[CHAPTER IX]
THE HOCKEY MATCH
The balance of the week was a busy time for Dick. His usual hour of study before supper was dropped, and he spent that time with every other spare moment in trying to recruit candidates for the crews. He buttonholed boys in classroom and even in chapel, pursued them across the frozen Yard, waylaid them in the corridors, and bearded them in their dens; and all with small success. Those who displayed a willingness to go in for rowing were almost invariably younger fellows whose ambitions were better developed than their muscles. Those whom Dick longed to secure had an excuse for every inducement he could set forth. The seniors pleaded lessons; the upper middle fellows were going in for baseball, cricket, anything save rowing; the lower class boys were unpromising to a degree; and when Saturday came he found that out of a possible ten recruits the most promising was a long-legged, pasty-faced youth who had been dropped from the hockey team and whose desperate desire to distinguish himself in some manner was alone accountable for his complaisance.
That Taylor and Crocker and some of the other candidates had been busy was evident from the first—Taylor especially, Dick told himself bitterly.
“Try for the crew?” said one senior whom Dick approached, “why, Roy Taylor was speaking to me about it, and I promised him I’d think it over. But I don’t see how I can, Hope; you know yourself how beastly hard the studies are this term; I’m an awful duffer at mathematics, and German, too; and then as for physics—well, really I can’t see how I’m ever going to pass.” And when Dick pointed out modestly enough that he (Dick) had the same studies and was going in for rowing, and expected to graduate notwithstanding, the other waived the argument aside carelessly: “Oh, you, Hope! You’re different; you’re one of those lucky beggars that never have any trouble with lessons. Why, if I was like you I wouldn’t hesitate an instant; I’d say put me down for the crew right away. But as it is—— By the way, is it true that you’ve only got twenty candidates?”
“Who told you that?” asked Dick.
“Taylor, I think. That isn’t very many, is it? I don’t see how you’ll get a crew out of that.”
“Nor do I,” muttered Dick, as he turned away discouraged.
When Saturday came, bringing Carl Gray at two o’clock with the suggestion that Dick join him and witness the hockey match with St. Eustace, the latter concluded that he had earned a vacation, and so donned his warmest sweater and jacket and allowed himself to be torn away from the subject of candidates. As the two lads crossed the yard toward the steps that led down to the river by the boat-house they encountered Trevor, who, when their destination was made known to him, turned about and joined them. It was a bitterly cold day, and the wind, sweeping down the broad river, nipped ears and noses smartly. Despite this, however, a fair-sized audience had assembled on the ice near the landing, where a rink had been marked out, and were either circling about on skates or tramping to and fro to keep warm.
“Haven’t begun yet,” said Carl Gray as they reached the head of the steps. “Looks as though they were having a debate instead of a hockey match.”
As they reached the ice they saw that the captain of the Hillton team, an upper middle youth named Grove, was in earnest conversation with a St. Eustace player—apparently the captain of the opposing team—while a circle of interested boys surrounded them. As the three approached the gathering broke up, and Grove, spying Dick, came toward him looking angry and indignant.