Читать книгу The Secret Play - Ralph Henry Barbour - Страница 4

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Clearfield is a fairly typical New England mill town, lying some two miles in from the coast. Doubtless the early settlers had been attracted by the water power to be derived from the river which flows around the town on the north. Certainly, they could not have been influenced by æsthetic or sanitary considerations, for the town occupies what must have been in their time a more or less level meadow a few feet above the river and a very few more above the sea, and, aside from the possibility of good drainage—which probably never occurred to them—those first residents of the future Clearfield found few natural advantages and little of the picturesque. To be sure, northward and westward the country breaks into low hills and is attractive enough, but a distant view of those hills could scarcely have made up for mosquitoes and malaria, for Needham’s Mill, as the first settlement was called, was surrounded by marsh.

However, the Clearfield of to-day is no longer Needham’s Mill. The marshes have disappeared—although it is still no uncommon thing to strike a peat-bed when excavating for a cellar—and there is a small-sized city of some seventeen thousand inhabitants, with broad, well-shaded streets, some fine buildings and many manufactories. Clearfield is famous for its knitting mills, but has divers other industries as well. The railroad crosses Mill River from the north, and the trains stop at a new and commodious station, post-card pictures of which you can purchase at Wadsworth’s Book Store and at Castle’s Pharmacy. It is no longer quite correct to say that the river flows around the town, for within the past ten or fifteen years the town has crossed the river and the larger mills and the boat-yards are built along the stream in what is known as the North Side and which is reached by two well-built bridges. Clearfield is served by a trolley system, and, if one wants to reach the shore he may step into a big yellow-sided car at Town Square and be whisked to Rutter’s Point, where the summer hotel and the cottages face the ocean, in a very few minutes. The Common, a square of turf bisected by paths and set with benches and a band-stand, occupying a block in the older part of town, is the center of the business section. Facing the Common are Clearfield’s best and newest business blocks and the Town Hall and the post office, and it was toward the Common that Dick Lovering conducted Eli and Gordon Merrick at the conclusion of football practice.

Gordon was fifteen years old, a very live-looking boy with clean-cut features, dark hair and eyes and a well-built, athletic figure. He and Dick were very good friends, and on the way in from the field they had found so much of strictly personal interest to discuss that after Dick had drawn up before the post office he remembered, while Gordon had gone inside for some stamps, that the latter had quite neglected to mention the important matter he had alluded to at the field. Tom Haley, a big, powerful-looking boy of sixteen who played center on the school team, stopped to talk a moment. Tom was pessimistic to-day.

“Lanny had us doing signal work most of the afternoon,” he said. “He’s putting the cart before the horse, Dick, for half of us can’t handle the ball yet without dropping it. When are we going to get someone to coach? Heard anything about it?”

“I heard to-day that Lanny was trying to get a man in Westport who has been coaching Torleston High School. That’s all I know, Tom.”

“I suppose it’ll be hard to find anyone as late in the season as this. Well, I guess it’s no affair of mine. Glad it isn’t. How’s Eli running?”

“Like a clock,” replied Dick warmly. “He’s a fine little car. I’d take you home, Tom, but I’ve got Gordon with me. He went in the post office.”

“Thanks, that’s all right. I’d like a ride sometime, though, Dick. I’ve never been in one of those things.”

“Well, I never had until a couple of weeks ago,” laughed Dick. “I’ll get you to-morrow and take you out to the field if you like, Tom.”

“Will you? You bet I’d like it! Much obliged. It’ll be out of your way, though. You know I live over by the railroad.”

“I know, but Eli doesn’t mind the cars!”

Tom smiled as he nodded and went on, and Gordon hurried out of the post office. “Sorry to keep you waiting,” he said as he jumped back into the car. “There was a mob at the stamp window, though.”

“What was it you wanted to see me about?” asked Dick as he turned the car cautiously about and narrowly escaped a corner of a coal-wagon.

“About Mr. Grayson,” replied Gordon, relaxing his clutch on the side of the car as the danger was averted.

“What has he been doing, Gordie?”

“It’s what he’s going to do. He’s going to have a birthday next month.”

“Think of that!” marveled Dick. “I didn’t suppose high school principals ever paid attention to anything so—so frivolous as birthdays!”

“I don’t know that he does,” laughed the other, “but some of the girls are. Hasn’t Louise Brent said anything to you about it?”

“No. I haven’t seen her for a couple of days.”

“You haven’t! What’s the matter? Haven’t quarreled, I hope.” Gordon’s tone was vastly concerned.

“No, but I’ve been busy. Stop your kidding and tell me what you are trying to get at.”

“Well, the girls—quite a lot of them, mostly seniors, I think—want to give Mr. Grayson a present of some sort on his birthday. You know he’s pretty popular with the ladies, Dick.”

“What’s it going to be? A sofa-pillow?”

“No, you idiot! What the girls want to do is get up a purse, collect a lot of money, you know, and refurnish his office for him.”

