Sentiment and the Senior

HUGH PENDEXTER

E had traversed the fields and pastures instead of the honest highway that he might gain the farmhouse unobserved. His motive was a sense of shame, as evidenced by his lagging steps and uneasy face. He had hoped to assemble his miserable thoughts on some definite line of action before being discovered. But even as he reached the lane bars and rested his arms on the top rail his first, desperate survey of the quiet, homely premises included the bent figure of his father, working about the barn. Involuntarily and in self-derision he contrasted the old man's shabby presentment with his own spruce attire. He had crawled home by unfrequented ways to confess his moral insolvency; he had nothing with which to offset the many sacrifices so cheerfully made in his behalf. And as if his mental ken had not sufficiently exhausted the perfective, this visual reminder was now added to intensify his tardy repentance.

Unable to longer endure anticipation he picked up his bag and vaulted the bars, just as his father straightened in joyous surprise. All that life had to offer would be a cheap price now, if it could but buy back the old order of content.

"Jameson!" cried the old man, advancing stiffly, with both gnarled hands outstretched. "Ye've come home to see us."

The son could only seize the hands, clutching so eagerly at his, and wring them in silence.

"Mother!" bellowed the father, snatching up the bag and eying it in genial amazement. "The boy's here. Left all his highfaulting doings and larning to run down and see us."

Almost at the first words the porch door slammed and a white-haired woman hurried to meet them. "The dear boy," she cooed, appropriating him entirely.

His unworthiness caused him to groan inwardly as he realized how he had been the focal point of their very existence.

"Come in! come in!" she cried softly. "To think you should come at the busiest time of your last year."

"We kinder looked for ye in the Easter vacation," said the old man apologetically; "yet we weren't so unreasonable as to expect ye to let a little thing interfere with yer books. Lawd! but it's good to see ye."

"I had to come," cried the boy, as they entered the old-fashioned sitting room.

"It does me a world of good to hear you say so," murmured the mother. "We ain't seen you since Christmas."

It was impossible to tell them just now. He must wait at least until the first fervor of their joy had quieted; then, perhaps, he could distort, belittle, or prevaricate—or do something to soften the blow.

"There! set down under that class flag yer mother pinned up last fall," his father was saying. "Now let's have a good squint at ye. I snum, Jameson! but ye do look peaked. Why, mother, he looks all tuckered out. Why in sin didn't ye write me to meet ye instead of toting that derned handsome carpet-bag three miles?"

"I didn't know I could come till the last minute," was the weary explanation,

"Be you ill, Jameson?" anxiously queried his mother.

"Yes, yes," he mumbled brokenly. "That is, I'm tired. No; really, nothing ails me beyond that."

"Dang it! What d'ye want to kill yerself for over yer books?" remonstrated the old man, pushing back his spectacles and gazing at the youth in mild disapproval. "Why didn't ye steal out and play a few of them golf games and git perked up a bit? I was looking over about a ton of yer truck this morning and stole one of yer clubs to drive nails with. The game must be quite broadening to the mind. See what I did to my finger." And he chuckled as he exhibited a swollen digit. "And I didn't say a single cuss word, neither."

"And to think of the money I've spent in buying that stuff," muttered the son.

"No such a thing," defended his mother. "In climbing up a ladder that reaches to a diploma you must have some easy rungs. It's all a part of your education and we've gloried in it. Whenever you've fetched home a new music instrument, or any other fixing, your father has always been pleased and vowed you should go through college in a pleasant way."

"That's the idea," affirmed the father. "The farm can send you through flying—and has. From the very start we planned ye should have all yer mind for yer books and a decent amount of play. No slave-driving game for Jameson, says I; and we're satisfied with the way it's worked out. All we asked was that ye bring us a rip-bang diploma at the end."

"You've done too much for me."

"No, siree!" denied the father brusquely. "We jest suited ourselves. To be honest, we was selfish through it all. We wanted a scholar in the family, and by the Old Harry we've got him!" And he smote his palm exultingly.

"And your father didn't use any disagreeable language when he pounded his finger, dear, because it was your club," smiled the mother, brushing back his hair in the old, fond way.

"I cussed like a trooper when I got out to the barn," growled the father.

