Читать книгу Those Smith Boys on the Diamond; or, Nip and Tuck for Victory - Howard Roger Garis - Страница 9

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A LIVELY HAZING

“Wow! But this is a lonesome place!” exclaimed Cap Smith, as he and his brothers were set down by the depot stage in front of the gates of Westfield Academy.

“And we’ve got it all to ourselves for two weeks,” added Pete. “I wonder how we can stand it?”

“Got to,” declared Bill grimly. “Say, they’ve got a beaut diamond,” and he motioned toward the baseball field.

“Nothing doing in that line until spring,” commented Cap. “Football has the call now, but I don’t s’pose we’ll get a look in at that. Well, come on,” and he went through the massive bronze gates.

“Where you going?” demanded Bill.

“Up to see Prexy. Dad gave me a letter for Dr. Burton, the president, and we want to pay our respects, and find out where we’re going to sleep to-night. I don’t exactly feel like camping out on the grass.”

“Me either,” came from Pete. “Say, as soon as we can get into some old togs can’t we get up a game. Maybe there are some fellows sent on here early, like us, and we can pick up a nine.”

“I’m afraid not, son,” spoke John, “but that looks like a place where a college president would hang out. Come on, we’ll give it a trial.”

A little later they were shaking hands with the venerable Dr. Burton, who made them genially welcome, but looked all the while as if he didn’t quite know what to do with them, and wished they would take themselves off, or go away so that he could get back to a volume of Chinese proverbs on which he was working, making a translation of it into modern Hebrew.

“I’m very glad to see you young gentlemen,” he said, “and I hope you will like it here at Westfield. The students will—ahem—arrive shortly.” That was all the reference he made to the fact that our heroes were sent on ahead of the time as a sort of punishment, and the boys were duly grateful.

“I have arranged for you to have rooms, temporarily, in the senior dormitory,” went on Dr. Burton. “Professor Landmore, the science instructor is there, and he—er—he will, ahem—look after you,” and the good doctor seemed a trifle embarrassed.

“I guess he thinks we sure do need looking after,” murmured Pete, when he and his brothers had settled down in a big room containing three beds, which apartment was to be their home until the term opened.

“Shall we decorate?” asked Bill.

“What, put up all our trophies? Not much!” exclaimed Pete. “Wait until we get into our own flat, and see what sort of neighbors we have. This will do for now. I’m going to get unharnessed,” and he proceeded to don some more comfortable clothes than those in which he had traveled.

A little later the brothers were out on the deserted diamond, tossing balls back and forth, and batting them. In vain they looked for some one with whom to organize even half a nine, and finally they gave it up, and strolled about, looking at the college buildings, walking over the football gridiron, and speculating as to what sort of fellows they would get chummy with when the students arrived.

For two weeks our heroes lived rather a dull life, though Professor Landmore made friends with them, and took them on long walks collecting science specimens. Once he went fishing with them, but he paid little attention to the sport after he had captured a new species of frog, notes concerning which he proceeded to enter at great length in a book, while the Smith boys pulled out some fine specimens of the finny tribe.

That night, the final one before the opening of the term, our friends were given their regular rooms in the Freshman dormitory—three connecting apartments, not very large, but just suitable for the boys. And straightway the brothers began to decorate the walls, each in his own peculiar way.

With their choice possessions and trophies hung up, the brothers gathered in Pete’s room that night for a talk before turning in.

“Well, the crowd will be here to-morrow,” observed Bill.

“Yes, and then for some lively times,” added Pete.

“How do you mean?” asked Bill.

“Initiations, and hazing and all that. But we’ll have to stand it.”

“Surest thing you know,” declared Cap. “We all want to make the ball team this spring, and if we balk out of the hazing I know what that means.”

“Are you going to take all that comes?” asked Bill.

“Well, up to a certain point, but if it gets too strenuous, I’ll take a hand myself. But we can’t tell until the time comes. Now let’s get to bed.”

Lively were the scenes that took place the next day. With the arrival of many new students, the return of old ones, the assigning of the boys to their rooms, the making up of classes, it is a wonder that poor old “Prexy’ ” did not desert. But he took everything calmly, and soon a sort of order came out of chaos.

The Smith boys found themselves in the midst of a lively colony of students in their dormitory. There were five rooms on a short corridor, and of these our heroes had three. Pete’s apartment was between those of Bill and John’s, while the letter’s adjoined the room of Donald Anderson, a new lad who was at once dubbed “Whistle-Breeches” by some senior from the fact that Donald wore corduroy trousers, which squeaked or “whistled” as he walked. As soon as he learned why he was so christened, he got rid of the offending garments, but the name stuck, and “Whistle-Breeches” he remained to the end of his course.

