The Crimson Sweater/Chapter 6

OOTBALL practice was hard and steady the next week, for Maitland had trounced Ferry Hill 17 to 0, and as Maitland was only a high school, albeit a rather large one, the disgrace rankled. Jack Rogers wasn't the sort of chap to wear his heart on his sleeve, and so far as his countenance went none would have guessed him to be badly discouraged. But he was, and Roy, for one, knew it. And I think Jack knew that he knew it, for once in a lull of the signal practice he looked up to find Roy's eyes on him sympathetically, and he smiled back with a dubious shake of his head that spoke volumes. Things weren't going very well, and that was a fact. The loss of Horace Burlen during that first month of practice meant a good deal, for Horace was a steady center and an experienced one. To a lesser extent the absence of Pryor and Warren, Horace's friends in exile, retarded the development of the team. By the end of the second week of practice a provisional eleven had been formed, for Mr. Cobb believed in getting the men together as soon as possible, having learned from experience that team work is not a thing that can be instilled in a mere week or two of practice. Whitcomb was playing center on the first squad in Horace's absence. Roy was at quarter on the second, with a slow-moving young giant named Forrest in front of him. But Forrest was good-natured as well as slow, and in consequence he and Roy got on very well, although they never exchanged unnecessary remarks. The back field had learned that Jack Rogers would not stand any nonsense, and if they had any desire to make things uncomfortable for the quarter-back they didn't indulge it on the football field. The second stood up very well in those days before the first, in spite of the fact that sometimes there weren't enough candidates to fill the places of injured players. With only forty-odd fellows to draw from it was remarkable that Ferry Hill turned out the teams that it did.

Meanwhile life was growing easier for Roy. Even the younger boys had begun to tire of showing their contempt, while the fact that Chub Eaton had "taken up" the new boy went a long way with the school in general. Chub was not popular in the closest sense of the word; he was far too indifferent for that; but every fellow who knew him at all liked him—with the possible exception of Horace—and his position of baseball captain made him a person of importance. Consequently, when the school observed that Chub had selected Roy for a friend it marvelled for a few days and then began to wonder whether there might not be, after all, extenuating circumstances in the new boy's favor. And besides this Roy's work on the gridiron had been from the first of the sort to command respect no matter how unwilling. And it was about this time that another friend was restored to him.

Roy had come across Harry but once or twice since she had passed him in the campus, and each time he had been very careful to avoid her. But one morning he ran plump into her in the corridor of School Hall, so plump, in fact, that he knocked the book she was carrying from her hand. Of course there was nothing to do but stoop and rescue it from the floor, and when that was done it was too late to escape. As he handed the book back to her he looked defiantly into the blue eyes and said, "Good morning, Miss Harriet." Strange to say, he was not immediately annihilated. Instead the blue eyes smiled at him with a most friendly gleam, and,

"Good morning," said Harry. Then, "Only I oughtn't to answer you for calling me 'Miss Harriet'; you know I hate Harriet."

"Excuse me, I meant Miss Harry," answered Roy a trifle stiffly. It was hard to forget that cut direct.

"That's better," she said. "You—you haven't been down to inquire after the health of the baby since you rescued him."

"No, but I hope he's all right?"

"Yes, but Methuselah is awfully sick."

"He's the parrot, isn't he?" asked Roy. "What's wrong with the old sinner?"

"He's got a dreadful sore throat," was the reply. "I've tied it up with a cloth soaked in turpentine half a dozen times, but he just won't let it be."

"Are you sure it's sore throat?" asked Roy gravely.

"Yes, his voice is almost gone. Why, he can scarcely talk above a whisper!"

Roy thought to himself that that wasn't such a catastrophe as Harry intimated, but he was careful not to suggest such a thing to her. Instead he looked properly regretful.

"Don't you want to see him?" asked Harry, in the manner of one conferring an unusual favor. Roy declared that he did and Harry led the way toward the barn, her red hair radiant in the morning sunlight. On the way they passed two of the boys, who observed them with open-eyed surprise. Harry's favor was not easy to win and, being won, something to prize, since she stood near the throne and was popularly believed to be able to command favors for her friends.

Methuselah certainly did look sick. He was perched on the edge of his soap box domicile, viewing the world with pessimistic eyes, when Harry conducted the visitor into the enclosure and sent the pigeons whirling into air. Harry went to him and stroked his head with her finger.

"Poor old 'Thuselah," she murmured. "Did he have a sore throat? Well, it was a nasty, mean shame. But he's a naughty boy for scratching off the bandage Harry put on. What have you done with it? You haven't—" she looked about the box and the ground and then viewed the bird sternly—"you haven't eaten it?"

Methuselah cocked his eyes at her in a world-wearied way that seemed to say, "Well, what if I have? I might as well die one way as another." But Roy discovered the bedraggled length of linen a little way off and restored it to Harry.

"I'm so glad!" said the girl with a sigh of relief. "I didn't know but he might have, you know. Why, once he actually ate a whole ounce of turnip seeds!"

"Hurt him?" asked Roy interestedly.

"N-no, I don't believe so, but I was awfully afraid it would. John, the gardener, said he'd have appendicitis. But then, John was mad because he needed the seeds."

