“Bless you, I didn’t ask you over here to talk English to you,” interrupted the other heartily. “I was after the cause, Harven—the effect was apparent. Come out from under the weeping willows and hit the sunshine trail, my boy! That’s the first thing. Then find something to do and do it hard. After that English A and all the other courses will pretty nearly look after themselves! Good night.”
Outside, Stuart heard Mr. Moffit’s window go up and the instructor’s voice called: “Harven! You’re not doing it, you know! Shoulders back and whistle, you duffer!”
Stuart laughed and obeyed.
He met Coach Haynes only twice or thrice in that week. He made no effort to avoid him, but their paths seldom crossed. When they did meet they spoke politely. Rather to his surprise, Stuart found that his enmity toward the coach was leavened by a large admixture of respect. The coach, he reasoned, was an open and avowed foe who had, when all was said, fought fairly. Some day not far distant Stuart meant to go to him and tell him just exactly what he thought of him, but until that delectable moment he would treat him with the dignity and respect due one warrior from another. But toward the Committee on Athletics, faculty and student members alike, he cherished a dark wrath. Especially toward Judson McColl and Stearns Wilson was this anger directed. They, as it seemed to Stuart, were veritable snakes in the grass. He got a good deal of unconscious comfort from that anger and suffered a distinct loss when he was forced to abandon it. That happened one morning when toward the end of the week, he met McColl face to face in front of the library and, instead of returning McColl’s friendly “Hi, Stuart!” gave him a coldly contemptuous look and passed silently on. Almost any other fellow but the President of the Student Council would have shrugged his shoulders and thereafter let Stuart alone, but McColl wasn’t the sort to do that; which is, perhaps, one reason why he was President of the Student Council and of Manning Society. Unexpectedly, Stuart felt himself grasped by the shoulders and pushed gently but very, very firmly against the library wall. Judson McColl regarded him good-humoredly yet sternly.
“Let’s get this right, Stuart,” he said quietly. “Why the haughty brow and the frozen glare? Come across, old man.”
Stuart came across promptly, glad of the chance, and McColl heard him out patiently. Then, however, he told Stuart things that fairly took the ground from under Stuart’s feet. “Stearns and I were against the resignation business from the start,” he said, “but we had the three faculty members against us right along. We didn’t make much of a fight against that first resolution, for we thought it might be a good thing if you came and talked it over with the Committee. Where you made your mistake was not doing it, Stuart. When you sent your resignation in Stearns and I did everything we could to get the Committee to lay it on the table and appoint a sub-committee to see you, but Pierson and Wallace and Dodge wouldn’t stand for it. We called Coach Haynes in that evening and he was flatly against accepting the resignation, but——”
“What?” exclaimed Stuart.
“Yes, Haynes told us plainly that we shouldn’t accept your resignation until we’d made another effort to smooth things over with you. But the faculties were on their dignity, and Pierson said you’d had your chance and had refused it. When it came to a vote Stearns and I were two against three and we lost out.”
“I didn’t know that,” muttered Stuart.
“You know it now, son,” answered Jud McColl dryly. “It’s a pretty good idea not to go off half-cocked, Stuart.” Then McColl laughed and slapped Stuart on the shoulder. “Buck up and smile!”