Tom, Dick and Harriet/Chapter 6

HEN the thermometer on the north side of School Hall registers four degrees below zero at noon it means cold weather; and that is just what the thermometer did on Saturday. In sheltered angles where the sun shone it was not so bad, but on the way across the campus, where the wind blew unobstructed, fellows in knickerbockers moved rapidly, Jack Frost in pursuit and pinching their calves sharply. By half past three, what time the hockey game with Cedar Grove School was scheduled to commence, the mercury had dropped another point and the audience about the rink consisted of exactly six boys, among them Dick and Sid Welch, and one girl. Of course the girl was Harry. I doubt if there was another girl for miles up or down the river who would have braved the cold that afternoon for the sake of sport and patriotism.

The rink is some three hundred yards down the shore from the boat-house. Years before a ferry plied between this point and the opposite town of Coleville, but with the completion of the new bridge below Silver Cove the enterprise, like many similar ones in the vicinity, had ceased to be profitable. Ultimately the boat had disappeared and only the ferry house and landing remained. But that was last year; now even those were gone, the lumber—such of it as was fit for the purpose—having been used in the construction of the barrier around the rink. Many of the old joists and planks, however, were too rotten to hold nails and these had been left piled up on the beach. Sid, struck by a brilliant idea, had looted the pile, and by the time the game had begun a big bonfire was blazing merrily. The handful of spectators divided their attention between the fire and the contest until the first half was over, with the score three goals for Ferry Hill and one for Cedar Grove. Then every one, players, spectators, substitutes, and referee—who was Chub—gathered as near the flames as safety permitted and alternately turned faces and backs to the warmth.

“You’re a wonder, Sid,” declared Roy. “If I had half your brain—!” He shook his head eloquently, at a loss for words.

“Oh, Sid’s a great fellow for scheming how to be comfortable,” said Billy Warren, who played right center for Ferry Hill. “Did you ever hear about the contrivance he rigged up on his bed the first year he was here?”

Every one replied that he had, except Harry; and Harry demanded to be told.

“Well,” said Warren, “Sid used to go to sleep with two blankets over him and the comforter over the foot of the bed, you know. Then along toward morning it would get cold and Sid would want the comforter, but he was too sleepy to reach down and get it.”

“That’s right,” interrupted Chub, whose bed was next to Sid’s in the Junior Dormitory. “I used to find him all curled up in a ball in the morning with his teeth chattering like—like—”

“I didn’t!” declared Sid.

“Shut up, Sid, you know you did,” said Warren. “Well, so what does Sid do but get a piece of clothes-line and tie an end to each corner of the comforter. Then when he woke up and found he was freezing to death all he had to do was to take hold of the rope and pull the comforter up. Oh, he’s a wonder, Sid is!”

“Just the same, it worked all right,” said Sid with a grin, as the laugh went around. “And I wish I had that comforter now.”

“I don’t see how you could get much more on,” said Dick, as he viewed Sid’s rotund appearance. “You look like a bale of sweaters now.”

“I’ve only got two on,” was the reply. “I was going to borrow Chub’s, but he went and wore it himself.”

“How dare you, Chub?” laughed Roy. “You ought to have more consideration for others.”

“Thunder!” replied Chub good-naturedly, “Sid would borrow everything I have if I’d let him. As it is he wears more of my things than his own. Last week I tried to find a pair of stockings and couldn’t; Sid had the whole lot in his locker.”

“They had holes in them,” answered Sid gravely.

“They certainly had when you got through with them,” laughed Chub. “Come on, fellows; time’s up.”

The two teams went back to the ice, peeling off sweaters and gloves, and presently the game was on again. It was the first contest of the year and the play was pretty ragged. But there were exciting moments, as when Harris, who played point on the home team, got away with the puck for a long race down the rink, passed to Fernald in front of the Cedar Grove goal, captured the disk again on the quick return and smashed it past goal-tender’s knees for a score. Toward the latter part of the period the visitors weakened and Ferry Hill’s tally grew rapidly, until at the final call of time the score stood 12-4 in favor of the home players. Cheers were exchanged and the Cedar Grove fellows hurried away toward the station. The others went back to the replenished fire and leisurely donned their sweaters. Dick, who had a moment before wandered away toward the edge of the river, called to Roy.

“What’s that thing over there?” he asked.

“What thing? Where?”

“Across the river. It looks like a boat, but I don’t see how any one can sail a boat when there isn’t any water.”

“Oh,” answered Roy, joining him, “that’s an ice-boat, you silly galoot. Haven’t you ever seen one before?”

“No, but I’ve seen pictures of them. I didn’t recognize it, though. Say, that’s pretty slick, isn’t it? Look at the way it scoots around over there! How the dickens is it made?”

“Oh, you make a frame-work of timbers kind of three-cornered like and stick a skate or a runner at each corner, and put a mast in with a sail or two, and have another runner at the back with a tiller for steering, and there you are.”

“You don’t say? Well, that’s the most—er—enlightening explanation I ever heard, Roy; lucid’s no name for it!”

“Well, it’s the best I can do,” Roy laughed. “If you want further particulars I advise you to run over and take a look. I’m no boat-builder.”

