ON THE EVE OF THE STRUGGLE
On the morning after the discovery of the loot hidden under the floor of the closet at 34 Gannett Hall Teeny-bits awoke with the feeling that he had been experiencing a nightmare in which disaster and unhappiness had fastened a death-like clutch upon him. It scarcely seemed possible that those events with which the evening had been crowded were real.
The speech at the mass meeting, the discovery of Snubby Turner sliding down the side of the fire rope and breaking into Campbell's room, the incident with Mr. Stevens, the summons to Doctor Wells' office, the visit to Gannett Hall and the astounding secret that revealed itself when the boards of the closet were lifted,—all those events seemed like strange imaginings. Teeny-bits jumped from bed and opened the door of the closet. The little marks that he and Doctor Wells had made with the paper-knife were sufficient evidence to bring back the reality of each incident and to plunge Teeny-bits into a gloomy perplexity from which not even the crisp brightness of the November day or the prospect of the Jefferson game could divert his mind.
The worst of it was that there seemed to be nothing that he could do except await developments; he thought of going to Snubby Turner and demanding an explanation of the part that Snubby had played in breaking into Tracey Campbell's room, but he could not bring himself to make what would be nothing less than a serious accusation of his friend. He determined to wait.
Throughout the day it seemed to Teeny-bits that he was leading two lives,—the one absorbed in the personal problem that had been thrust upon him, the other concerned with the mechanical performance of the various duties that came his way. He attended classes, ate his meals and took part in the regular football practice, but his mind was elsewhere.
Coach Murray was the first to notice that everything was not quite right. When the practice was two thirds over he spoke to Teeny-bits.
"Aren't you feeling fit?" he asked.
"I'm all right," replied the half-back.
"I'm afraid you've been working a little too hard," said the coach. "We'll call that enough for you to-day."
Doctor Wells had a habit of conferring with Mr. Stevens in matters that concerned his personal relationship with the members of the school. He had a great respect for the English master's understanding of character. On Tuesday morning he summoned Mr. Stevens to his office and put a blunt question.
"What do you think of Holbrook—Teeny-bits, as they call him?"
"Why, I've always liked him," said Mr. Stevens.
"Are you quite sure of him?"
For an instant Mr. Stevens did not answer, and then he said quickly: "Yes, I——, oh, I'm sure he's all right. In fact, I've considered him as the same type—though, of course, with a different background—as Neil Durant; and you know what I think of Neil."
If Doctor Wells had noticed the slight pause which preceded the English master's reply, he gave no sign. "I agree with you," he declared. "But I want to tell you about a puzzling incident that happened last night."
Briefly, but omitting no important detail, Doctor Wells told Mr. Stevens of the unsigned letter that accused Teeny-bits, of his conference with the newcomer and of the visit to Gannett Hall. When the Head described the discovery of the stolen property beneath the floor of Teeny-bits' closet, the expression on Mr. Stevens' face changed.
"You actually found those things in his room!" exclaimed the English master. He was sitting in the same chair in which Teeny-bits had sat just twelve hours before.
Doctor Wells, sitting opposite, smiled slightly at the surprise in Mr. Stevens' voice; he had heard just such a quality of surprise mingled with indignation in the voice of Teeny-bits.
"It astonishes you as much as it did me," said the Head. "What do you think of it?"
Mr. Stevens sat and looked into the fire and did not answer the question. The room became so quiet that the clock on the mantel seemed to raise its voice,—as if suddenly it had become animate and wished to make itself heard. It ticked out a full minute and sixty seconds more and then—as it were—became silent, for the voice of the English master drowned it out.
"That put a real problem up to me," he said. "I didn't know at first what to do, but I think I see clearly now. Something happened last night—something I couldn't quite explain; I've been puzzling over it. Unless I were sure—well sure that you know just what weight to give to outward appearances, I shouldn't tell you this; everything considered, however, I think you ought to know it. The incident happened last night only a few minutes before you asked me to send Holbrook over to you."
