“If you please,” nodded Dick. “Our boys will want everything ready when they reach the grounds.”
So the two chums were quickly carried beyond the noise and confusion. A few minutes later the wagon turned in at the Fordham Athletic grounds.
The Fordham High School boys were out in the field, practicing. As seen in their padded togs they were an extra-bulky looking lot.
“Great Scott!” grunted Darrin, half disgustedly. “Each one of those Fordham fellows must weigh close to a ton.”
“The more weight the less speed, anyway,” laughed Dick good-humoredly.
“And, look! I wonder how old some of those fellows are,” continued Darrin. “I wonder if, in this town, men wait until they’ve made their fortunes and retired, before they enter High School. Why, some of these Fordham fellows must have voted for president the last two times.”
“Hardly as bad as that, I guess,” smiled Prescott. “Still, these Fordham boys do look more like a college eleven than a High School crowd.”
Dave continued to gaze over at the home team, and to scowl, until the wagon was halted before dressing quarters. Here the teamster and another man made short work of carrying in all the tog-bags.
A few minutes later the other fellows arrived.
“Say, which team is it we’re fighting to-day?” demanded Hudson. “Harvard, or Yale?”
There was general grumbling comment.
“I think,” insisted Tom Reade, “that the Fordham team wouldn’t like to stand a searching hunt into the eligibility of some of their players.”
“They’ve surely brought in some who are not regular, fair-and-square High School students,” contended Dan Dalzell.
There was much more talk of this sort, some of the Gridley boys insisting that Fordham ought to be compelled to account for the size and seeming age of some of the home players.
“We’re up against a crooked line-up, or I’ll give up,” muttered Greg Holmes.
“Now, see here, fellows,” laughed Captain Dick. “I don’t believe in making any fuss beforehand. We’ll just go ahead and take what comes to us.”
“It would be too late to make a kick after we’ve played,” cried some one.
“You fellows,” continued Dick, “make me think of what I heard Mr. Pollock say to Wilcox, chairman of the campaign committee back home.”
“What was that?” demanded half a dozen.
“Why,” chuckled Prescott, “Mr. Pollock said to Wilcox: ‘Now, see here, there’s always a chance that the election will go our way. So never yell fraud until after the election is over.'”
“I guess that’s the wisest philosophy,” laughed Coach Morton, who had taken no part in the previous conversation.
“If that’s the Fordham team,” continued Dick, “it’s one of pretty sizable fellows. But we’ll do our plain duty, which is to pile out on to the field and proceed to stroll through any line that is posted in our way.”
Just before the Gridley youngsters were ready to go out for preliminary practice the big Fordham fellows came off the field.
“Hullo!” piped Dave, as the Gridley boys strolled out to the gridiron. “You ought to feel happy, Dick. There’s a big section of West Point over on the grand stand.”
Nearly two hundred young men in black and gray cadet uniforms of the United States Military Academy pattern sat in a solid block at one point on the grand stand.
“No, they’re not West Pointers,” sighed Dick. “See here, those fellows, of course, are students at the Fordham Military institute. They wear the West Point uniform. And that’s the military school that Phin Drayne went to.”
“The sneak!” grunted Dave. “I wonder if he’s over in that bunch, now.”
“I’m not even enough interested to wonder,” returned Prescott. “He’s where he can’t do us any harm, anyway.”
“But, if the Fordham boys put anything over us, I’ll bet Drayne has things timed so that the military boys will do a big and noisy lot of boasting.”
“They will, anyway, if we allow them a chance,” answered Dick. “Now, spread out, fellows,” he called, raising his voice.
In the next moment the ball was in lively play.
The first time that a fumble was made a jeering chorus sounded among the military school boys.
“I expected it,” growled Darrin.
“We don’t care, anyway,” smiled Dick. “Let ’em hoot! I don’t draw the line until they throw things.”
“If they knew Phin Drayne as we do, they’d throw him first,” grimaced Darrin.
A minute later another hoot went up. It was plain that the military school boys had been primed for this.
But the gray-clad youths, it was very soon evident, were not the only ones who had come out to make a noise. Half of the Fordham crowd present joined in the volleys of derision that were showered down on the practicing boys from Gridley.
“It’s nothing but a mob!” declared Darrin, his eyes flashing.
“Careful, old fellow,” counseled Prescott coolly. “They’re trying to get our nerve before the game begins. Don’t let ’em do it.”
This excellent instruction Dick contrived to pass throughout his team. Thereafter the Gridley boys seemed not to hear the harsh witticisms that were hurled at them from all sides of the field.
Just in the nick of time the Gridley Band began playing. That stopped the annoyance for a while, for Fordham had neglected to provide a band.
Yet when the Gridley High School song was started by the band, and the Gridley boosters joined in the words, the answer from Fordham came in the form of a “laughing-song,” let loose with such volume that the Gridley offering to the merriment was drowned out.
“I hope we can give this rough town a horrible thumping—that’s all,” muttered Dave, his eyes flashing.
“Don’t let them capture your ‘goat,’ and we will,” Dick promised, as quietly as ever.
The plain hostility of the home crowd was wearing in on more than one of the Gridley boys. Dick felt obliged to call his eleven together, and to give them some quiet, homely but forcible advice. Coach Morton followed, with more in the same line.
Yet it came as a welcome relief to the Gridley youngsters when the referee and the other officials came to the field and game was called.
Dick Prescott won the toss, and took the kickoff.
That, of course, sent the ball into Fordham ranks. In an instant the solid Fordham line emitted a murmur that sounded like a bear’s growl, then came thundering down upon the smaller Gridley youngsters.
There was a fierce collision, but Gridley held on like a herd of bulls. The ball was soon down.
For five minutes or so there was savage playing. Fordham played a “slugging” game of the worst kind. Several foul tackles were quickly made by home players, yet so quickly released that the referee could not be sure and could not inflict a penalty. Sly blows were struck when the lines came together.
The average football captain would have claimed penalties, and fought the matter out.
But Dick Prescott let matters run by. He was waiting his opportunity.
So hard was the “slugging,” so overbearing and ruthlessly unfair was the Fordham charge that, at the end of five minutes, Gridley was forced to make a safety, losing two points at the outset.
“Yah!” sneered an exultant voice from the ranks of the military school. “That’s the fine Captain Prescott we’ve heard about!”
Tom Reade, in togs, was standing among the Gridley subs at the side line.
Tom recognized, as did all the Gridley boys, the voice of Phin Drayne.
“Yes!” bellowed Tom, facing the gray-clad group. “And that last speaker was a fellow who was expelled from Gridley High School for selling out his team!”
It was a swift shot and a bull’s-eye. The Fordham Institute boys had no answer ready for that. Half of them turned to stare at Phin Drayne, whose guilty face, with color coming and going in flashes seemed to admit the truth of Reade’s taunt.
“Dick,” growled Darrin, as they moved forward, after the safety, to Gridley’s twenty-five yard line, “these Fordham fellows are simply ruffians. They’re fouling us every second, and they’ll smash half our fellows into the hospital.”
“We’ll see about that!”
Dick Prescott’s voice was as quiet and cool as ever, but there was an ominous flash in his eyes.
CHAPTER XV
“We’ll Play the Gentleman’s Game.”
At the next down Dan Dalzell held up his hand, making a dash for the referee.
“I claim a foul!” he called.
“Captain, this is for you,” announced the referee, turning to Dick. “Be quick, if you’ve any complaint to make.”
“Come here, Dalzell,” called Prescott. “What was the foul?”
The Fordham players crowded about, muttering in an ugly way—all except one man, who skulked at the rear.
“There’s the hoodlum,” continued Dan excitedly, one hand over his left breast. He pointed to the Fordham player skulking at the rear. “That fellow deliberately gave me the elbow over the heart when we came together.”
“What have you to say, Captain Barnes?” demanded the referee, turning to the Fordham leader.
“It’s not true,” retorted Barnes hotly. “Daniels, come here.”
The matter was argued quickly and hotly, Gridley accusing, Fordham hotly denying.
“Can’t you Gridley fellows play with anything but your mouths?” snarled Captain Barnes.
“We play a straight game,” retorted Dick coldly. “We play like gentlemen.”
