Dick Merriwell's Heroic Players; Or, How the Yale Nine Won the Championship

by Burt L. Standish

The classes back in New Haven for their reunions vied with one another in improvising strange costumes for the occasion. One class was arrayed in the garb of clowns, with painted white faces, baggy white trousers, and all the paraphernalia of the circus. Another was dressed in roughrider costume—that was the class of ’98, so many of whose members had not stayed to graduate, but had rushed to enlist at the first sign of the coming war with Spain.

Then there were monks, and ballet dancers, and cooks, and men dressed like little boys, in knee breeches and blouses, and all sorts of fantastic costumes. All the classes assembled by the campus, near Dwight Hall, and then, swinging into procession behind a band that blared out Yale tunes all the way, marched gayly out to the field, singing and shouting all the way, swinging back and forth across the street in the famous old Yale march, so that girls who had never been there before squealed with delight, and even the proud and pompous fathers of the graduates had to laugh, to see men as old as themselves behaving like boys again just because they were back at Yale, and wanted to show that they still had the old Yale spirit.

It was a great sight, and even Dick Merriwell, who had seen it many times, and would that day, except for his more important duties as universal coach, have been dancing along with his own class, dressed like a Russian peasant, laughed as if he was seeing it for the first time.

Every one got to the field early, and the graduates took possession of the diamond, with the band in the middle, and danced around, so that every one could see them. And they didn’t seem to care how ridiculous they looked. They were having a good time, and they were back at Yale, to see a Yale team beat one from Harvard, so that was all they cared about. Up in the stands, the pretty girls cheered them madly, and the men from Harvard, who were perfectly willing for Yale to have all the fun beforehand, so long as their team won and gave them a chance to have a procession of their own afterward, cheered them, too.

“Don’t you wish you were going to pitch, Jim?” asked Harry Maxwell, of Jim Phillips, as they sat on the bench, waiting for it to be time for the game to begin.

“Not a bit,” said Jim heartily. “This is old Gray’s big day—it’s his last chance, you know, and I want him to have all the glory there is coming to him. Where is he, I wonder?”

Others were asking that question, too, in sudden wonder. Taylor, the big senior catcher, was there, but he had not seen Gray since the diplomas had been handed out. Dick Merriwell, too, was absent, and Tom Sherman, already nervous as he thought of his responsibilities as captain of the Yale team that all these graduates had turned out to cheer so heartily, grew more and more worried as time for the game approached.

Jim himself was anxious. He was not by any means ready to pitch. He had, under strict orders from Dick Merriwell, been resting his arm in anticipation of the possible need of playing in New York on Saturday, and he was stiff and unprepared for action. Entirely aside, therefore, from his desire to see Gray pitch and establish his reputation, Jim was unwilling to face the idea of filling in, for he was afraid that he would be an easy victim for the Harvard batters, and would be quite unable to rally in time for the game on Saturday, should he lose.

But five minutes before it was time for the game to begin, Dick Merriwell, hot and flushed, suddenly appeared. He called Sherman, Jim Phillips, and Bill Brady, and Winston, the substitute pitcher, to talk to him.

“Gray has been forbidden to play by the faculty,” he said abruptly. “It seems that he turned in a blank examination paper in the history course yesterday morning. Canfield is furious, and won’t listen to Gray’s statement that he did nothing of the sort. The dean is inclined to think that there is something that Gray doesn’t know about, but he says that, if it is true, he will be required to return his diploma. And, anyway, he can’t play to-day. I haven’t time to explain more now. Winston must pitch, and do his best. You’re in no condition, Jim, and we’ll have to take a chance to-day. Run the team, Sherman. I’ll be back as soon as I can.”