“It is twelve minutes after two; I’m not detaining you?” he asked, with a broad suggestion of sarcasm.
“No, sir, I have ten minutes yet,” answered the Hero.
“Ah, thank you. Well, now—” Mr. Robinson drew his eyebrows together while he silently marshaled his arguments. Then—“I have never,” he said, “opposed athletic sports in moderation. On the contrary, I think them—ah—beneficial. Mind you, though, I say in moderation, distinctly ‘in moderation!’ In fact, in my own college days I gained some reputation as an athlete myself.”
The Hero suppressed a smile. His father’s reputation had been gained as short-stop on a senior class nine that, with the aid of pistols, old muskets, and brass bands, had defeated, by a score of 27 to 16, a sophomore team, his father having made three home runs by knocking the ball into a neighboring back yard. The Hero had heard the history of that game many times.
“But you, sir,” continued Mr. Robinson, severely, “you, sir, are overdoing it. You are allowing athletics to occupy too much of your time and thought. I take to-day to be an average one?”
“Hardly, sir,” answered the Hero. “Saturday is always busier than week-days, and to-day we have one of our big games.”
“I am glad to hear it, very glad. I reached here at eleven o’clock, and you dragged me out to the field while you practised batting. At twelve you had a recitation. At one you took me to the training table, where I sat among a large number of very—ah—frivolous young men who constantly talked of things I do not, and do not care to understand. You have now kindly allowed me a half-hour of your society. In a minute or two you will tear off to the field again, to be there, so you tell me, until half past five. Now, sir, I ask you, is what I have described an equable adjustment of study and athletics, sir?”
“I’m very sorry, dad,” replied the Hero, earnestly. “If I’d known you were coming to-day I could have fixed things a little differently. But as it was, I couldn’t very well give you much time. I wish you’d come out to the game, sir. It’s going to be a thundering good one, I think. Princeton is after our scalps.”