“Do you mean that we’re not?” demanded Barnes swaggeringly.
“So far you’ve played like a lot of sluggers.”
“See here! I’ve a good mind to thrash you, Prescott!” quivered Barnes.
“It’s always the truth that stings,” retorted Dick, with a cool smile.
“My fist would hurt, too.”
“That’s what we’re asking you to do—to save all your slugging and bruising tactics until after a straight and gentlemanly game has been played,” retorted Dick, with spirit.
Barnes clenched his fists, but the referee stepped squarely in between the rival captains.
“Cut it!” directed that official tersely. “I’ll do all the talking myself. Captain Barnes, return to your men and tell them that slugging and tricky work will be watched for more carefully, and penalized as heavily as the rules allow. If it goes too far I’ll declare the game forfeited to the visiting team.”
“This is a shame!” fumed Barnes. “And the whole charge is a mass of lies.”
“I’ll watch out and see,” promised—or threatened—the referee. “Back to your positions. Captain Barnes, I’ll give you thirty seconds to pass the word around among your men.”
“That black-haired prize-fighter with the mole on his chin tries to give me his knee every time we meet in a scrimmage,” growled Hudson to Dick. “If he carries it any further, I think I know a kick that will put his ankle out of business!”
“Then don’t you dare use it,” warned Dick sternly. “No matter what the other fellows do, our team is playing a square, honest game every minute of both halves!”
The referee had signaled them to positions. The Gridley boys leaped into place.
Play was resumed. In the next three plays Fordham, under the now more keenly watchful eyes of the officials, failed to make the required distance, and lost the ball.
Gridley took the ball, now. In the next two plays, the smaller fellows advanced the ball some twelve yards. But in the next three plays following, they lost on downs, and Fordham again carried the pigskin.
“The Fordham fellows are passing a lot of whispers every chance they get,” reported alert Dave.
“I don’t care how much they whisper,” was Dick’s rejoinder. “But watch out for crooked tricks.”
Minute after minute went by. Gridley got the ball down to the enemy’s fifteen-yard line, then saw it slowly forced back into their own territory.
Now Fordham began to “slug” again; yet so cleverly was it done that the officials could not put their fingers on a definite instance that could be penalized.
Bravely fighting, Gridley was none the less driven back. From the ten-yard line Fordham suddenly made a right end play on which the whole weight and force of the team was concentrated. In the mad crush, three or four Gridley boys were “slugged” in the slyest manner conceivable. Fordham broke through the line, carrying the pigskin over the goal line with a rush.
Fordham boosters set up a roar that seemed to make the ground shake, but the two hundred boys from the military school took little or no part in the demonstration. Tom Reade’s reply to Phin Drayne had silenced them.
Swaggering like swashbucklers Fordham followed the ball back for the kick for goal. It was made, securing six points, which were added to the two received from Gridley being forced to make that safety earlier in the game.
“Of all the miserable gangs of rowdies!” uttered Dave Darrin, as the teams rested in quarters between the halves.
“I have two black-and-blue spots to show, I know I have,” muttered Hudson.
“We’ll have some of our men on stretchers, if this thing keeps up,” growled Greg Holmes.
“What are you going to do about this business, Captain?” demanded two or three of the fellows, in one breath.
“As long as we play,” replied Dick Prescott, “we’ll play the same gentleman’s game, no matter what the other fellows do. We may quit, but we won’t slug. We won’t sully Gridley’s good name for honest play. And we won’t quit, either, until Mr. Morton orders us from the field.”
“You have it right, Prescott,” nodded the coach. “And I shan’t interfere, either, unless things get a good deal worse than they have been. But the Fordham work has been shameful, and I don’t blame any of you for feeling that you’d rather forfeit the game and walk off the field.”
Besides being coach, Mr. Morton was also manager. At his call the team would have left the field instantly, despite any other orders from the referee. It always makes a bad showing, however, for a team to leave the field on a claim of foul playing.
“All out for the second half!” sounded a voice in the doorway.
The Gridley boys went, fire in their hearts, flame in their eyes.
CHAPTER XVI
Gridley’s Last Charge
“Remember, Captain Barnes!” called the referee significantly.
“Why don’t you talk to Prescott, too?” demanded the Fordham captain sulkily.
“I don’t need to.”
“You—-don’t—need to?” demanded Barnes, opening his eyes in pretended wonder.
“No; Prescott and his fellows have a magnificent reputation for fair play, and they’ve won it on merit.”
“You’re down on us,” growled Captain Barnes.
“I’m only waiting till I can put my finger on some slugging to stop the game and hand it to Gridley,” retorted the referee, with a snap.
“Be mighty careful, fellows; be clever,” whispered the Fordham captain to his most “dependable” men.
“Are we going to throw the game?” demanded the slugger who had so angered Hudson.
“No; but don’t get caught at anything. Better not do anything. We’ve got those milk-diet infants eight to nothing now. Play their own kind of kindergarten game as long as we can hold the score without rough work.”
Barnes’s own instructions would have sufficiently stamped his team, had these orders been heard by anyone else.
At the beginning of the second half Fordham played a much more honest game, and Gridley began to pick up hope that fairness might prevail hereafter.
Gridley’s own game, in the second half, was as swift and scientific as it had ever been. By sheer good playing and brilliant dashes Dick and his men carried the ball down the field, losing it once on downs; but after the first ten minutes of the half they kept the pigskin wholly in Fordham territory.
Back and forth surged the battle. Fordham, despite its greatly superior weight and bulk, was not by any means superior when under the utmost watchfulness of a referee avowedly anxious to penalize.
Yet, until the game was nearly over, Fordham managed to keep the ball away from its own goal line.
Then, while the lines reformed and Dick bent over to snap back, Dave Darrin called out a signal that electrified the whole Gridley line. It called for one of their most daring plays, that Prescott himself made famous the year before.
While the start, after the ball was in play, seemed directed toward the right wing of Gridley, the ball was actually jumped to little Fenton, at the left end, and Fenton, backed solidly by a superb interference, got off and away with the ball. In a twinkling he had it down behind Fordham’s goal line.
Then the ball went back for the kick. The band played a few spirited measures while the wearied Gridley boosters suddenly rose and whooped themselves black in the face.
The kick, too, was won.
“Oh, well.” growled Barnes, “we have two points to the good yet, and only four minutes and a half left for the game. Don’t get rough, fellows, unless you have to.”
As the Gridley boys sprang to a fresh line-up their eyes were glowing.
“Remember, fellows, the time is short, but battles have been won in two minutes!”
This was the inspiring message flashed out by Captain Dick Prescott.
With all the zeal of race horses the Gridley High School boys flung themselves into their work.
After a minute and a half of play, Gridley had done so much that, just before the next snapback Barnes let his sulky eyes flash about him in a way that was understood.
Fordham must rush in, now, and hold the enemy back, no matter at what cost of roughness—if the roughness could be done slyly enough.
Then it came, a fierce, frenzied charge. The ball was down again in an instant, and Hazelton, a Gridley man, lay on the field, unable to rise.
Physicians hurried out from the side lines.
“Broken leg,” said one of them, and a stretcher was brought.
“Have we got to stand this sort of thing?” demanded Hudson, in a hoarse whisper. “Say the word, and I’ll send two of their men after Hazelton.”
“Don’t you do it!” snapped Dick sharply. “It would disgrace our school colors and our school honor. Don’t let knaves make a knave of you.”
Tom Reade came out on a swift run from the side lines to take Hazelton’s place.
“We ought to be allowed to carry guns, when we play a team like this one,” blurted Tom indignantly.
“We’ll pay them back in the score,” retorted Dick soberly, though his eyes were flashing.
Dave, in the meantime, was swiftly passing some orders Dick had whispered to him. These orders, however, related to plays to come, and did not call for retaliation on Hazelton’s account.
Play was called sharply. “Pay in the score,” became the battle cry raging in every Gridley boy’s heart.
Four successive plays carried the ball so close to the Fordham goal line that Barnes and his followers were in despair.
They still used whatever rough tricks they thought they could sneak in under the eyes of the game’s officials, and some of these made the Gridley boys ache.
Then came a signal beginning with “three” which stood for reverse signal. The numerals that came after the three called for the same trick that Fenton had put through so splendidly.
