comment among the neighbors the way Will Young, whom they were inclined to look at sceptically since "he went East to college," was pitching in and working harder than any hired man onhis father's place and, what was more surprising, seeming to enjoy it; they did not know quite what to make of it. He was paying back the $200.
It surprised his father also and pleased him, and so did Will's respectful manner and his simple boyish endeavors to carry out all his wishes. He was trying to pay back the other debt also.
When the fall came again Mr. Young hated more than ever to have him leave, but this time, as he told Will's mother, he would fix it, he guessed, so Will wouldn't have to work himself to a skeleton.
"Hello, here comes Deacon Young with a brand new orange-and-black blazer on!"
"Yea-a-a," interrupted one fellow in a loud, shrill voice, and the others all joined in and yelled, "Yea-a, Deacon!" and ran at him and pounded him on the shoulders, jumped on his back and made other signs of pleasure at seeing a classmate once more, while they asked him what kind of a vacation he had had, and told him he looked as though he had been training for football all summer. Will laughed and told how he had trained.
"It must be great to work on a farm," said Lee, punching the Deacon's shoulders.
"Come on," one of them shouted, "we're taking a walk about the old place to see how everything looks. Let's gather a crowd—Ninety-blank this way!"
They shouted the old cry in concert and started off together.
"What are you going to do this year, Deacon?" It was Todd who happened to be marching next to Young.
"How do you mean?"
"Well, are you going to pole or loaf or be a dead-game or what?"
"Well," answered Young, "I'm going to do some of the first and combine some football with it if I have good luck; but I am not going to try any more of the last. I don't know as I need tell you that, Todd." He wanted to say more, but only frowned as he thought of how hard it would be to accomplish what he had resolved to accomplish with the club this year.
Todd said, "I'm glad you told me, though. I think the whole club made a fool of itself last year. It needs to take a big brace."
Young turned and looked at him. Todd had spoken in his usual quiet, careless manner, but Young thought his words implied something.
"Do you think—say, Todd, do you think there's much hope of its bracing?"
"Not unless they're made to," laughed Todd. "Perhaps," he said, looking the other way, "we can make 'em if we pull together. What do you say, Deacon?"
"Let's try," said Young. He held out his hand.
Todd took it in an embarrassed manner, and then shouted: "Hi, there, you fellows in front! Let's go down to meet the 2.17. There'll be a lot of the class in on that train. Start up a song, somebody."
They all marched off across the campus singing, with loud happy voices:
"Here's to Ninety-blank—Drink her down—drink her down."
Arms were thrown carelessly over shoulders and perhaps they swaggered a little as they marched. But it feels very good to be a Sophomore, especially the first day.
And all this fraternal joyousness, together with the superabundance of orangeand black, greatly impressed one of the very green Freshmen who happened just then to be scurrying by with wonder in his eyes. And it happened to be at about the same spot in the walk that another Freshman had met another crowd of Sophomores and was called "Deacon" for the first time in his life. But that was a whole year ago.
Young had learned a good deal in that year, he was thinking. "Not all of what you are taught at college," he said to himself, "comes out of the text-books—especially in Freshman year."
"Mr. Williams has had the good fortune—it really seems largely a matter of luck in many cases—to treat his fresh material with a simplicity which imparts a sense of strong reality. The newspaper life has a lasting fascination for any one who has ever known it, and I think the most ignorant must feel something of its charm in these tales."—W. D. HowellsinLiterature.
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