"Then I shall play football."
HICKS STARTS ANOTHER MYSTERY.
"Fifteen men sat on the dead man's chest—
Yo-ho-ho and a bottle of rum!
Drink and the Devil had done for the rest—
Yo-ho-ho and a bottle of rum!"
T HAVILAND HICKS, JR., his chair tilted at a perilous angle, and his feet
thrust gracefully atop of the study-table, in his cozy room, one Friday
afternoon two weeks after John Thorwald's return to the football squad, was
fathoms deep in Stevenson's "Treasure Island." As he perused the thrilling
pages, the irrepressible youth twanged a banjo accompaniment, and roared
with gusto the piratical chantey of Long John Silver's buccaneer crew;
Hicks, however, despite his saengerfest, was completely lost in the
enthralling narrative, so that he seemed to hear the parrot shrieking,
"Pieces of eight! Pieces of eight!" and the wild refrain:
"Fifteen men sat on the dead man's chest—
Yo-ho-ho and a bottle of rum!"
He was reading that breathlessly exciting part where the cabin-boy of the
Hispaniola, and Israel Hands have their terrible fight to the death, with
the dodging over the dead man rolling in the scuppers, the climbing up the
mast, and the dirk pinning the boy's shoulder, before Hands is shot and
goes to join his mate on the bottom; just at the most absorbing page, as he
twanged his beloved banjo louder, and roared the chantey, there sounded,
"Tramp—tramp—tramp!" in the corridor, the heavy tread of many feet
sounded, coming nearer. Instinctively realizing that the pachydermic parade
was headed for his room, T. Haviland Hicks, Jr., rushed to the closet,
murmuring, "Safety first!" as usual, and stowed away his banjo. He was just
in the nick of time, for a second later there crowded into his room Captain
Butch, Pudge, Beef, Hefty, Biff, Monty, Roddy, Bunch, Tug, Buster, Coach
Corridas, and Thor, the latter duo bringing up the rear.
"Hicks, you unjailed public nuisance!" said Butch Brewster, affectionately.
"We, whom you behold, are going for to enter into that room across the
corridor from your boudoir, and hold a football signal quiz and confab. We
should request that you permit a thunderous silence to originate in your
cozy retreat, for the period of at least a hour! A word to the wise is
sufficient, so I have spoken several, that even you may comprehend my
meaning."
"I gather you, fluently!" grinned T. Haviland Hicks, Jr., taking up
"Treasure Island" and his graceful pose once more. "Leave me to peruse the
thrilling pages of this classic blood-and-thunder book, and I'll cause a
beautiful serenity to obtain hither."
"See that you do, you pestiferous insect!" threatened Beef McNaughton,
ominously. "Come on, fellows, Hicks can't escape our vengeance, if
he bursts into what he fatuously believes is song. Just let him act
hippicanarious, and—"