Again the ball started toward the right wing. This time the Fordham players were sure they understood—and like a flash massed their defense against Gridley’s left.
But on that reverse signal the ball continued to move at the right. Before Barnes and his followers could comprehend, another touchdown had been scored by the visitors.
And then came the kick for goal, and it was a splendid success. The kick came just at the end of the second half. That kick won the game for Dick’s sorely pressed team.
Gridley’s score, won by a cleanly played game against bruisers, stood at twelve to eight!
Now, indeed, did the Gridley boosters turn themselves loose, the band leading.
Barnes and his ruffians skulked back to dressing quarters, there to abuse the referee, the “Gridley kickers” and everyone and everything else but themselves.
It wasn’t long before some of the Fordham subs slipped out to find their cronies and sympathizers in the crowd that was slowly dissolving.
Then the word was passed around:
“Wait and be with us. Barnes is going to stop the Gridleys on the way to the station. Barnes is going to make Prescott fight for some things he said on the field! Of course, if you fellows get generally peevish, and the whole Gridley team gets cleaned out, there won’t be many tears shed.”
So scores of the sort of rabble in whom such an appeal finds ready response hung about, eager to see what would turn up.
CHAPTER XVII
The Long Gray Column
One small urchin there was, so small that he escaped notice as he hung about hearing the word passed.
But that urchin was a Gridley boy who had raised the money to come and see this game. The boy possessed the Gridley spirit. As fast as his legs would carry him he raced to dressing quarters, and there told what he had heard.
“Thank you, kid!” said Dick. “You’re a good Gridley boy,” and then he continued:
“So that’s the game, is it They’re going to mob us, are they I guess they can do it—but, fellows, keep in mind to pass some of the blows back! When we go down in the dirt be sure that some of the Fordham fellows have something to remember us by for many a day! I’m glad Hazelton has already been sent forward in an ambulance.”
As Dick finished dressing and waited for the others, he saw one of the subs dropping a spiked shoe into an outer jacket pocket.
“What’s that for?” Dick demanded sternly. “A weapon?”
“Yes,” sheepishly admitted the other.
“Put it in your bag, then, and let it go on the baggage wagon. Fellows, we’ll fight with nothing but fists, and only then if we’re attacked.”
“But those scoundrels will probably use brickbats,” argued the fellow who had tried to drop the spiked shoe into his overcoat pocket.
“No matter,” rang Dick’s voice, low but commanding. “If we have to, we’ll fight for our lives as we fought for the game—on the square! Good citizens don’t carry concealed weapons until called upon by the authorities to do it.”
“Bully for you, Prescott!” rang the voice of the coach.
“You here, Mr. Morton?” cried Dick, wheeling and seeking the submaster. “Mr. Morton, you’re not a boy, and you don’t want to be mixed up in such affairs. Why don’t you start—–“
“My place, Captain Prescott, is with the team I’m coaching,” replied the submaster. “And I think the signs are that we’re going to need all the pairs of fists that we have, and, more, too.”
The baggage wagon came to the door. Dick, Dave and Tom coolly loaded the baggage on. The wagon started off at good speed.
Then the two stages drove up to the door.
“Pile in, boys!” called one of the drivers.
Neither of the stage drivers was in the secret of what was likely to happen down the road.
The start was made, the horses moving barely faster than a walk.
By this time the athletic field was practically deserted. There was no sign of the presence of the Fordham High School team, nor of the bad element that Barnes had enlisted.
It was not until the stages had proceeded nearly four blocks that Dave, sitting beside Dick on the driver’s seat of the first stage, caught sight of some bobbing heads further up the road.
“There they are,” whispered Dave. “Lying in wait at the next corner. They’ll jump out when we get there.”
“Let them!” muttered Dick. “They’ll have to start it—but after they do—–!”
The stages had almost reached the next corner. Grinning, or scowling, according to individual moods, the roughs streamed out into the, street.
Gridley boys steeled themselves for a conflict, hopeless in odds of five to one!
At this point a clear voice sounded in the distance.
“A Company, left wheel, march!”
Around another corner near by came a company of boys from the Fordham Military Institute. It was followed by a second company, a third and a fourth.
Then, by a further series of commands, one company was sent, on the double quick, to march ahead of the first stage, while another company fell in behind the second stage, while the other companies formed and marched on either side of the stages.
While these hasty maneuvers were being carried out the fine-looking young cadet major of the battalion lifted his fatigue cap to Dick Prescott.
“Captain,” called the boyish major, “you gave us such a fine exhibition of gentlemanly football that we beg leave to show our appreciation by marching as your escort of honor to the station.”
The rough crowd in the street had fallen back to the sidewalks, a savage mutter going up at the same time.
The Military School boys were without arms, save those Nature had given them, but they, marched in solid ranks and stood for two hundred pairs of fists!
So Barnes’s last hope of vengeance vanished. Even his own rough followers turned to eye him in disgust.
Before they left the grounds some of the Military School boys had heard a whisper or two of what Barnes planned.
The soldier is drilled to fair play, and to detestation of cowardice. These young military students passed the word quickly. They left the grounds at once, but formed near by, on a side street near where they learned that Barnes and his rough mob lay in ambush.
“I declare, that’s the neatest, most military thing I ever saw done!” laughed Dave Darrin.
“And done by the boys you made fun of as sham West Pointers!” laughed Dick quizzically.
“But I didn’t mean it,” protested Dave, growing very red. “These are splendid fellows. Evidently they think that they, too, are entitled to say a word or two about the good name of Fordham.”
“You didn’t like the first look of these fellows, Dave, because they had started to cheer for Fordham High School. But did you notice that they cheered no more for Fordham after Reade answered Phin Drayne so forcibly.”
“It’s a fact that these men didn’t boost any more for Fordham,” assented Dave. “By the way, I have one clear notion in my head!”
“What is it?”
“That Phin Drayne isn’t marching in these close gray ranks about us.”
Phin Drayne wasn’t. At this moment Phin was back at the military institute, his face twitching horribly as he packed his clothing in the trunk in which it had come.
For, almost instantly after Reade had called out, some of the military students around Drayne had demanded of him whether there was a shadow of truth in what Reade had said.
Phin Drayne’s “brass” had deserted him. He knew, anyway, that these comrades could dig up his past record at Gridley very quickly.
Drayne knew that his days at Fordham were over.
“It was all my confounded tongue, too,” muttered Phin dejectedly. “If I had kept my tongue behind my teeth I don’t believe any of the Gridley fellows would have noticed me, or said anything. Oh, dear! I wonder where I can go next!”
In the meantime the Gridley High School team and substitutes, escorted with so much pomp, attracted a great deal of notice in the streets of Fordham.
People turned out to cheer them, and to wave handkerchiefs and ribbons. For Fordham wasn’t all bad or rough; not even the High School. The roughest element in the school had captured football—that was all. Some of these boys belonged to the wealthier families, and had been brought up to believe they could do as they pleased. This was the High School in which Phin Drayne naturally belonged.
Down at the railway station the Gridley crowd and the Gridley Band awaited the coming of the team. The fine sight made by the gray military escort brought a hurricane of cheers from the Gridleyites.
Just at the nick of time the leader of the band bethought himself, and signaled his musicians. As the stages drew up the band played, and the Fordham Military Institute’s battalion moved into line of battalion front.
Dick feelingly thanked young Major Ransom.
“Oh, that’s all right, Prescott,” laughed young Ransom. “If we hadn’t shown up at all you fellows would have given a good account of yourselves. But we had to do it. Fordham is our headquarters, too, and the honor of the town, while we live and study here, means something to all of us. Don’t gauge even the Fordham High School by what happened to-day—or came near happening. There are some mighty fine fellows and a lot of noble girls who attend Fordham High School. But Barnes—he’s the curse of the school population of the town.”
Three or four days later Dick asked Darrin:
“Did you hear the outcome of the Fordham affair?”
“No,” Dave admitted.