"And you've been so anxious to do well at graduation that you've hurt your health," continued the mother, oblivious of her husband's defiant gaze. "Why, you don't even talk."

"I shall be all right soon," he muttered, almost desperate enough to take advantage of their fears and give way to the physical strain. "To see you two has done me good already," he added.

"Bless his heart," whimpered the mother, not attempting to conceal her tears.

The father, made of sterner stuff, yet envying her in all her little affectionate prerogatives, winked owlishly and rose and drank deeply from the long-handled dipper. Then he declared: "Wal, young man; seeing as how ye've almost ruined yer health by too much study we shall expect something pretty pert from ye at commencement."

"You know, dear, we're going to be there to hear you," confided his mother. "We'd planned it as a surprise; but as you've been so good and thoughtful to come to us when commencement is only a few days off, I guess I'll let the cat out of the bag." And she smiled in happy expectancy of his delectation.

"It's—it's too good of you!" he cried passionately. Then he closed his eyes to conceal their misery. He had not counted on this exigency. They must be spared for the moment at any cost. He should have remained in town and by written communications broken the blow by degrees. Now that course was too late.

"Ye'll be going back on the night train, I s'pose," the old man regretted.

This gave him a hint of one last thin possibility, and he hastened to return: "Yes; I could steal away for only a few hours. I must go back this afternoon."

"But the baggage ye fetched?" mildly reminded his father, scrutinizing the bag.

"Only some odds and ends I wanted to leave," he explained, heartsick at falsehood. "And don't, please don't," he begged, "expect me to do anything at graduation. There's lots of chaps brighter and better than I in the class."

"Why, Jameson Ridly!" gasped his mother, highly indignant at such heresy.

"Tut! tut!" scoffed his father. "Modesty is a good thing; but, dod rot it, boy! what have yer mother and me been waiting for, and scrimping and saving for, all these years? Neither of us are fools, and we pride ourselves on having started our only son square. I swan! ye've simply got to beat 'em all, or ye'll be playing ag'in us. Why, ye can't help beating 'em. Look at yer mother! Wa'n't she the brightest gal in the whole neighborhood? Wa'n't she run after by every younker? Huh! talk to me about yer being several rods behind in the homestretch and I'll larrup ye." And he chuckled in much good humor. Then with a mischievous twinkle: "Jest because of yer mother alone ye must come out ahead. D'ye know why she was so sot on ye going to collige?"

"Henry Ridly, stop!" she commanded.

"Because," persisted the old man in high glee, "once a young school teacher in this neighborhood, who is now a college professor somewhere, got sweet on her." Her smiling confusion, spiced with a touch of indignation, added zest to his enjoyment.

"Henry, I'm ashamed of you talking such nonsense," she protested, yet not successful in attempting to smother the inception of a complacent smile. "The idea! I'll never tell you anything again as long as I live. A young man may be foolish without being told on. You was foolisher." But with a toss of her head she confessed: "Not that I didn't have my share of good looks in my younger days."

"God help a poor, weak fool," groaned the youth, as he stumbled up the narrow stairs leading to his low-roofed room.

"Well, Ridly, what is it?"

The youth turned eagerly from the window where he had been dully waiting, but his heart sank as he noted the stern jaw and strong face of the tall, thin, white-haired president. Instinctively he knew all was won or lost in the first few words, but he could only blurt out: "Have mercy on a fool."

"Now, now, Ridly," protested the president in icy disapproval. "How many times have you young gentlemen been told that the way of the transgressor is hard? How many times have you been informed it is useless to appeal to me and seek to take advantage of my sympathies once the faculty has joined with me in taking a certain course of action? What I may personally feel toward any misguided student must not deter me from being just. And certainly do I owe it to those young gentlemen who have always conducted themselves uprightly, to carry out my decision in your case—or in any case where repeated infraction of our rules is the offense. I am very sorry, very sorry indeed, Ridly, that you should embarrass me by calling here to-night. It's—ah—it's almost unjust of you, inconsiderate, to say the least. Go home and strive to start anew. With new and purer purposes seek"

"I'm not pleading for myself," broke in Ridly despairingly, his mouth filling with passionate, unfaltering speech. "I'm pleading for an old man and woman, my parents—the best in the world—who have centered every attention and loving thought on giving me a chance. It will ruin the last years of their simple, honest lives if they learn my disgrace. I went home yesterday to tell them all. To have told them anything would have broken their hearts. My God! isn't there such a thing as a reprieve? Even a felon sometimes enjoys a commutation of sentence. Must their souls' peace be damned because of my folly? Have I committed so unpardonable an offense that lasting sorrow must come to them? Grant me one more boon."