“That’s what I’ll do,” answered Dick, tightening the straps of his skates. “Come along!”

“Are you crazy? Want me to freeze myself?”

“Freeze nothing! It’ll warm you up. Come on; it won’t take but a minute or two.” Roy hesitated. Then:

“All right,” he consented, “I’ll go you. Only it isn’t likely that the boat’s going to stay there and wait for us.”

“Bet you I can catch her if she doesn’t have too big a start,” said Dick.

“Oh, sure!” scoffed Roy. “She only makes about thirty miles an hour!”

“Get out!”

“That’s right, though,” answered Roy. “They say some of them can do pretty near a mile a minute in a good wind. I don’t know about that one there, though; don’t think I ever saw her before; she’s got a red hull, hasn’t she?”

“Yes, if you call that thing a hull,” replied Dick. “Are there any more around here?”

“Two or three, I think.”

“Well, then, maybe I’ll let this one go if it tries to get away,” Dick said. “Are you ready?”

Roy said that he was, but at that moment Chub hailed them.

“Where you fellows going?” he shouted.

“Across the river,” answered Roy. “Dick wants to study ice-boats. Want to come?”

Chub and Harry and Sid joined them, the latter begging them to wait until he could get his skates on.

“All right, slow poke,” answered Roy. “How about you, Harry? It’ll be beastly cold out in the middle there.”

“Oh, I’m nice and warm,” answered Harry. “What did you say about an ice-boat?”

“Dick never saw one before and he wants to go over and make the acquaintance of that one over there. Whose is it, Harry? Do you know?”

“Yes, it belongs to Joe Thurston, Grace Thurston’s brother. He goes to Hammond. She’s in my class at Madame Lambert’s.”

“Who, the ice-boat?” asked Chub.

“No, Mister Smarty, Grace Thurston. Anyhow, I said ‘it.’”

“You said ‘she!’”

“I said ‘it!’”

“Ladies! Ladies!” remonstrated Roy. “No disturbance, I beg of you! Remember there’s a gentleman present.”

“Where?” asked Chub, looking carefully around.

“Here,” grunted Sid, tugging at a strap.

“For that lie, Sid,” answered Chub severely, “we will go and leave you. Come on, fellows.”

“Wait, wait please!” begged Sid. “I can’t get the buckle in the right hole. My fingers are frozen stiff. You might help a chap, Chub.”

“All right, I will if you’ll tell the truth. Are you a gentleman, Sid?”

“No,” answered Sid diplomatically. “It’s that fourth hole, Chub. That’s it. Thanks.” He got up, hobbled to the edge of the ice and skated away. “Neither are you, Chub!” he shouted tauntingly. Chub instantly gave chase, leaving the other three to follow more leisurely. Across the frozen river and a little further down-stream the ice-boat was skimming up and down near shore, luffing, filling and turning in the brisk wind as though trying her sails.

“That’s just about what she’s doing, I guess,” said Roy as they skated, three abreast, a hundred yards or so behind the flying forms of Sid and Chub. “Those sails are brand-new, I think. She’s coming around again. If we were nearer now you could get a good view of her, Dick.”

“I’m going to try, anyhow,” answered Dick, as he dug his blades in the black ice and sped away from them.

“Shall we try it, too?” asked Roy. Harry nodded her head.

“I’ll race you,” she cried, and, suiting action to word, darted off after Dick. She had obtained a good lead before Roy had gathered his wits together, and he realized that to attempt to overtake that flying form was quite useless for him. He was a good skater, but Harry had held the school supremacy for several years and had, as she had stated to Dick, even beaten Hammond’s best talent the winter before. But Harry had found more than her match at last, for, try as she could and did, she could not gain an inch on Dick, who was putting in his best licks in an endeavor to head off the ice-boat as it passed up-stream close to the farther shore. In a trice Roy was left to himself. He saw that he could not hope to intercept the boat even if the others did, and so kept on diagonally across the river toward the ice-houses below Coleville. Sid and Chub were still busy with their own affairs, the former leading the latter a difficult chase, turning and doubling and thus far avoiding capture. The wind swept across the ice with stinging buffets against legs and face, and Roy rubbed his ears vigorously to keep them from freezing. Presently he drew near where they had been cutting ice and found that to continue on toward the shore and the path of the returning boat he would either have to cross the cuttings or skate for some distance up or down the river to get around them. New ice had formed in the lanes and it looked fairly thick. Roy slowed down and examined it. Then he struck at it with the heel of one skate, found that it didn’t break, and skated quickly across. It was a narrow lane down which the cakes of ice had been floated to the house and he was soon over it. Then came thick ice again. He looked up the river. The boat was still before the wind and had passed Dick while that youth was some distance away. Now he had paused, apparently undecided whether to remain there or to join the others down-stream. Harry had already given up the chase and headed toward the ice-houses. Sid and Chub were still chasing madly about in mid-stream. Roy shouted and the wind carried his voice so well that both Harry and Dick heard and waved to him. Then a wide expanse of new ice confronted him and as he skated unhesitatingly on to it he noted the different sound which it gave forth under his blades. And then, without the least warning, the surface gave beneath him like paper and he was fighting for breath with the green water ringing in his ears and clutching at his heart with icy fingers.