Methuselah had closed his eyes and now looked as though resolved to die at once and get it over with. But at that moment Snip trotted out from the barn, where he had been hunting for rats, and hailed Roy as a long-lost friend. Perhaps the incident saved the bird's life. At least it caused him to alter his mind about dying at once, for he blinked his eyes open, watched the performance for a moment and then broke out in a hoarse croak with:

"Stop your swearing! Stop your swearing! Stop your swearing! Stop your swearing!"

It was such a pathetic apology for a voice that Roy had to laugh even at the risk of wounding Harry's feelings. But Harry, too, found it amusing and joined her laugh with his. Whereupon Methuselah mocked them sarcastically in tones that suggested the indelicacy of laughing at a dying friend.

"I think," said Harry, "he'd like you to scratch his head."

Roy looked doubtfully at the bird and the bird looked suspiciously at Roy, but when the latter had summoned up sufficient courage to allow of the experiment Methuselah closed his eyes and bent his head in evident appreciation and enjoyment.

"I don't believe you're nearly so sick as you're making out," said Roy. "I believe you're an old bluffer."

And the bird actually chuckled!

Harry doused the bandage with turpentine again and once more tied it around Methuselah's neck.

"Now don't you dare scratch it off again," she commanded severely, shaking her finger at him.

"Well, I never—" began the bird. But weariness overcame him in the middle of the sentence and he closed his beady eyes again and nodded sleepily.

"I don't believe he slept very well last night," confided Harry in a whisper.

"Maybe he was cold," Roy suggested.

"I've thought of that. I don't usually move them indoors until much later," said Harry thoughtfully, "but the weather is so cold this Fall that I think I'll put them in to-day. Maybe he's been sleeping in a draft. Mamma says that will almost always give you a sore throat."

They walked back to the cottage together and on the way Harry was unusually quiet. Finally, when Roy had pleaded a recitation, she unburdened her mind and conscience.

"I—I'm sorry about the other day," she said suddenly.

Roy, who had turned away, looked around in surprise.

"I mean when I didn't speak to you one morning," explained Harry bravely. Her cheeks were furiously red and Roy found himself sharing her embarrassment.

"Oh, that's all right," he muttered.

"No, it isn't all right," contradicted Harry. "It was a low-down thing to do and I was sorry right away. Only you didn't look and so—so I—I didn't call you. I—I wish you had looked. It was all Horace's fault. He said—said—"

"Yes, I guess I know what he said," interrupted Roy. "But supposing what he said is so?"

"I wouldn't care—much," was the answer. "But I know it isn't so! Is it?"

Roy dropped his eyes and hesitated. Then,

"No," he muttered. "It isn't so, Harry."

"I knew it!" she cried triumphantly. "I told him I knew it afterwards! And he said girls weren't proper persons to judge of such things, and I don't see what that's got to do with my knowing—what I know, do you?"

Roy had to acknowledge that he didn't.

"And you're not cross with me, are you?" she demanded anxiously.

"Not a bit," he said.

"That's nice. I don't like folks I like to not like—Oh, dear me! I'm all balled up! Only I mustn't say 'balled up.' I meant that I was—confused. Anyway, I'm going to tell all the boys that it isn't so, that you didn't squeal—I mean tell—on Horace and the others! And I think it was a nasty trick to play on you! Why, you might have caught your death of cold!"

"Or a sore throat, like Methuselah," said Roy, smiling.

"Or you might have been drowned. Once there was a boy drowned here, a long, long time ago, when I was just a kid. It was very sad. But you weren't drowned, were you? And so there's no use in supposing, is there? But I'm going to tell the boys that—"

"I'd rather you didn't, please, Harry," broke in Roy.

Harry, who was becoming quite enthusiastic and excited, opened her eyes very wide.

"Not tell?" she cried. "Why not?"

"Well," answered Roy hesitatingly, "I—I'd rather you didn't."

"No reason!" said Harry scornfully.

"If they think I'd do such a thing," muttered Roy, "they can just keep on thinking so. I guess I can stand it."

Harry looked puzzled for a moment; she was trying to get at his point of view; then her face lighted.

"Splendid!" she cried. "You're going to be a martyr and be misunderstood like—like somebody in a book I was reading! And some day, long after you're gone—" Harry looked vaguely about as though searching for the place Roy was to go to—"folks will discover that you're innocent and they'll be very, very sorry and erect a white marble shaft to your cherished memory!" She ended much out of breath, but still enthusiastic, to find Roy laughing at her.

"I guess I'm not hankering for any martyr business, Harry. It isn't that exactly; I don't know just what it is. But if you won't say anything about it I'll be awfully much obliged."

"Well, then, I won't," promised Harry regretfully. "Only I do wish you were going to be a martyr!"

"I shall be if I don't hurry," answered Roy. "I have math with Mr. Buckman in about half a minute."

"Pooh! No one's afraid of Buck!" said Harry scornfully. "Cobby's the one to look out for; he's awfully strict." Roy was already making for School Hall. "You'll come and see Methuselah again soon, won't you?"

"Yes," called Roy.

"And you'll play tennis with me some day, too?"

"I don't play very well."

"Never mind," answered Harry, "I'll teach you. Good bye!"