While Doctor Wells listened with an intentness that was revealed by the lines of his contracted brows, Mr. Stevens described how he had found Teeny-bits crouching in the shrubbery behind Gannett Hall and mentioned the newcomer's confusion at being discovered.
"I've always believed that character inevitably expresses itself in a person's face," said Doctor Wells, "and I have come gradually into the conviction that I can read faces. I thought I had made no mistake in this case—and I think so still. But they say there are exceptions to the general rule. I don't know—well, for the present, the only thing to do is to wait. Time is a great revealer of secrets."
On Wednesday and Thursday the Ridgley football team went through light signal practice which was intended, as Coach Murray said, to "oil the machinery" and "polish off the rough spots." Thursday afternoon the whole school marched down to the field to watch the practice and to test their cheering and their songs.
At dark when the team was in the locker building Coach Murray announced that there would be no practice on Friday. "I want you to forget football from now until Saturday," he said. "Imagine that no such game ever existed. To-morrow, go on a little walk somewhere or take it easy in any way you like, but don't bother your brains with any football thinking."
On Friday afternoon Tracey Campbell, at the suggestion of Bassett, decided to "forget football" by taking a little tour in his father's automobile. Tracey telephoned home, discovered that the elder Campbell was out of town, and had little difficulty in persuading his mother to send the chauffeur over to Ridgley with the car. Tracey suggested that he might take along one or two members of the football team, but Bassett made a remark or two that caused the substitute back to change his mind. After driving to the "mansion" and leaving the chauffeur, Tracey and Bassett rode out into the country and came back by the way of Greensboro. Their conversation had been none too pleasant, for there were certain things between them that furnished grounds for differences of opinion. But Bassett was clever—more clever than most of the members of Ridgley School believed him to be—and he had a way of putting his finger on weak spots and causing irritation that resulted in action. As on two previous occasions, the pair stopped at Chuan Kai's Oriental Eating Palace, and there Bassett gave voice to what he considered as a finality.
"Well," he said, "if Teeny-bits weren't on hand for the game, of course you'd play in his place, as you deserve to, and then you'd get your letter and the runabout."
"Well, he'll be there, so don't worry yourself about that," said Campbell. "He's on the inside and nothing you can do—got a match? I'm going to smoke."
"Didn't you tell me one time that Chuan Kai had a regular den upstairs where no one ever went—except the Chinks?"
"I guess so," said Tracey.
"The trouble with you," was Bassett's next remark, "is that you can't see a real chance when it's right in front of your nose. Now listen, and I'll tell you something."
The result of the conversation that went on between Bassett and Campbell during the next quarter of an hour was that Campbell finally got up from the table and said:
"We'll talk to Chuan Kai."
As an outcome of what passed between the two members of Ridgley School and Chuan Kai, an agreement was made which involved the payment of a certain amount of money. Chuan Kai counted the bills and slipped them out of sight within the folds of his loose-fitting coat. He had more than one reason for undertaking to help these two young members of the white race; they had money which moved from their pockets to his pockets and they had promised him more; the owner of the building in which Chuan Kai had established the business of the Oriental Eating Palace was Campbell, the leather dealer. Third reason, and greatest in the Chinese mind, was the fact that years ago, but not so long but that the memory of it was as vivid as a lightning flash on a black night, Campbell—who had not been above turning his hand to various undertakings that, though murky of purpose, were productive in returns—had circumvented certain laws that prevented a yellow man from gaining entrance to the land of the Americans. The father of this youth held Chuan Kai in the hollow of his hand, and Chuan Kai knew that a few words spoken to the enforcers-of-law would send him away from these shores, where living came so easily, back to China where stalked a specter which he had reason to fear with the fear of one whose heart trembles like the heart of a field mouse that hears the cry of the long-taloned owl. Those reasons trooped through the Oriental's mind as his black eyes shifted from the face of Campbell to the face of Bassett.
"You understand," said Bassett. "It's an initiation for one of our school societies and it must be always a secret—never tell any one we had anything to do with it. You understand?"
Yes, Chuan Kai understood; he knew English and he knew well enough what societies were; this he imagined was a "play" society, the kind with which young Americans amused themselves, quite unlike some societies he knew about.