“I just heard it all up at ‘The Blade’ office. The fact that the Military School cadets escorted us in such formal manner to the railway station attracted a lot of attention in Fordham. The principal of the High School there started a quiet investigation of his own. Barnes and two other fellows on the Fordham eleven have been suspended from school until the School Board can take up their cases and decide whether they ought to be expelled. The Fordham principal has also made it plain that next year’s team will have to be scanned by him, and that he’ll keep out of the eleven any fellows who don’t come up to the tests. There’s a jolly big row on in Fordham, and Barnes isn’t having any sympathy wasted on him you can just bet.”
“It serves him and that whole football crew just right,” blazed Darrin.
Hazelton’s injury kept him out of school only a fortnight. The supposed break in his leg turned out to be only a sprain.
While school teams like that commanded by Barnes are rare, they are found, now and then. Yet the fate of rowdy athletes in the school world is usually swift and satisfying. Other schools refuse to compete with schools that are known to put out “rough-house men.”
Dick & Co. had laid by their togs. They had said farewell to school athletics.
In the winter’s basket ball they did not intend to take part. For the baseball nine, that would begin practice soon after the new year, there was plenty of fine material in the lower classes.
“I feel almost as if I had been to a funeral,” snorted Darrin, when he came away from the gym. after having turned in all his togs and paraphernalia.
“It’s time to give the younger fellows a show,” sighed Dick.
“You talk as though we were old men,” gibed Dave.
“In the High School we are,” laughed Dick. “We’re seniors. In a few short months more we shall be graduates, unless—–“
There he stopped, but Darrin didn’t need to look at his chum. Both knew what that pause meant.
CHAPTER XVIII
The Would-Be Candidates
The big stir came earlier than it had been expected.
Every boy who has followed such matters in his own interest will appreciate what the “big stir” means.
Congressman Spokes, representing the district in which Gridley lay, had a vacant cadetship at West Point within his gift, and also a cadetship at Annapolis.
_”On December 17, at nine A.M., at the town hall in Wilburville, I will meet all young men who believe themselves to possess the other proper qualifications for a cadetship at either West Point or Annapolis.”_
So ran the Congressman’s announcement in the daily press of the district.
Every young man had to be of proper age, height, weight and general good bodily condition. He must, of course, be a citizen of the United States.
Every young man was advised to save himself some possible trouble and disappointment by going, first of all, to his family physician for a thorough examination. If serious bodily defects were found, that would save the young man from the trouble of going further in the matter.
But at the Wilburville town hall there was to be another physical examination, which every young man must pass before he would be admitted to the mental examinations, which were to last into the evening.
Dick Prescott read this announcement and thrilled over it.
For two years or more he had been awaiting this very opportunity.
Every Congressman once in four years has one of these cadetships to give to some young man.
Sometimes the Congressman would give the chance to a boy of high social connections, or else to the son of an influential politician. A cadetship was a prize with which the Congress man too often paid his debts.
Good old General Daniel E. Sickles was the first Congressman to formulate the plan of giving the cadetship to the brightest boy in district, the young man proving his fitness by defeating all other aspirants in a competitive examination.
Since that time the custom had grown up of doing this regularly. It is true, at any rate of most of the states of the Union. In some western and some southern states the cadetship is still given as a matter of favor.
The young man who receives the appointment goes to the United States Military Academy at West Point. He is now a “candidate” only. At West Point he is subjected to another searching series of physical and mental examinations. If he comes out of them successfully he is admitted to the cadet corps, and becomes a full-fledged cadet.
The candidate must report at West Point on the first of March. If he succeeds in entering the corps, and keeps in it, four years and three months later the young man is graduated from the Military Academy. The President now commissions him as a second lieutenant in the Regular Army. Thus started on his career, the young man may, in later days, become a general.
While the cadet is at West Point he is paid a salary that is just about sufficient for his needs and leaves enough over to enable him to buy his first set of uniforms and other equipment as an army officer.
West Point is no place for idlers, nor for boys who dislike discipline. It is a severe training that the cadet receives, and the education furnished him by the United States is a magnificent and costly one. It costs Uncle Sam more than twenty thousand dollars for each cadet he educates and graduates from the United States Military Academy.
The same general statement is true regarding the United States Naval Academy at Annapolis, Maryland. In the latter institution, however, the cadet learns how to become an officer in the United States Navy.
Now, here were both grand opportunities, offered together.
While Dick Prescott had been waiting, hoping and praying for the cadetship at West Point; Dave Darrin had been equally wistful for the chance to go to Annapolis.
“Our chances have come, old chum!” cried Dick, looking into the glowing face of Darrin.
“Yes; and of course an Army or Navy officer should be a brave man. But now the chance has come, I find myself an utter coward,” confessed Dave.
“How so?”
“I’m in a blue funk for fear some other fellow will get it away from me,” confessed Darrin honestly. “And if I fail in this great ambition of my life, I’m wondering if I’ll have the nerve to go on living afterwards.”
“Brace up!” laughed Dick protestingly.
“Now, honestly, old fellow, aren’t you just badly scared!” Dave demanded.
“Whisper, Dave! I am,” Dick admitted.
“Well, there is nothing like having some one that you can confess everything to, is there?” muttered Darrin.
“I guess it has done us both good to own up,” laughed Dick. “But see here!”
“Well?”
“I simply won’t allow myself to be scared.”
“Then you’re as keen for West Point as I am for Annapolis,” retorted Darrin suspiciously.
“Dave, old fellow, you know what the Gridley spirit demands? You know how we and the rest of the fellows managed to win eternally in athletics? Just because we made up our minds that defeat was impossible.”
“That’s fine,” laughed Dave. “But we’ll probably have to buck up against more fellows than we do on an athletic field. And probably dozens of them go in with the same determination.”
“I don’t care,” declared Prescott. “I want that West Point cadetship. I’ve wanted it for years, and now the chance has come. I’m going to have it!”
Dave Darrin gradually succeeded in working himself into the same frame of mind. Yet there were many moments when he was tortured by doubts as to whether the “Gridley spirit” would serve in bucking a long line of young fellows all equally anxious to get to Annapolis.
The first step taken by Dick and Dave was to get excused from the High School for the time.
Both boys had lists of the studies and standards required for entrance to the Military Academy or the Naval Academy. Dick and Dave, each in his own room at home, spent the next few days in “boning” as neither had ever “boned” before.
“But we must get three hours in the open air each day, Dave,” Dick insisted. “We mustn’t go up for the trial with our nerves shattered by moping all the time indoors.”
Only Dick & Co., and a very few friends, knew what Dick and Dave were planning. It was kept a secret.
The date of the High School senior ball was set for December 17.
“Can you be back in time to go to the ball?” Laura Bentley asked Prescott.
“I’m afraid not, Laura. Besides, when I get back from Wilburville, I’m afraid I’ll feel pretty well tired out.”
“You’re not afraid of failing?” asked Laura anxiously.
“I’m not going to allow myself to fail. Yet, even if I win, I shall be tired out after the ordeal. Wish the ball could come a couple of days alter the ordeal. I wanted to go to it and to dance with you, Laura.”
“I’m sorry you can’t go,” sighed the girl.
Darrin, too, had given up all thoughts of attending the senior ball, and this was the first time that either lad had “skipped” the class ball.
“It seems too bad to be away,” grumbled Dave. “But I know how I’ll feel on that night. If I carry off the honors for Annapolis, no mere ball could hold me! I’ll need air and space. I’ll be lucky if I don’t get arrested on that night for building bonfires in the streets.”
Dave next sighed dismally and continued:
“If I don’t carry off the Annapolis prize, I’ll feel so disappointed that I won’t look anybody in the face! Dick, Dick! It’s fearful, this waiting—and wanting!”
“It won’t seem like the class ball a bit without you two boys,” declared Belle Meade, pouting, the next afternoon.
“But if we get through,” muttered Dave, “think of the gay, splendid times to which we can invite you at Annapolis and West Point.”
“Indianapolis and Blue Point are far away,” murmured Belle, purposely misnaming both famous places.
“_Ann_-apolis!” flared Dave
“_West_ Point!” protested Dick hotly.
“Don’t mind Belle,” begged Laura quietly. “She’s the worst tease I know.”
“If I get the appointment to Annapolis,” continued Darrin, “you’ll be asking me, next, if I expect to be promoted, after a while, to he helmsman, or fireman, on some cruiser.”