Next to Bill there roomed a well-dressed, supercilious lad, who was reputed to be quite wealthy, and his overbearing manners added to this surmise. He was James Guilder, but he was at once christened “Bondy” for he had boasted of his father’s stocks and bonds.

Behold then, these five lads domiciled together in the Freshman corridor. Across the hall from Pete’s room, was a larger apartment, which, as befitted his station, held a lordly senior, one Dick Lawson, who rejoiced in the name of “Roundy” because he was fat. He was also good natured, and though the school authorities had placed him there to have a sort of leavening effect on the Freshmen, he was too good natured to be any sort of a monitor.

After the first supper, partaken of with the entire school assembled in the refectory, the three Smith boys went to their rooms, not knowing what else to do.

“I say, we’re not going to stay in like chickens; are we?” demanded Bill.

“No, but take it easy,” advised Cap. “We want to get the lay of things before we start anything.”

“That’s all right,” agreed Pete. “Do you know what the Freshmen do the first night?”

“Get hazed?” ventured Cap.

“No, they go out and collect signs from around town—pull ’em off, you know; bootblack signs, restaurant signs—any kind—and decorate their rooms with ’em. Let’s do it. Whistle-Breeches said he’d go.”

“Let’s don’t,” came from Cap calmly. “To-morrow will do as well, and I want to look over some lessons. We’ve got to buckle down to work here. It isn’t like the school at home.”

“Wow! I say you’re not going to become a greasy grind so soon; are you?” demanded Bill in contempt.

“Not exactly,” answered Cap, “but we didn’t come here just to have fun. Dad expects something of us.”

“Of course,” agreed Pete, “and we won’t disappoint him, either. I guess I’ll—”

But a knock on the door interrupted him, and a voice called out:

“Open up, Freshies!”

“The hazers!” whispered Bill. “Shall we stand ’em off?”

“Might as well get it over with,” suggested Cap. “Just stick together, that’s all, and when I give the word, which I’ll do if they get too strenuous, just sail into ’em as we did into Beantoe and Spider that time.”

“Sure,” agreed his brothers.

“Come on, Freshies! Open up or we’ll break in!” and the summons was a thundering one.

“Coming!” cried Pete gaily, and he swung back the portal to confront a crowd of Sophs and Juniors, who had taken it unto themselves to do some hazing.

“Oh, this is fruit! This is easy!” was the cry, as they saw the Smith brothers.

“Please—please you—you won’t be too—too rough, will you fellows?” pleaded Pete, in simulated terror.

“Rough? Oh no, we’ll be as gentle as lambs; eh boys?” retorted one of the hazers.

“Oh, no, we won’t do a thing to them!” cried another.

“Who’s in the next room?” demanded the leader of the band.

“Bondy Guilder,” replied Bill, indicating the room adjoining his, where the wealthy lad was domiciled.

“And on the other side?”

“Whistle-Breeches Anderson.”

“Good! Yank ’em both out, boys,” was the order, and some of the cohorts left to execute it, while our three heroes were pulled and hauled from their apartments, going not unwillingly, as they thought of Cap’s plan.

“Out on the diamond with them,” ordered the leader, who was addressed as “Senator” but with whom the Smith boys were not acquainted. “Bring along the other two.”

Pete and his brothers soon found themselves in the midst of a motley crowd of Freshmen, more or less alarmed over the ordeal in prospect. Some were cravenly begging to be let off. Others were threatening and some, like our friends, were silent, taking it as a matter of course.

“Now then, the gauntlet for some one,” ordered the Senator. “Line up, fellows. Here’s a good one to start with,” and he hauled Bondy Guilder out from the press.

“Hands off!” exclaimed the wealthy lad angrily.

“Oh, ho! High and Mighty; eh? Well, that doesn’t go at Westfield. Send him down the line, fellows,” and the Senator gave Bondy a shove. The hazers had lined up in two files, armed with bladders, rolls of papers, books and stockings filled with flour. It was a reproduction of the old Indian gauntlet along which hapless prisoners had to pass, being beaten and clubbed as they ran.

“You chaps are doing this at your own risk!” cried Bondy trying to break away.

“That’s all right, sport! We’ll chance it,” came the answer. “Run, you lobster, or you’ll get the worst of it!”

“I—I protest!” cried the victim, as he turned to see who had hit him with an inflated bladder, in which corn rattled.

“He doth protest too much!” cried a laughing hazer, fetching Bondy a resounding thump with a slap-stick.

“Run!” shouted the Senator, giving him another shove, and the wealthy lad ran perforce, since he was half-pushed, half-pulled the length of the double line.