Chuan Kai called out suddenly two words that sounded to Bassett and Campbell like "Ka-wah changsee", and within twenty seconds one of the Chinese waiters stood in the doorway with an expectant look in his eyes. More words of Chinese like pebbles rattling over stones and falling into water flowed from the singsong lips of Chuan Kai. The waiter went away and came back with a broad-shouldered Chinaman whose sleeves were rolled up, revealing sinewy yellow muscles. Campbell and Bassett guessed that he came from the kitchen where he had been cutting meat, for his hands were red and the apron he wore was stained. Chuan Kai spoke to these two hench-men at some length; they replied in guttural syllables that signified understanding.
A little after dark, on that same Friday evening, Teeny-bits came back from supper at Lincoln Hall and went up to his room. He had taken a walk with Neil Durant and Ned Stillson and had made up his mind that he would go to bed early and keep his thoughts away from the things that were troubling him. He had started to undress and had removed his shirt and collar, when some one shouted up from below:
"Oh, Teeny-bits, you're wanted on the telephone."
Teeny-bits pulled on a sweater and went downstairs. In answer to his inquiry he heard a voice—an unnaturally gruff voice, he remembered afterwards—telling him startling news. His father, old Daniel Holbrook, had been hurt—a train had struck him at the station—Teeny-bits was wanted at home at once.
Waiting to hear no more, he hung up the receiver and without pausing to tell any one where he was going, hurried out of Gannett Hall and ran across the campus toward the hill-road that led down to the village of Hamilton a mile away. He had covered half the distance when he saw an automobile just ahead of him standing beside the road. As he approached, he noticed that, though the lights were out, the engine was running; he determined to explain the emergency and ask for a ride to the village. He never made the request, however, for as he came abreast of the car he heard a sharp whistle close beside him and was suddenly assailed by two dark figures that sprang upon him and, almost before he could struggle, bore him to the ground.
Teeny-bits had been in many a rough-and-tumble wrestling match and was able to take care of himself in competition with any ordinary opponent, even when weight was against him; he struggled desperately, but within the space of a very few seconds he realized that he was helpless. At the first onslaught something that felt like a voluminous cloth had been thrown over his head and he found himself enveloped in its folds; he tried to cry out for help, but his voice was muffled and ineffective. Though unable to see his assailants, he kicked and struck out with desperation, but all to no avail. His feet were brought together and fastened with the same material that covered his head and pinioned his arms to his body. In a moment he felt himself raised from the ground and realized that he was being lifted into the automobile. Hands fumbled at the cloth about his head, tightening the folds over his mouth and eyes, loosening the folds over his nose so that, though he could neither see nor talk, he could breathe without difficulty.
The whole attack had been carried out swiftly, and it was so entirely different from anything that Teeny-bits had experienced that he felt dazed and bewildered. The automobile was moving rapidly now, as he could tell by its tremulous motion and its frequent lurches. No sound that would aid him in identifying his assailants came to his ears, however, and he could only helplessly await the next development. A cautious tightening of his muscles convinced him quickly that it was of no use whatever to strain against his bonds. Whoever these men were who had bound him in so strange a manner, they had done their work well. Minutes passed, and still the automobile rolled on swiftly; whither it was carrying him—north or south or east or west—Teeny-bits had no way of knowing. Finally it began to move more slowly and after a few moments vibrated as if passing over cobble-stones.
Teeny-bits knew instantly when it came to a stop, for the vibrations ceased. Only a moment passed before he felt himself lifted by two pairs of hands and a moment later realized by the sound and the motion that he was being carried up a long flight of steps. He heard a door open and shut and he sniffed a strange odor; food cooking and smoke, it seemed to suggest, but strange food and strange smoke. Another flight of steps was mounted, another door was opened, and Teeny-bits felt himself deposited upon something that seemed like a mattress. He tried to speak, to ask where he was and what his captors intended, but only muffled mumblings came from his lips. He heard the door close and knew that he was alone. A feeling of despair, the equal of which he had never experienced, swept over him; he was in the power of nameless enemies whose purposes were unknown and perhaps sinister.