“Well, would you expect to be!” asked Belle, with an appearance of great innocence.
“Don’t, Belle,” pleaded Laura. “The boy are too much in earnest. It isn’t fair to tease them, now. Wait until they’ve been at West Point and Annapolis a couple of years. Then ask them.”
“What would be the use then?” asked Belle dryly. “By that time our young cadets will have met so many girls that they would have to think back quite a while before they could remember our names.”
Laura’s pretty color lessened for an instant.
“Don’t you believe it,” broke in Dick promptly. “Just as soon as I have a right ask for cards for a West Point hop I’m going to ask for cards for Miss Bentley and Miss Deane, and their chaperon.”
“The same here, for Annapolis,” promised Dave solemnly. “So you see, girls, you’ll have to be prepared to do some traveling in the near future.
“But you won’t get to Annapolis, anyway, until June,” replied Belle, a bit more gently. “So you won’t have any Annapolis hops until next fall, will you?”
“Probably not,” Dave admitted.
“But you won’t go to Annapolis, anyway,” suggested Laura, turning to Prescott. “There may be some West Point hops between then and June.”
“I feel pretty sure there will be,” nodded Dick cheerily. “And you girls may be sure of my keeping my promise.”
“And I’ll keep mine for the very first hop that comes off at Annapolis after I get there,” Darrin assured them.
The laugh was on both young men, though neither they nor their fair young companions knew it.
The poor “plebe,” as the first year’s man at either West Point or Annapolis is known, would be in for a terrible experience at the hands of his comrades if, during his “plebe” year, he had the “cheek” to seek to attend a cadet hop. He must wait until he has entered his second year before he has that privilege.
This is a wise regulation. In his first year the poor “plebe” has so bewilderingly much to learn that he simply couldn’t spare any time for the cultivation of the graces of the ballroom. In his first year, he has dancing lessons, but that is all that comes his way.
Greg Holmes came to Prescott with a wistful, rather sad face.
“How are you coming on, Dick?” Greg asked.
“Meaning what?”
“Are you going to be well prepared for the examinations?”
“As far as being able to pass with a decent percentage,” Dick answered, “I am not all uneasy. All that worries me is the fear that some other fellow may have a slightly better percentage. That would ditch me, you know.”
“Oh, you’ll win out,” predicted Greg loyally. “And I just wish I had a chance like yours!”
“Why don’t you go in and try for it, then?” urged Dick generously.
“No use,” uttered Greg, shaking his head. “You can beat me on the scholastic examination, and I know it, Dick. The best I could hope for would be an appointment as your alternate. And your alternate to West Point isn’t going to stand any show for a cadetship, Dick Prescott!”
Besides the candidate each Congressman may appoint one or more “alternates.” These alternates also report at West Point. If the “principal” fails there, the alternate is given a chance to make good for the cadetship.
But Greg Holmes, though he was wildly anxious to go to West Point, felt certain that it would be useless to go there as Dick Prescott’s alternate.
“I hate to see you not try at all, Greg,” declared Dick. “Why don’t you try? If you beat me out there won’t be any hard feelings.”
“I couldn’t beat you out, and I don’t want to, either,” responded Greg. “But wait! I may have something to tell you later on.”
Dan Dalzell had much the same kind of a talk with Dave Darrin. Dan felt the call to the sailor’s life, but hadn’t any notion that he could slip in ahead of Darrin.
“Even if I could, Dave, I wouldn’t try it,” declared Dan earnestly. “I want badly enough to go to Annapolis, and I admit it. But I believe you’re just about crazy to get there.”
“I am,” Dave admitted honestly. “But the prize goes to the best fellow, Dan. Jump in, old fellow, and have your try at it.”
Dalzell, however, shook his head and remained silent on the subject after that.
To both Dick and Dave it seemed as though the next few days simply refused to budge along on the calendar. Certainly neither of them had ever known time to pass so slowly before.
“I hope I’ll be able to keep my nerve up until the seventeenth,” groaned Darrin.
“Surely, you will,” grinned Dick. “You’ve got to!”
“I’ve been studying until all the words on a page seem to run together, and I don’t know one word from another,” complained Dave.
“Then drop study—if you dare to!”
“I’m thinking of it,” proposed Darrin seriously. “Actually, I’ve been boning so that the whole thing gets on my nerves, and stays there like a cargo of lead.”
“Let’s pledge ourselves, then, not to study on the fifteenth or the sixteenth,” urged Dick.
“I’ll go you, right off, on that,” cried Darrin eagerly.
“And we’ll spend those two days in the open air, roaming around, and trying to enjoy ourselves,” added Prescott.
“Enjoy ourselves—with all the load of suspense hanging over our heads?” gasped Darrin.
“Well, we’ll try it anyway.”
To most people in and around Gridley the world, in these few days, seemed to bob along very much as usual. Dick and Dave, however, knew better.
At last came the evening of the sixteenth! Both anxious boys turned in early, though neither expected to sleep much. Both, however, were soon in the land of Nod.
But Dick awoke at half-past four on the morning of the fateful seventeenth. By five o’clock he knew that he wasn’t going to sleep any more. So he got up and dressed.
Dave Darrin was in his bath, that same morning, before four o’clock. Then he, too, dressed, and wondered whether every other fellow who was going into the contest to-day felt as restless.
The mothers of both boys were astir almost as early. Mothers can’t take these examinations, but mothers know what a son’s suspense means.
Dick and Dave met at the station a full twenty minutes before train time.
CHAPTER XIX
Tom Reade Bosses the Job
“Ugh!” shivered Dave, as the chums met on the platform. “It’s cold out here!”
“Come inside, then, and get warm. But you’re a great athlete, to mind an ordinary December morning,” laughed Dick Prescott.
Together they stepped into the waiting room.
“What time does our train go?” asked Dave, though he had known the time of this train for the last week.
“Seven-forty,” replied Dick.
“And it’s seven-twenty, now. Whew, what a await!”
“I could have stayed home a little longer,” nodded Dick. “Only I told father and mother that I’d feel more like being started if I got down here this far on the way.”
“Sure thing,” nodded Dave sympathetically. “My Dad had to hold on to me to stop my leaving the house an hour earlier than I did.”
Both boys laughed, though not very heartily. Each was under a terrific strain—just from wondering!
“If I get through, and win out to-day,” muttered Dick, “I know I shan’t feel half as anxious when it comes time to take the graduating exams.”
“No,” agreed Dave. “Then you’ll know you have a chance; but to-day you can’t be sure of that much.”
Five minutes before train time the chums were astonished at seeing another of the chums walk into the station. It was Tom Reade, looking as jovial and contented as a youngster could possibly look.
“Hullo, Tom!” came from Dick.
“Howdy, Tom, old man!” was Dave’s greeting.
“Hullo, fellows!” from Reade.
“Where are you bound?” inquired Dick.
“Wilburville?”
“_What_?”
“Fact!” Reade assured them.
“Going to the exams.?” Dave demanded quickly.
“Yep.”
“Why, you never said a word about thinking of West Point,” exploded Prescott.
“You were making fun of Annapolis only the other day!” asserted Dave, just as though making fun of Annapolis were one of the capital crimes.
“Hang West Point!” exploded Tom Reade.
“Oh! Then it’s Annapolis you’re after,” grunted Darrin.
“Sink Annapolis!” exclaimed Reade.
“Then what on earth are you after?” demanded Dick.
“Have you any fool idea in your head, Tom, that you can take an exam and stand a chance of getting Congressman Spokes’s job away from him?” Dave asked.
Tom threw himself into one of the seats, crossed his feet, thrust his hands down in his ulster pockets, and surveyed the pair before he answered:
“I’ll tell you what ails you two. You have a notion that the sun rises at West Point and sets at Annapolis. Now, I know a heap better, and I haven’t an eye on either place. Can you fellows guess why I’ve taken the day off from school and why I’m going to Wilburville?”
“We surely can’t,” declared Dave.
“Well, then, I’ll tell you,” promised Tom amiably. “I knew you two good old chaps would be going to pieces with blue funk to-day. I knew you’d be chattering inside, and turning all sorts of colors outside. You’d try to cheer each other, but each of you is too badly scared to be of any use to the other. So I’ve come along to take up your minds, jolly you and stiffen your backbones alternately. That’s my whole job for to-day.”