And what a trouncing he got! He was at once recognized as a supercilious and overbearing lad and the punishment to fit the crime was duly meted out to him. He reached the end of the gauntlet rather much the worse for wear, and his spruce new suit was in need of a tailor’s services.

“Now for the next!” cried the Senator. “Where’s that Whistle-Breeches fellow?”

“Here,” answered Anderson.

“Well, we’ll let you off easy, for you look like a good sort.” Whistle-Breeches was grinning in an agony of apprehension. “Can you sing?” he was asked.

“A—a little.”

“Dance?”

“Even less.”

“Good, then you’ll do the Highland fling. Here, who’s got the mouth organ?”

“I have,” was the answer from the ranks of the hazers.

“Pipe up a Scotch hornpipe. Where’s that whitewash brush, and skirt. Off with his trousers.”

Before Donald could protest he was minus his lower garments and a short skirt of Scotch plaid had been slipped over his head, and fastened behind. Then a dangling whitewash brush was hung about his hips, in imitation of a Scottish costume, and while the mouth organ made doleful music Whistle-Breeches as well as he was able, which was not very good, did a dance.

“Livelier!” was the command, amid a gale of laughter, and livelier it was, until even the hazers were satisfied.

“Next,” called the Senator, like a barber.

“Here are three we can work off together,” volunteered some one, and Pete, Bill and John Smith were thrust forward.

“What’ll it be?” demanded the Senator.

“Blanket tossing,” called several.

“No, the pond test.”

“Too cold for the water. We’ll give ’em the blanket degree. Bring out the woolens.”

Some heavy horse blankets were produced and with the hazers holding to the corners, our heroes were tossed up into the air, and caught as they came down with sickenish feelings. But they had been through the ordeal before, and knew what to do. They kept quiet and were not hurt.

But when Bill and Pete were tossed together, it was not so much fun, and they very nearly had an accident. Altogether it was rather a tame hazing, and the Sophs and Juniors felt it so.

“The pond! The pond!” was the cry.

“That means a ducking,” said Cap in a whisper to his brothers. “We won’t stand for that. Let ’em take you along easy, until they get you right to the edge, and then take a brace, and pitch in the first man you can grab. I’ll whistle when it’s time. They won’t suspect anything.”

“The pond! The pond!” was the cry again raised, and though the Senator and some of the older students were a bit averse to it they had to give in to the majority.

“Come on!” cried the crowd, hustling Pete and the two other lads along. “It’ll be over in a minute and you’ll feel better for it,” consoled one hazer to Cap.

“Do you really think so?” he asked gently.

“Sure,” was the reply, and the youth wondered why the three did not make more of a fuss. He found out a little later.

“Much against our will, we are compelled to initiate you into the mysteries of the Knights of the Frogs,” said the Senator, as the crowd lined up on the bank of a pond not far from the football gridiron.

“Go ahead,” said Cap easily, glancing on either side where his brothers stood. “Is it deep?”

“Only to your waist,” answered the Senator. “Can you swim?” and he was in earnest for he would have stopped the hazing had he found either of the candidates deficient in the watery pastime.

“A little,” admitted Bill. “Oh, please—please don’t throw us in!” he pleaded suddenly.

“No, don’t—I—I have a cold,” added Pete, taking his cue.

“I—I’d a good deal rather have something else, if it’s all the same to you,” put in Cap, pretending to shiver.

“I thought we’d get their goat!” shouted a lad who had been disappointed that the candidates did not show more fear. “All ready now, in with ’em!”

The three Smith brothers allowed themselves to be led close to the edge of the pond. On either side of each lad stood a hazer, with one hand on a collar and the other grasping the seat of the trousers.

“All ready!” again called the leader. “I’ll count three and in they go!”

“One!” came the tally, and the throwers swayed their victims slowly to and fro.

“Two!” came the count.

But before the third signal could be given there came a whistle from Cap. At that instant the hazers had eased back ready for the forward motion at the word three!

But it did not come. Instead Pete, Cap and Bill seemed to slip down. In an instant they were loose. But they did not run.

Instead they put out their feet, one after the other gave vigorous shoves, and six forms, dextrously tripped, lay prostrate on the sod. They were the forms of the lads who had expected to toss into the pond the three Freshmen.

“In with ’em!” cried Cap, and before the astonished hazers knew what was up, one after the other had been rolled down the sloping bank of the pond, into the water.

The tables had been turned most effectively, and, as our heroes fled off through the night they heard some one call:

“For the love of tripe, what are we up against? Who were those fellows?”

“Th—those—those Smith boys!” was the spluttering answer of one who crawled out of the frog pond.