CHAPTER XIA REFUSAL
“I can’t do it,” said Dan soberly.
“Can’t do it!” exclaimed Walter. “You can’t help yourself! You’re going to the Tait School! You’re going to room with me; you’re going to pitch on our nine and——”
“It’s good of you, Walter; but I can’t, that’s all.”
“Why can’t you?”
“It costs too much. I simply can’t do it. I can go to the normal school——”
“But, man, you aren’t going to pay the bills!”interrupted Walter.
“Who will pay them?”
“My father.”
Dan was silent a moment, looking down at the ground at his feet. When he glanced at his friend again he said, “That’s too much, Walter. It’s too much for your father——”
“You don’t know my father!” broke in Walter impulsively. “He has whole barrels of money. Why, Dan, only last month he cleaned up a cool hundred thousand in a deal——”
“Well, it’s his money, not mine.”
“Of course it is, and if he chooses to take oneper cent of what he made on that deal and put it into your education, why, that’s his business too, isn’t it?”
“Not entirely.”
“Whose is it?”
“Partly mine.”
“No, sir!” declared Walter emphatically. “It’s none of your business! My father has a right to spend his own money just as he wants to, hasn’t he? I’ve heard him say a million times that all money was good for anyway was just to use. Don’t be foolish, Dan.”
“I don’t mean to be. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate what you’ve just said to me. But, Walter, there’s another side and you haven’t thought of that.”
“There isn’t any other side!” declared Walter promptly.
“Doesn’t everything have at least two sides?” asked Dan quizzically.
“No, sir!”
“What hasn’t, for example?”
“This offer I’m making you. Why, Dan, it’s the chance of a lifetime. You’ve never been out of Rodman except to go over to Benson or to Simpson’s Corners to play ball. You don’t know anything of what the world is like.” Unaware of the dull flush that spread over Dan’s cheeks as he spoke, Walter continued eagerly: “Why, man alive, the Tait School is the greatest school in the UnitedStates! There isn’t another that can hold a candle to it! Why, our nine whipped the freshman nine of every one of the big colleges. We’ve had more men enter college without conditions in the last five years than any other prep school. We’ve got the best teachers, the finest buildings, the greatest crowd of fellows. Why, Dan, you simply don’t know what you’re talking about! You’re turning down a chance that hundreds of fellows would jump at. You can’t mean it! If you talk it over with Moulton, he’ll tell you that if you are fool enough to say no it’ll just show that you haven’t brains and aren’t fit to go to school anywhere, not even to the normal school that you seem to think is one of the big institutions of the land. I’m not going to say another word to you about it now. When you think it over and tell your mother and Tom and Moulton about it you won’t have a peg left to hang your hat on.”
“It’s good of you anyway, Walter,” said Dan quietly. “Don’t forget that I appreciate all you say.”
“No! You don’t half appreciate it or you wouldn’t pull off the way you’re doing. Honestly, Dan, is there a single real reason why you can’t say ‘yes’ right off the bat?”
“Yes.”
“What is it?”
“I don’t know that I can make you see it, Walter, but it’s too much to take when I know it will be a long time before I can pay back the money.”
“But you don’t have to pay it back! You don’t even have to think of that! My father will pay every cent of the term-bills!”
“Walter, did you ever think of what it means for a fellow to be poor and have to take what some one else gives him?”
“I don’t know that I have,” replied Walter more seriously. “Though when it comes to that,” he added lightly, “I haven’t very many shekels myself, except my allowance.”
“That’s different.”
“I suppose it is—after a fashion. I never thought very much about it anyway.”
“If I should offer to give you my yearling colt would you take her?”
“No.”
“Of course you wouldn’t,” said Dan positively.
“That’s different too. In the first place, you couldn’t afford to give Ban away. She’s too valuable——”
“No, that’s not it!” interrupted Dan. “You wouldn’t be thinking as much of me as you would of yourself. You’d be saying to yourself, ‘I can’t take Ban. It’s too much to take as a gift.’ Now, be honest, Walter, isn’t that really just what you’d think?”
“Perhaps I might,” admitted Walter, “but that has nothing to do with this case.”
“Hasn’t it?”
“Not a bit! You see——”
“I don’t just see. I tell you, old man, it’s good of you and your father, but I want you to think of my side too.”
“Dan, you’re an obstinate old——”
“I guess you’re another.”
“I’m not, either! You just pull back like a balky mule!”
“While you’re pulling just as hard the other way.”
“You’ll be sorry some day and call yourself seven kinds of a fool! It isn’t every day in the week a fellow gets the chance to turn down such an offer as you’ve got.”
“Don’t you suppose I know that?” asked Dan softly, as he became aware that his disappointed friend was becoming angry.
“You’ll be sorry when it’s too late, I’m afraid.”
“That may be true.”