Looking in some amazement at Reade, the other two chums realized that good old Tom was telling the truth.
“Of course, I’ll admit,” continued Reade, “that, if I were going on the grill to-day, I’d be worse than either of you. But I’m not. I wouldn’t live in West Point, and I wouldn’t be caught dead at Annapolis, so I shan’t have any scares or any nervous streak to-day. I’ll look after you both, the best I can, and do what little lies in my power to keep your minds off your troubles.”
“Well, who’d ever have thought of a thing like that but Tom Reade?” gasped Dick gratefully.
“It’s mighty good of you, old chum,” declared Darrin fervently.
“Now, then,”`resumed Reade, uncrossing his legs, “as I’m on the job to look after you, allow me to remind you that that is your train whistling at this moment.”
Three very jolly boys, therefore, piled out of the station building and boarded the train.
Tom spoke to the conductor a moment before following the others to seats.
“You see,” spoke Reade, “I’m even going to the trouble to make sure that this is the right train, and not a belated express.”
“I never though of that,” muttered Darrin, turning a bit pale.
“Great Scott!” gasped Dick. “I can feel the cold sweat oozing out at the bare thought. Suppose we had been harebrained enough to get on the wrong train, and be carried so far past that we couldn’t get back to Wilburville by nine o’clock!”
“Drop all worry. Don’t think of anything alarming, or even disconcerting,” chuckled Tom. “I’ve taken charge of the whole job, and I guarantee everything. One of the little things I guarantee is that you’ll both win out to-day.”
“In algebra,” muttered Darrin, “I hope they won’t go too deeply into quadratic equations—–“
“Cut it!” ordered Reade severely. “Likewise forget it! Say, I heard a rattling good story last night. It carries a Dutchman, a poodle, a dude and an old maid. Let me see if I can remember just how it runs.”
With that Reade got started. He soon had his two friends started as well. They laughed until the brakeman at last thrust his head in and called:
“Next station, Wilburville!”
“Stop and get out, young man!” called Tom. “Do you think we don’t know our way?”
Then into another story plunged Tom Reade. He spun it out, purposely, until the train slowed up at Wilburville.
“‘Bus right up to the town hall!” cried a driver, sizing the trio up shrewdly.
“Thank you; that’s our auto over there,” nodded Tom, pointing to a lunch wagon. Reade started the chums at a brisk walk. Of the first native they met they inquired the way.
Tom was still talking at forty horse-power when they came to the town hall.
“That building holds our fate!” muttered Dave, as they drew near.
“Stop that!” ordered Tom. “Anyone would think that Annapolis was all the candy in the land. What are you worrying about, anyway? Haven’t I taken all the responsibility for this thing upon myself? Haven’t I promised you both that you shall find your little toy appointments in your Christmas stockings? Do you think I’m lying?”
“But the exams!” groaned Dave.
“Well, they’re competitive,” quoted Tom cheerily.
“That’s just what ails ’em!” argued Dave.
“You make me think of my cousin, Jack Reade, of the militia,” taunted Tom. “He’s a captain. Now, Jack wanted to be appointed assistant inspector general of rifle practice. He was ordered up for his exam. Poor fellow spent three weeks, days and nights, boning for that exam. The family had the doctor in twice, for they were afraid Jack was studying himself crazy. Then the day came for the exam. Jack went into the ordeal shivering. The examiner asked Jack to write down his full name, the date of his birth, and the date of his entry into the militia. Jack answered all three questions straight, and got a hundred per cent. for his marking. Yet you fellows talk about exams as though they were really hard!”
Still laughing the three passed inside.
Dick Prescott had firmly resolved to do no more talking about the ordeal. But Darrin hadn’t. So, after the boys had entered the building, and had climbed to the next floor, where the hall was, and had taken a look inside, Dave drew back into the corridor.
“Great guns, did you look inside?” he demanded. “There are a million boys in there already.”
“Cheer up,” soothed Tom. “Most of ’em want to go to West Point.”
Tom fairly forced his chums inside. The boys already there, some three-score, at least, turned to regard the newcomers curiously.
“The rest of you may as well go home,” announced Tom laughingly. “My friends have a first mortgage on the jobs you’re after.”
Presently, more fellows came in. Then some more, and still more.
“Let’s go down and stand by the door, where we can get more air,” urged Darrin.
“Yes,” agreed Tom. “And we’ll throw out any of the rest that may have a nerve to try to step in here.”
Hardly had they taken their stand by the door when the three chums received a shock.
For the next arrivals were Phin Drayne, and his father, Heathcote Drayne.
Phin was now in attendance at the Wilburville Academy, and his father had come down, the evening before, to urge his son to try for West Point.
Tom looked the newcomer over with especial disfavor. Young Drayne, like many another “peculiar” fellow, was an unusually good student. At any time Drayne would have a very good chance of coming out even with, or just ahead of, either Dick or Dave.
The Draynes did not favor our three chums with any greeting, but walked on down into the hall.
“Excuse me a minute,” murmured Tom. “I want to find out how the land lies.”
Tom thereupon walked boldly over to the Draynes.
“May I speak with you just a moment, Mr. Drayne?” asked Tom.
“Go ahead,” replied Mr. Heathcote Drayne, not over-graciously.
“It is important, sir, that I speak with you aside,” Tom went on.
Heathcote Drayne scowled, then stepped to one side, turning and glancing down at Reade.
“Well, young man, what is it?”
“I thought it barely possible,” continued Tom coolly, “that I might be able to offer you a hint or two worth while.”
“Worth whose while?” demanded Heathcote Drayne, suspiciously.
“Yours. Has your son come here to compete for either the West Point or Annapolis cadetship?”
“What if he has?”
“Then has Phin his certificates of good character with him?” demanded Tom, his blue eyes steely and cold as he looked straight and significantly at the elder Drayne.
“Confound your impudence, Reade! What do you mean?”
“Just this,” continued Tom readily. “Only boys of good character are eligible for West Point or Annapolis. Now, the fact is, your son was expelled from Gridley High School for a dishonorable action. Are you content to have your son try for a cadetship, with that record hanging over his head and enveloping his chances?”
“Who’ll know anything about that record if you don’t blab?” demanded Mr. Drayne.
“Why, your son would have to state where he had attended school, and furnish certificates of good character from his teachers,” ran on Reade. “Now, honestly, do you think that Dr. Thornton, of Gridley High School, would furnish a certificate on which Congressman Spokes could appoint your boy to West Point or Annapolis? Because, if you think so,” wound up Reade, “go ahead and put Phin in the running, to be sure.”
With that Tom marched off back to his chums.
“What have you been up to?” asked Dick curiously.
“I’m manager for you two half-witted fellows, ain’t I?” queried Reade.
“What have you been saying to Mr. Drayne?” asked Dave.
“Just watch father and son, and see how they seem to be enjoying their talk,” chuckled Tom. “There, what do you see now? I thought it would end like that.”
This was the first time it had occurred to the elder Drayne that his son’s character would be inquired into. In fact, Mr. Drayne had had half an idea that the United States Military Academy was a place that made a specialty of reforming wild boys and making useful citizens of them.
CHAPTER XX
When the Great News Was Given Out
At just nine o’clock Congressman Spokes came on to the platform followed by two other men.
One of these latter was a town official, who, in a very few words, introduced the Member of Congress.
Congressman Spokes now addressed the young men upon the vocations they were seeking to enter. He explained that neither the Military nor the Naval Academy offered an inducement to boys fond only of their ease and good times.
“At either school,” warned the Congressman “you will find ahead of you years of the hardest work and the strictest discipline. No boy whose character is not good can hope to enter these schools of the nation. It is not worth any boy’s while to enter unless he stands ready to sacrifice everything, his own ideas and prejudices included, to the service of his country and his flag.”
Congressman Spokes continued in this line for some time. Then he called for the boys who wished to try for West Point to gather at the right side of the hall; those for Annapolis at the left side.
“This is the first time you and I haven’t been on the same side in everything, old fellow,” Dick whispered smilingly, as he and Dave Darrin parted.