Dick whistled. “That would be a lot of money! He certainly needs new furniture, though. But the question is whether Mr. Grayson is popular enough with the fellows, Gordie.”

“Oh, he’s not a bad old scout, Dick. Of course, he’s always been rather down on athletics——”

“Hold on now! Let’s be fair. He hasn’t been down on athletics, Gordie. He merely thinks that we fellows pay too much attention to it. He’s not—not awfully sympathetic, but it isn’t fair to say that he’s against it. Now go on, and pardon the slight digression.”

“All right; he’s not what I said. Anyhow, I think most fellows like Grayson pretty well. They ought to. He’s awfully fair and—and decent, even when he gives you fits about something.”

“I trust he has never had occasion to give you fits,” said Dick gravely.

Gordon grinned. “Well, we’ve had one or two slight misunderstandings,” he replied cheerfully. “But I don’t hold it against him.”

“That’s sweet of you. I hope you’ve told him so.”

“Oh, dry up and listen. And don’t wobble the car about so! It gives me heart-failure. That’s what Morris did the day we went through the fence.”

“Your conversation is so absorbing that it quite takes my mind from the car,” replied Dick. “Perhaps you’d better wait until I get you home.”

“All right, seeing that I’m most there—if nothing happens. There’s Fudge on the porch.” Gordon waved and Fudge shouted something unintelligible and Eli chugged around the corner of Troutman Street and drew up at the Merricks’ gate. “Come on in a minute,” said Gordon.

“No, you sit right here and unfold your tale. I’ll put the brake on hard so Eli won’t run away. There! Now what’s the scheme and what must I do about it?”

“Well, they wanted me to talk to you about it first; the girls, I mean. They seemed to think you had a certain amount of sense. I don’t know why they thought so, but——”

“Never mind the compliments, Gordie. You tell them that I am with them heart and soul and think it’s a fine idea. Now, what is it?”

“Well, they want to do the thing quietly, you see; keep it a secret.”

“I don’t just see how they can,” Dick objected, “if they mean to raise money by subscription.”

“Keep it a secret from Mr. Grayson, I mean, you idiot! They want to get the things and then smuggle them into the office when he’s out.”

“They’ll have trouble keeping it dark, I’m afraid,” said Dick seriously. “Someone’s almost certain to let it out.”

Gordon nodded. “That’s what I said, but your sister——”

“Is she one of the conspirators?” asked Dick.

“Yes. She said she was certain none of the girls would tell and so it would be up to the fellows. And of course I had to stand up for my sex, Dick, and tell her that none of us would let it out.”

“I don’t see why I haven’t heard something about all this,” mused Dick.

“You have—now. The girls were keeping it quiet until this morning. Nell Sawin called me up on the telephone after breakfast and told me and said I was to speak to you about it and make you come to-night.”

“Come where to-night? Your talk is wonderfully lucid, Gordie.”

“To Louise’s house,” laughed Gordon. “There’s to be a sort of meeting of the—the——”

“Criminals,” prompted Dick.

“Ways and means committee, or something. Just a few of the girls and you and Morris, naturally, and Lanny and me. Will you come?”

“Yes, of course. Hold on, though! To-night? I don’t believe I can, to-night, Gordie. You see school opens to-morrow and I haven’t really done a thing yet.”

“That’s all right. No one has. Anyhow, it won’t take long and you can go home afterwards and study as much as you like. They especially want you there, Dick. In fact, I don’t dare to show up without you!”

“Well, if that’s so I’ll go,” laughed Dick. “Joking aside, though, I like the scheme. Mr. Grayson is a fine man, Gordie, even if he does happen to be a principal, and it will be a mighty nice thing to show him we think so. I don’t believe the school has ever done anything like this for him since he came here. If it has I’ve never heard of it.”

“Nor I. How long has he been here, I wonder?”

“Must be fourteen or fifteen years. He came as assistant to old Mr. Flagg, who’s superintendent of education now. I suppose Mr. Grayson can’t be much over fifty, Gordie, but I’m so used to thinking him an old man that it seems as if he was somewhere about seventy.”

“I suppose he really isn’t so dreadfully old,” said the other. “I dare say most of the fellows will be glad to chip in and get him a present.”

“How much money will it take?” asked Dick.

“I don’t know. I suppose the idea is to get as much as we can and buy accordingly. If every student gave a dollar——”

“Some of them won’t give a quarter,” replied Dick. “Lots of them can’t afford to.”

“Well, if only half of them gave a dollar apiece——”

“Don’t count your chickens before they’re hatched, Gordie. And pile out now; I’ve got to get home to supper. What time does this conference take place? Do I have to ‘doll up’ for it?”

“Of course not. They didn’t say what time. About half-past seven, I suppose. Ask Grace.”

“I might do that,” agreed Dick, as Gordon vacated his seat. “See you later then. Get up, Eli!”