"Now, now, Ridly," deplored the president wearily, "I have heard all this before—many times. The evil we do always rests the most severe on the innocent."

"But the price is too great in this instance," pleaded the youth. "See! I have been a woeful fool—admitted. I have wasted my father's hard-earned money. I have lived uselessly—and yet, if your object is to punish me, to correct me, I've learned my lesson thoroughly. There is nothing you can say in censure, there is no moral you can point, there is no phase of mental suffering you may wish to inflict, beyond what I have said to myself and taken home to myself and writhed beneath. Yesterday, when I looked into their honest old faces and shivered under the gaze of their blindly proud eyes, I ran the whole gamut of abasement. I am pleading, I tell you, for the peace of two pure lives—I plead for the aged, the self-sacrificing"—and his hands were thrown wide in boyish eloquence—"I plead for a good man and a noble woman. Grant me one slim bit of leniency and I'll pay any price. Let me but remove this from them and I'll submit to anything. But God help them both if you will not!"

The president's face lost something of its ennui as he followed the youth's vehemence and unconsciously approved of his fiery technic. It was sophomoric, of course, and yet interesting from its sincerity. Finally he inquired: "And your request is?"

"That I be permitted to stand on the stage with the other chaps. That I be allowed to deliver my class part. That I be allowed to receive—a blank diploma."

"You ask too much, even on the plea of mercy," said the president coldly.

"They are coming here. They will sit well front. They will proudly wait for their poor devil of a son to deliver the address they know he has prepared. And I regret to say, they will expect much of him," continued the youth wildly. "What difference does it make to you and your sentence if I am allowed to take a mummer's place and file on and receive a worthless roll of paper? What odds if I give my part? If I do not do the last their hearts are broken. If I am indulged in all I ask my punishment is none the less severe—nay, it is increased. The iron has grilled me through and through. And after all, your sentence will have been carried out; for I shall not have graduated."

"Impossible!" muttered the president, frowning.

"Don't say that," groaned the other. "Remember, I came here a raw country boy. I was ignorant of consequences. I have ended as I began—a fool. But by the memory of some overpowering, all soul-filling want of your own at some time—grant me this."

The appeal did not impress the president as being magniloquent. Instead, he sank his chin into his neck and stared at the petitioner dreamily for a few seconds, and then said gravely: "My great desire, when I was a youth, was denied me. But there! God forbid I should not temper justice with mercy to the innocent—your parents. Go to your room, Ridly. Appear with the others, deliver your part—and receive an unsigned diploma. But remember, I am permitting this deceit for the sake of an old father and mother, who in the fondness of their love cannot imagine you guilty of any undesirable thing, and whose great love has not deserved the pitiable return you have made it." Then more sternly: "Go to your room, sir, and remember that where you have received a reprieve—after doing evil—there are men who have been denied the heart's dearest wish, although they were actuated only by purity. Good night. No; don't thank me. Thank your God for such a father and mother."

Of all the fond parents who gathered in the small college town to witness the final achievements of their sons perhaps young Ridly's father and mother evidenced as much complacent joy as any. To this old couple the occasion was purely a personal one. The college buildings were erected expressly for their boy; the campus life breathed but for him. In fact, they did not suspicion that any interest could attach to the spot except because of his four years of activity there.

From his early childhood they had worked and prayed for this day, had sacrificed for it—and, behold! it was now upon them. Other triumphs would be his as a matter of course; but the present, near to overwhelming in completeness, belonged in part to them and resulted in part from their endeavors. And thus the great joy radiating from their faces was not that of onlookers, but of participants.