What a hurried count the interested youngsters made! But Tom Reade, who didn’t belong to either crowd, probably made the most accurate count. He discovered that sixty-two of the boys had voted for West Point. Forty-one favored Annapolis. A few young men present, like Tom, didn’t care to go to either government school.
“When I am ready to give the word,” continued Congressman Spokes, “the young men who want to go to West Point will file out of the door at this end of the hall. In the rooms across the corridor they will find the physicians who are making the physical examinations for West Point.
“The Annapolis aspirants will file downstairs and enter through the first door at the left, where other physicians will make the physical examinations for Annapolis.
“The examinations by the physicians here will not be conclusive for the successful candidates. The final physical examinations, like the final scholastic examinations, will be made at West Point and Annapolis.
“Now, each young gentleman who passes the physical examination will receive a signed card with his name on it. Such successful young men are then excused until one o’clock. At one o’clock sharp the young men who have certificates from the medical examiners may report for their scholastic examinations. Do not come here, however, for the scholastic examinations. West Point aspirants will report at the High School, and those for Annapolis at the Central Grammar School.
“Now, at eight o’clock this evening you return here. At that hour, or as soon there after as possible, announcement will be made, from this platform, of the names of the successful young men and their alternates. Now the young men for West Point forward, the Annapolis hopefuls downstairs!”
Inside of two minutes the town hall was bare, save for the presence of Tom Reade, who, with his hands in his pockets, walked about, whistling.
In forty-five minutes Dick, flushed an breathless, broke in upon Tom, as the latter sat waiting patiently for his friends.
“I’ve passed the doctors all right,” announced Dick, producing his card.
“That’s all right, then,” nodded Tom. “And the rest will be easier.”
Twenty minutes later Dave Darrin join them.
“I’ve passed—that part of the trial,” he proclaimed.
“Then, until twelve o’clock, there’s nothing to do but go out and kill time,” declared Reade.
“Twelve o’clock” repeated Dick. “You mean one o’clock.”
“I mean twelve,” retorted Tom, with emphasis. “At twelve you eat; you don’t gorge, but you chew and swallow something nourishing. Then you’ll be in fit shape for the little game of the afternoon.”
Both of the chums had reason to realize the weight of their debt to jovial, helpful Reade; who was banishing care and keeping their minds off their suspense. In fact time passed quickly until it was time for Dick and Dave once more to part, to seek their separate examinations.
Just forty of the boys who wanted to go to West Point had passed the doctors as being presumably fit in body and general health. Twenty-seven of the Annapolis aspirants had passed the doctors. Already three dozen disappointed young Americans were on their way home, their dream over.
Tom Reade chose to walk over to the local High School with Dick. Dave found his way alone to his place of examination.
Dick Prescott and the thirty-nine other aspirants were assembled in one of the class rooms at the High School. On each desk was a supply of stationery. After the young men had been seated the examination papers in English were passed around. This examination Dick thought absurdly easy. He finished his paper early, and read it through three times while waiting for the papers to be collected.
History was a bit harder, but Dick was not especially disturbed by it. Not quite so with geography. Dick had had no instruction in this branch since his grammar school days, and, though he had brushed up much of late on this subject, he found himself compelled to go slowly and thoughtfully. Arithmetic was not so hard; algebra a bit more puzzling.
It was after six o’clock when the examinations were finished, and all papers in. As fast as each examination was finished, however, the papers had been hurried off to the examiners and marked.
Faithful Tom was waiting as Dick came out in the throng.
“Congratulations, old fellow!” cried Reade, holding out his hand.
“You’ve passed,” announced Tom gravely.
“Why, the examiners haven’t fin—–“
“They don’t have to,” snorted Tom. “I don’t have to wait for the opinions of mere examiners. You’ve passed, and won out, I tell you. Now let’s go look for Dave.”
It had been agreed that the three should meet, for supper, at the same restaurant where they had lunched. Darrin was not there yet. It was nearly seven o’clock when Dave came in, looking fagged and worried.
But Tom was up on his feet in an instant, darting toward Darrin.
“Didn’t I tell you, old fellow?” demanded. Reade. “And my congratulations!”
“If you hadn’t been such a good fellow all day I might be cross,” sighed Dave. “Whee! But those examiners certainly did turn my head inside out. Don’t you see a few corners of the brain still sloping over outside?”
“Cheer up,” quoth Tom grimly. “Nothing doing. You haven’t brains enough to overflow. In fact, you’ve so few brains that I’m going to do the ordering for your supper.”
“Everything I can do, now, is over with, anyway,” muttered Prescott. “So I’m going to forget my troubles and enjoy this meal.”
Dave tried to, also, but he was more worried, and could not wholly banish his gloom.
Tom succeeded in making the meal drag along until about ten minutes of eight. Then he led his friends from the restaurant and down the street to the town hall.
Here, though most of the young men were already on hand, there was nothing of boisterousness. Some were quiet; others were glum. All showed how much the result of the examinations meant to them.
But the time dragged fearfully. It was twenty minutes of nine when Congressman Spokes appeared on the platform and rapped for order. He did not have to rap twice. In the stillness that followed the Congressman’s voice sounded thunderous.
“Young gentlemen, I now have the results from all the examiners, and the averages have been made up. I am now able to announce my appointments to West Point and Annapolis.”
Mr. Spokes paused an instant.
“For West Point,” he announced, “My candidate will be—–Richard Prescott, of Gridley. The alternate will be—–“
But Dick Prescott didn’t catch a syllable of the alternate’s name, for his ears were buzzing. But now, for the first time, Tom Reade was most unsympathetically silent.
“For Annapolis, my candidate will be—–David Darrin, of Gridley. The alternate—–“
Neither did Darrin hear the name of his alternate. Dave’s head was reeling. He was sure it was a dream.
“Pinch me, Tom,” he begged, in a hoarse whisper, and Reade complied—heartily.
“The young men who have won the appointments as candidates and alternates will please come to see me at once, in the anteroom,” continued Congressman Spokes, who, however, lingered to address a few words of tactful sympathy to the eager young Americans who had tried and lost.
“Come along, now, and let’s get this over with as quickly as possible,” grumbled Torn Reade. “This Congressman bores me.”
“Bores you?” repeated Prescott, in a shocked voice. “What on earth do you mean?”
“I don’t like his nerve,” asserted Reade. “Here he is, giving out as if it were fresh, news that I announced two hours ago.”
Congressman Spokes was waiting in the anteroom to shake hands with the winners. He congratulated the candidates most heartily, and cautioned the alternates that they also must be alert, as one or both of them might yet have a chance to pass on over the heads of the principal candidates.
Mr. Spokes then asked from each of the young men the name of his school principal, the address of his clergyman and of one business man. These were references to whom Mr. Spokes would write at once in order to inform himself that the lucky ones were young men of excellent character.
Then the Congressman wished the young men all the luck in the world, and bade them good evening, after informing them that they would hear, presently, from the Secretary of War with full instructions for West Point, and from the Secretary of the Navy for Annapolis.
“Fancy Phin Drayne passing in his references for the character ordeal!” chuckled Tom Reade, as the three chums walked down the street.
“What time does the next train leave for Gridley?” suddenly demanded Dave.
“In twelve minutes,” answered Tom, after looking at his watch.
“Let’s run, then!” proposed Dave.
“We can mope, and have five minutes to spare,” objected Reade.
“Let’s run, just the same!” urged Dick Prescott.
The three chums broke into a run that brought them swiftly to the station, red faced, laughing and happy.
“Oh, what a difference since the morning!” sang Dick blithely. “Say, just think! West Point really for mine!”
“Bosh!” grunted Darrin happily. “I’m going to Annapolis!”
Then, as by a common impulse Dick and Dave seized Tom Reade by either hand.
“Tom,” uttered Dick huskily, “we owe you for a lot of the nerve and confidence that carried us through to-day!”
“Tom Reade,” declared Darrin. tremulously, “you’re the best and most dependable fellow on earth!”
“Shut up, both of you,” growled Reade, in a tone of disgust. “You’re getting as prosy as that Congressman—and that’s the most insulting thing I can think of to say to either of you.”
The train seemed fairly to fly home. It was keeping pace with the happy spirits of the young men, who, at last, came to realize that the great good news was actually true.