“It will be true! It is true! I simply can’t understand how any fellow can be such a fool as to throw over a chance to go to the Tait School, especially when the chances are that he’ll be the pitcher on the school nine. And, Dan,” Walter continued eagerly, “there hasn’t been a pitcher on the Tait School team who hasn’t been a varsity pitcher after he entered college. There’s Moulton, for example—oh, I’m not going to say anything more about it. If you could only see the Tait School just once you’d be perfectly willing for your old normal school to go to the hayseeds where it belongs. Youthink it over. I’ll see you again sometime. I’m going back to my grandfather’s now.”
As Walter turned away abruptly, and without once looking behind him, he was not aware that Dan remained standing in the place where the conversation had taken place and was ruefully watching his friend as he walked rapidly back to the old bridge.
“Well, Walter, what did Dan say when you told him what your father was going to do for him?” inquired Mrs. Borden cheerily as her boy entered his grandfather’s house.
“He said he wouldn’t do it,” replied Walter somewhat tartly.
“What?”
“Yes, mother, that’s exactly what he said.”
“Why did he say that?”
“You can search me! Dan is as obstinate as a pig in a garden. He’s the most unreasonable fellow I know anywhere.”
“I’m sure you did your part. It was noble of you to want to help Dan to obtain an education. I said that to your father——”
“What did father say when you told him?” broke in Walter.
“He laughed, and all he said was Dan had fifteen hit-outs in the game.”
“Strike-outs, I guess you mean, mother.”
“Is there any difference between a strike and a hit? I should think they meant pretty much thesame thing. If you were to strike another boy you’d be hitting him, wouldn’t you?”
“I might strike at him without hitting him.”
“Yes?” said Mrs. Borden dubiously. “Well, I shouldn’t let it trouble me, Walter. You were generous, I’m sure. I think it was noble of you and you made me feel very proud. Probably when your father comes up for the week-end he’ll be able to persuade Dan, though it does seem a little strange that one should have to persuade a boy to take what you are giving him.”
“You don’t know Dan! He’s the most obstinate and unreasonable boy in seven kingdoms.”
“Don’t be discouraged, my boy. Your father will find some way. He always does.”
Whether Walter was “discouraged” or not he did not explain, though he did not go near Dan’s home before the end of the week brought the return of Mr. Borden to the old homestead. His first word to his father, when Walter went in the automobile to meet him at the station, was, “Dan won’t do it.”
“Won’t he?” inquired Mr. Borden with a smile and not seeming at all surprised.
“No, sir. He’s as obstinate as an old mule.”
“Perhaps it isn’t quite so bad as that.”
“Yes, it is! I never saw such a fellow as Dan is. He doesn’t say much, but when he takes his stand you can’t budge him an inch. I don’t see why he turns down such a chance.”
“It may be that he will change his mind. What did you say when you told him of the offer?”
“I don’t remember. I didn’t say very much. I just told him what you had said. Probably I didn’t put it strongly enough.”
Mr. Borden laughed and said, “Never mind, my boy. I’ll have a little talk with Dan.”
“I wish you would, father! I don’t know that it will do any good, but there’s no harm in trying anyway.”
“Let me see—how many was it that Dan struck out in the game with the Benson nine?”
“You know already,” replied Walter a trifle tartly.
“Twenty-six?”
“No, sir. Fifteen.”
“That’s a good record. Well, I’ll see Dan soon.”
Walter’s eagerness and impatience increased when apparently his father forgot or ignored his promise. Not a word concerning his promised interview was said that evening nor on the morning following. It was late Saturday afternoon when Mr. Borden told his boy that he was about to go to Dan’s home and that he wished to go alone.
“You’ll need me,” pleaded Walter. “You don’t know Dan as well as I do.”
“Not in the same way, is what you mean, Walter.”
“I’d like to go.”
“I’d be glad to have you, but it will be betterfor you to stay here. If I have to do more afterward I may call in your help, but I’m sure, my boy, much as you think of Dan you would hinder more than you would help if you were to accompany me this time. I am not without hope that I’ll have a good word for you when I come back. Please tell me once more, Walter, how many Dan struck out in the Benson game.”
“You know already.”
“So I do. It was fifteen, wasn’t it?”
“Yes, sir.”
“What is the record?”
“For strike-outs?”
“Yes.”
“There have been quite a good many ‘no hit’ games. I don’t know just what the record for strike-outs is. It might be——”
“Perhaps Dan will make it when he becomes the pitcher of the Tait School nine,” suggested Mr. Borden good-naturedly. “Don’t give up too easily, Walter. One never can tell what may come, but in business I have learned at least one thing which would have been of help to you if you had known it before your interview with Dan.”
“What is that?”
“Never give the ‘other fellow’ the chance to say ‘no.’”
“I don’t see how you can help it sometimes.”
“That’s one of the things you have to learn by experience. Now I’ll go over to see the great‘strike-out’ pitcher. Let me see now; I must be sure of my ground. Was it twenty that Dan struck out?”
“I sha’n’t tell you any more that it was fifteen,” replied Walter a little crossly as he became aware that his father was good-naturedly making fun of him.
“Where will you be, Walter, when I come back?”
“Right here on the piazza.”