For a long while Teeny-bits lay in dumb misery, while one dismal thought after another marched through his mind. On the eve of the big game—the game in which for long weeks his hopes had been fastened, first with interest and then with an almost feverish anticipation—he had been mysteriously spirited away. Now he would not even witness the great struggle between his school and its ancient rival—to say nothing of playing and winning his R. But there were other thoughts. What of his father,—old Daniel Holbrook? Teeny-bits now suspected that the telephone summons was part of a plan to entice him away from the school, but, of course, there was a possibility that an accident had occurred and that even now Daniel Holbrook was hovering between life and death, and wondering why Teeny-bits did not come to him. There was still another thought: circumstances had cast about him a cloud of suspicion which was evident to two persons whose respect he wished to retain,—Doctor Wells and Mr. Stevens. What would their feeling toward him be when they learned that he had disappeared from the school without saying a word to any one? They could arrive at only one conclusion: that he was guilty of stealing from his schoolmates and that, fearing to face the charges against him, he had run away like a coward. If the worst should happen—if he should not come out alive from the predicament in which he now found himself—his name would be remembered forever as that of one who had neither honor nor courage.
Those thoughts seemed to Teeny-bits more than he could bear, and suddenly a feeling of bitter rage welled up within him against the unknown enemy who had caused him all this misery. He could not believe that Snubby Turner had anything to do with it. The only persons in Ridgley School whom he had reason to suspect were Bassett and Tracey Campbell. He made up his mind that if he ever escaped from his present predicament he would go straight to those two members of Ridgley School and ask them point-blank if they were at the bottom of his troubles. If they could not come forth with an answer that rang true, he would give them both a thrashing that they would never forget. He would welcome a chance to meet them singly or as a pair. He began to struggle at his bonds and was soon dripping with perspiration from his efforts. After a time he saw the uselessness of it and, almost exhausted, lay breathing deeply the close atmosphere of the room.
The night before the "big game" at Ridgley School resembled the lull before a storm; word had been passed as usual that the dormitories were to be quiet and members of the school were to keep away from the rooms of the football players, who, of course, needed, on this night of all nights, a sound and long sleep. In Lincoln Hall, at meal time, there had been a hum of eager conversation: the Jefferson team had arrived in Hamilton and had gone to comfortable quarters at Grey Stone Inn, three miles from the school. They would remain at the inn until just before the game, when they would come to the field in automobiles. Several of the Ridgleyites who had been in the station at the time of the visitors' arrival reported that the Jefferson players were "huskies" and that Norris, the renowned full-back, was the biggest "of the lot." The main body of Jefferson students would arrive by special train at noon on Saturday.
Many a member of Ridgley School on this eve of the great struggle was filled with a feeling of restlessness; it seemed that the minutes were dragging with indescribable slowness, that the night would never pass and that the hour would never come when the referee would blow his whistle to start the contest upon which the Ridgley hopes and fears were centered.
Among those restless spirits who longed for some way to speed the minutes was Snubby Turner. He had gone down to the Hamilton Station and had come away not at all reassured by the sight that had met his eyes. The representatives of Jefferson School were a formidable looking lot, and it increased Snubby's peace of mind not at all to have had a close view of Norris' athletic form. He sensed a feeling of overflowing confidence in these big sons of Jefferson, and he longed to talk to some one who could dispel his doubts and drive away the insidious fears that were gnawing at what he called his "Ridgley spirit." In these circumstances he would have gone to Teeny-bits, or he might even have imposed upon the hospitality of Neil Durant,—if he had not known that loyalty to the school demanded that he should not bother any member of the eleven. He finally sought consolation by going down to the basement of Gannett Hall to pay a visit to old Jerry. He found the ancient janitor's assistant leaning back in a rickety chair reading by the light of an unshaded electric bulb. The old man put the volume down upon his knee and looked at Snubby with eyes that seemed to be gazing on distant scenes.
"What kind of book is that?" asked Snubby. "A novel?"