In his turn he lavished every attention upon them, feeling the fervor of one reprieved. He took them to his rooms—most students enjoyed but one—and waited humbly while they idolized them. He took them to dinners, and, to top all extravagances, insisted they revel in the dissipation of the town's one theater. In this round of undreamed-of delectations they could see only the loving handiwork of their boy. The theater had been created solely for them, because of his forethought; for them was had the nerve-tingling "rush"; for them and them alone was the medley of three days' doings celebrated. As the ultimate pleasure of all the artful preliminary festivities came his graduation.

When he mounted the platform and encountered their confident, complacent gaze, all timidity left him; and whereas he had neglected them for four years he now poured out his whole soul to them alone. Uplifted by the awakening of his better nature and inspired by a mighty realization of all their goodness he leaped clear of the cut-and-dried mannerisms of the average declamatory effort, and in delivery his entire address was but an embroidered replica of his passionate appeal to the president.

The people said young Ridly was an orator; the faculty sighed and whispered he might have made a gallant figure in the law; the president pursed his lips and sought to crystallize into definiteness the film of a day dream, the substance of which was ever hinted at by the boy's impassioned demeanor! But the old father and mother, unashamed of streaming tears, murmured to each other in an ecstasy of pride. And the climax was capped when he received his valueless diploma.

As their satisfaction reached its zenith, so, inversely, did the fear of an awakening sink into his soul; and he groaned inwardly in lamenting he should so tardily impersonate his better self.

"We must see yer president and shake him by the hand," whispered the old man, as the aisles filled with rustling silks. "We must see him and thank him for you—as ye now be," he continued, as they reached the open air. "Lawd! but I bet he hates to lose ye. Gee whittaker! but I wish Tibbetts' store could have heard ye. Ye did it grand. But let's find the president."

"Henry," reminded his wife timidly, yet giving a satisfied switch to her skirts, "mebbe the president is too busy. I'm—I'm almost too happy to see anyone."

"Better go to my rooms," urged the youth. "Maybe—later. Plenty of time."

"No; I'll be danged!" cried the old man stubbornly. "I'm going to see him while I'm in fettle to thank him as I should. I'm going alone if ye two pull back."

The son, praying the president would be engaged, led the way in stupid silence across the campus. Contrary to his hopes they were admitted; and once they entered the dreaded chambers he begged with his eyes that he might not be exposed.

"My father and mother," he mumbled, and then fled in soul-sick apprehension to an anteroom.

To his surprise the interview was protracted much beyond the time allowed casual callers, and when he was summoned he was glad, for the sake of his telltale cheeks, that it was dusk.

"The president remembers us," murmured his mother, while his father stood very straight in pride.

"Remember you," laughed the president softly, as they moved to the door. "As if any of us youngsters could forget Patty Manlin! Yes, I have remembered it all. And to think our young Ridly is the son of the happy man!"

"And to think you should remember so far back," wondered the old lady, smoothing her skirts carefully. "To think, after being a college president, you should remember when you taught a country school in our district."

"I am still a bachelor," reminded the president gallantly, and bowing low as they crossed the threshold. Then, as if in an afterthought, he called after them: "But, Ridly—I now mean the young Ridly—will you stop a bit for a private word?"

The youth returned, with all the old dread alive. "Don't spoil it," he beseeched. "Don't spoil"

"It was all spoiled a long time ago," murmured the president, only half aloud. "A long time ago. Hark! What are the boys singing?"

Ridly cocked his ear to catch the farewell song of the old glee club, and half apologetically informed: "Only a bit of foolish sentiment, sir. Something about 'an old sweetheart of mine.'"

"Yes?" said the president, softly opening the window and bowing his white head to listen. Then he cried tenderly: "God bless the boys and all their foolish sentiment."

But as he stood erect he was his old grave, stern self, and, facing the boy, he demanded: "Your diploma, Ridly."

"Here, sir," sighed the youth, slowly producing the roll from beneath his arm. "I knew it must come to this—but it's hard—hard."

The president took the roll almost roughly and tossed it on his desk and studied the abject figure before him with the old scrutiny for a few seconds. Then bending quickly he seized a pen and scratched sharply. As he straightened he returned the paper and informed coldly: "You are now duly graduated from this college. I have signed your diploma, Ridly."