Neither Dick nor Dave could think of walking home from the station. They broke into a run. By and by they discovered that Tom Reade was, no longer with them.
“Now isn’t that just like old Tom?” laughed Darrin, when he discovered that their friend was missing. “Well, anyway, I can’t wait. Here’s where our roads branch, Dick, old fellow. And say! Aren’t we the lucky simpletons? Good night, old chum!”
Dick fairly raced into the bookstore conducted by his parents. He almost upset a customer who was leaving with a package under his arm.
“Dad!” whispered Dick, leaning briefly over the counter and laying a hand on Mr. Prescott’s shoulder. “I passed and won! I’m going to West Point!”
A look of intense happiness wreathed his father’s face and tears glistened in his eyes. But Dick raced on into the back room, where he found his mother.
“All the luck in the land is mine, mother!” he whispered, bending over and kissing her. “I won out! I go to West Point when the month of March comes!”
Mrs. Prescott was upon her feet, her arms around her boy. She didn’t say much, but she didn’t need to. After a moment Dick disengaged himself.
“Mother, Laura Bentley will be glad to know this news. She’s at the ball of the senior class to-night, but I’ll see if I can get her father on the ‘phone, and tell him the news for her.”
But presently it was Laura’s own sweet voice that answered over the wire.
“You?” demanded Dick. “Why, I thought you’d be at the ball!”
“Did you think I could be happy all the evening, wondering how you were coming on with your great wish?” asked Laura quietly. “Say, oh, Dick! How did you come out?”
CHAPTER XXI
Gridley Seniors Whoop It Up
“Oh, so many, so many congratulations, Dick!” came the response to Prescott’s eagerly imparted information.
“And so you missed the dance just because you could sympathize with some one else’s worry?” demanded Dick. “But say! The evening is still young, as dances go. Couldn’t you get dressed in a little while? Then we could both go and celebrate my good luck.”
“I’m dressed,” came the demure answer.
“What? Oh—well, now, that’s nice of you—–“
“I have been expecting this good news,” laughed Laura. “And so I’ve been dressed all evening, on the chance.”
“And you’ll go to the class ball if I come around quickly?”
“It would be mean of you not to come and take me, Dick!”
“I’ll have to change,” declared Dick. “But that never takes a boy long. Won’t I be around to your house in short order, though!”
Dick rang off and started to bound upstairs, but a new ting-ling sounded on the ‘phone bell.
“Here’s another party been trying to get you,” announced central. “Go ahead.”
“Hullo, Dick,” sounded a low, pleased voice. “I hope you’ve called up Laura.”
“Just rang off, Dave.”
“Then you know that the girls didn’t go to the class ball to-night, but just dressed and waited on the chance of hearing from us. I’m on the jump to dress, but I’ll meet you there, Dick.”
Dick took only time to explain the change in his night’s plans to his parents. Then he bounded off upstairs, but soon came down again, looking a bit dandyish in his best, and very happy into the bargain.
When Dick arrived at Dr. Bentley’s home an automobile stood in front of the house. Dick recognized it, however, as the doctor’s machine with the doctor’s man at the lever.
The instant that Prescott put his finger on the bell button Laura herself opened the door. She was radiant of face and exquisite in ball costume as she threw open the door and stood framed there, the light behind her.
“Oh, I’m so glad, Dick, so glad!” came her ready greeting. “Come in. I’m all ready but the wrap, but father and mother wish to be among the first to congratulate you.”
In the doctor’s office stood Dr. and Mrs. Bentley. They greeted Dick cordially and expressed delight over his success.
“But this is only the first ditch taken, you know,” spoke Prescott soberly, though in military phrase. “I have my chance now; that is all. I have more than four years of hard fight facing me before I am sure that the Army can be my career.”
“You’ll make it, Prescott, just as you’ve made everything you’ve gone after at High School,” replied Dr. Bentley heartily. “But, now that we’ve congratulated you, we mustn’t keep you an instant longer from your classmates. I had just come in with my car, and Laura told me, so I directed my man to wait. He’ll take you both along the road in short order. Good night, my boy!”
Laura brought her wrap, holding it out to Dick.
“If you’re to be a gallant Army officer,” she teased, “you must learn to do this sort of thing gracefully.”
Blushing, Dick did his best. Then the young people went out. Dick helped his companion into the car, then seated himself beside her.
“We’re going to pick up Dave and Belle,” Laura explained, as the car moved swiftly away. “Then we’ll all go in together.”
One fellow had beaten them to the class ball, and that fellow was Tom Reade. How he ever did it no one will be able to guess, but Tom flew home, got into his best, and had reached the ball before these young people appeared on the scene.
The happy young candidates-elect went with their companions to the cloak room. Then, Laura on Dick’s arm, and Belle clinging to Dave, the two couples entered the ballroom. The strains of a waltz were floating out. Abruptly the music ceased in the middle of the air, for Reade, standing beside the director, had motioned him to cease playing.
“Classmates and friends!” bellowed Reade, “it is my proud opportunity to-night to be able to be the first to announce to you some wonderful good news. To-day Dick Prescott, of ours, defeated all other competitors, and has secured the appointment from this district to the United States Military Academy!”
“Wow! Whoop!” That announcement had them all going. There was one tremendous, increasing din of noise. But Tom, jumping up and down, waving both arms and scowling fiercely, finally secured silence.
“Who’s doing this announcing?” he demanded. “Who’s master of ceremonies, if I am not. You just wait—all of you! I’ll give you the cue when to turn the noise-works loose. As I just stated, it’s Dick for West Point, but or, and—it’s Dave Darrin for Annapolis at the same time. Yes, Dave is going to represent this district at Annapolis!”
The musicians were on their feet by this time. All with a rush the sweet, proud strains rang out:
_”My country, ’tis of thee,
Sweet land of liberty,
Of thee I sing!”_
Instantly all stood at attention, the young men all over the hail holding themselves with especial erectness. Not a voice was heard until the good old refrain was through. To the two happy chums “America” had a newer, stronger meaning. The spirited air came to them with a new meaning that had never been plain before.
Dick felt the tears in his eyes. Foolish, o course, but he couldn’t help it! And choky Dave furtively wished that he dared reach for his handkerchief with all those hundreds of eyes turned on him.
As the music came to an end the High School boys filled their lungs for a mighty cheer. Quick as a flash, however, the leader of the orchestra tapped his baton, then swung it once more, and the instruments leaped on into:
“_Columbia, the gem of the ocean_!”
That was for the Navy, of course, and one didn’t have to keep quiet, either. Words of the song, and cheers, mingled with the musicians’ strains.
And then it wound up in a cheer and a mad rush of yelling that must have been heard for a mile.
An impromptu reception and hand shaking followed, but to Dick and Dave, and their partners, it had more the look of a mob.
It was a joyous and big-hearted mob, though, and in time it quieted down. After a very long interruption the dancing started again, and Dick and Dave were able to whirl away with their partners.
As the next dance after that, started there was a sudden halt by many of the couples, and soon a roar of laughter ascended. For the orchestra had chosen, as the air, “The Girl I Left Behind Me.”
This air will always be associated with the United Service—the Army and Navy. It is a rollicking, jolly, spirited old tune, as it needs must be for “The Girl I Left Behind Me” is the tune that is played when the country’s defenders, in war time, are marching away for the front, after just having said the last goodbye to mother, sister and sweetheart.
Just now, however, the old air had none of the tragic connected with it. It was all in the spirit of fun. Laura, blushing furiously, and Belle striving to appear wholly unconscious, but striving too hard, lent all the more merriment to the moment.
“It’s that confounded old idiot, Tom Reade,” muttered Dave to his partner. “I wonder how many more such tricks he knows!”
Presently came “The Army Lancers,” and that brought out a right royal good cheer. Two numbers after that, came “A Life on the Ocean Wave,” and more cheers.
It was after three in the morning when the gay affair broke up. But who cared for that? Class balls come but once a year.
Right after “Home, Sweet Home,” which wound up the ball, the orchestra added a number, “The Star Spangled Banner.”
Both Dick and Dave reached home pretty thoroughly tired out, after having seen their girl friends home. Neither boy rose much before