Old Jerry thrust his head forward slightly, as if seeing his visitor for the first time, and said:
"There's ijeers in this book, I wanter tell yer. It's about an awful smart feller who had ways of his own in gettin' at the bottom o' things—kind of a detecative chap."
Snubby looked at the title and saw that it was "The Mystery of the Million Dollar Diamond."
"It does a man good sometimes to exercise his brains on meesterious happenin's," said old Jerry, "and you know we got plenty o' reason to study up things o' that sort."
"Yes, we have; but I'm not half as much interested in that stuff just now as I am in the Jefferson game. Who do you think's going to win?"
Old Jerry laid the book carefully aside on his table, looked at his questioner seriously for a moment and said:
"I got my ijeers about that too, but it don't do no good to tell everythin' that is millin' aroun' in your head. Now I once heared of a feller who had a job forecastin' the weather for a noospaper, and he'd allus say right out positive whether it 'ud rain or shine—it was allus goin' to be bright and clear or dark and stormy—and along come a spell o' weather and every day for a week he said it was going to rain, and I'll be singed if there was a cloud in the sky all through them seven days—and the feller lost his job. Now the way I look at the game is this: we got a big chance to win and we got a big chance to lose, and if we do the things we oughter do it's goin' to be bright and fair, and if we do the things we hadn't oughter do it's goin' to be dark and stormy,—and I got my ijeers which is which. But, as I said, it don't do too much good to tell everythin' you know."
"It'll be an awful fight," said Snubby; "a terrible fight every single minute of the time, and I'll bet you two cents to a tin whistle that when that Jefferson crowd of heavy-weights gets through they'll know they've been playing somebody. I wish there were something I could do. I'm so doggone restless that I don't believe I'll sleep a wink to-night."
Old Jerry gave voice to a cackle of mirth. "Bet you'll sleep all right," he said. "I never yet seen a feller like you that didn't sleep when the time come for it, and as for helping, I guess you'll do your part if you keep on believin' that Ridgley School can't be beat and when the game is goin' on you yell your dumdest to encourage the team."
"Well," said Snubby, "I suppose you want to go on readin' that lurid-looking book of yours, so I'll be going up to my room, I guess."
"It ain't so lurid," said Jerry, "but it's interestin' 'cause it's kind o' teachin' me how to put two and two together so's they'll figger up to make four, if you know what I mean, and then I'm a mite stirred up myself about that game to-morrer and it's quietin' to my nerves."
So Snubby Turner left his friend in the little basement room, walked quietly up the stairs to his room and made up his mind that the best thing for him to do was to turn in.
Mass meetings, preliminary games and final practice were over and everything now awaited the climax of the season. By half-past nine lights were going out in the dormitories and presently quiet reigned over the white buildings on the hill and the stars, sending down their radiance from a clear sky, presaged fair weather for the great contest. The light was out in Teeny-bits' room and no one in the school—with the exception of two persons—doubted that the smallest member of the eleven was not sleeping soundly beneath the roof of Gannett Hall.
Saturday morning dawned as fair as the fairest day in the year; there was a nip in the air that suggested winter, but as the morning wore on, the mounting sun mellowed the chill until the "old boys"—men who had played for Ridgley and Jefferson twenty years before and who had come back to view once again the immortal combat between the "best school in all the world" and her greatest rival—slapped each other on the back and said:
"Perfect football weather!"
All roads led to Ridgley—or seemed to—on this day of days. The trains came rolling into the Hamilton Station, discharged their burdens of humanity and rolled on. Automobiles by the score climbed the long hill to the school,—automobiles bearing the fluttering red of Ridgley and the fluttering purple of Jefferson. There were shouts of greeting and shouts of gay challenge, honking of horns and a busy rushing here and there that suggested excitement, anticipation and hopes built high. And then came the special train from Jefferson—the Purple Express, so named—bearing hundreds of cheering students and a brass band of twenty pieces which led the procession into Lincoln Hall to the strains of the Jefferson Victory Song,—a fiendish piece of music in the ears of Ridgley's loyal sons, a stirring pean of confidence and challenge in the ears of those who waved aloft the purple. At Lincoln Hall the Jefferson guests—according to immemorial custom—sat down to a luncheon that Ridgley School provided. A year later the compliment would be returned. The band played, the visitors cheered, the song leader jumped on a table and swung his arms in time to the latest Jefferson song,—and all Ridgley School knew that Jefferson was having the time of her life. She had come to her rival with the best team in her history and she meant to enjoy every moment of a triumph which she was confident would be colossal. In all this excitement Teeny-bits' absence was not at first noticed. At breakfast some one asked for him and some one else said:
"I guess he's already eaten and gone; he probably didn't want to listen to our football gossip."
During the course of the morning two members of the faculty called for him—Doctor Wells and Mr. Stevens. They had an identical thought in mind—though neither knew that the other was thinking it. They were busy in extending the hospitality of Ridgley to the members of the Jefferson faculty and in greeting the "old boys" who had returned for the big game, but both wanted to have a word with Teeny-bits,—to tell him that they had confidence in him and that they knew everything would turn out right in the end and that they should watch him with special interest this afternoon and knew that he would forget everything else and play his best for Ridgley. They left word for him at the dormitory.
This was no ordinary game of football—Ridgley-Jefferson games never were ordinary—and this would transcend all past contests between the two schools. Jefferson was said to be irresistible; the Ridgleyites knew that the spirit of their team was irresistible, and when two "irresistible" forces come together something must give way. From Springfield, the nearest large city, came numerous copies of the Springfield Times with pictures of all the players and statistics in regard to age, weight and height. The largest amount of space was given to Norris, the Jefferson full-back, but Neil Durant came in for his share and a paragraph was devoted to Teeny-bits who was described in these words:
"The Ridgley left-half will be the lightest player on the field; he cannot be expected to do much against the heavy Jefferson line, but he has gained a reputation as a shifty runner and deserves to be watched on open plays."
At noon, when Teeny-bits did not appear for the special luncheon that was served to the members of the team in the trophy room of the gymnasium, Neil Durant and Coach Murray began to make inquiries.
"Where's Teeny-bits?"
Nobody had an answer.
"He'll probably be along pretty soon," said the coach. "He ought not to be late to-day, though."
When the luncheon was half-eaten Neil Durant got up and announced that he was going to send some one to look for the missing member of the team. He found Snubby Turner and asked him to run up to Gannett Hall and look for Teeny-bits.
When Snubby came back at the close of the meal with the report that Teeny-bits was not in his room and that nobody, as far as he could discover, had seen him all the morning, Neil Durant said:
"Maybe he went home. We'll probably find him down at the locker building."
But when the members of the team arrived at the field half an hour later in order to prepare themselves leisurely for the game, Teeny-bits had not appeared.
"That's mighty queer," Neil said to Ned Stillson. "I can't understand it. If he doesn't come we'll have to play Campbell in his place—and somehow I haven't much faith in Campbell. I'm going to call up Mr. Holbrook at the Hamilton station and find out if he knows anything about Teeny-bits."
In answer to Neil's call, Mr. Holbrook's assistant reported that Mr. Holbrook had gone home to dinner and was not coming back till late in the afternoon; he was going to the game.
"The Holbrooks haven't a 'phone in their house, have they?" asked Neil.
"No, they haven't," came the reply.
"Well, do you know where Teeny-bits is?"
"Why, up at the school, I suppose; I haven't seen him," was the answer.
It was evident that Mr. Holbrook's assistant had no information; Neil hung up the receiver and said to himself:
"Well, if his father is coming that's a good sign. When Teeny-bits shows up, I'll give him a lecture that'll make his hair stand on end."
At quarter-past one, when the Ridgley team ran out on the field for warming-up practice, Coach Murray looked over the squad and yelled sharply:
"Campbell, get out there in left-half and let me see you show some pep."
The tone of his voice was like a whiplash, and every member of the team knew that he was angry clear through.
Already the stands were beginning to fill with the friends of Ridgley and of Jefferson, though the cheering sections were as yet empty. In two long columns, stepping in time to the music of their respective bands, the Ridgleyites and the Jeffersonians were marching to the field.