"A-a-aye!" we yelled. "McTurkle! We want McTurkle!"
So we left the gang yelling themselves hoarse in front of the university and scooted over to our dormitory. McTurkle was in. He was sitting at his table with a green drop light casting a wan glow over his classic features. The table was piled high with all sorts of books, and you could just hear McTurkle's wheels go round. When we walked in he slipped the glasses from his nose by wriggling his eyebrows and turned around and looked at us blinking.
McTurkle was a funny genius. He was forever grinding. When he wasn't grinding he was causing strange, painful sounds to emanate from his room. For a good while we had puzzled over those sounds. Then, finally, one fateful night, we had descended upon McTurkle in force and learned the truth. McTurkle performed on the French horn. A French horn is an instrument which is wound up in a knot like a morning-glory vine, and the notes have such a hard time getting out that they get all balled up and confused and are never the same afterwards. I'm not musical, and don't pretend to be, but I'll bet a hat that the man who invented the French horn was the same chap who invented French verbs. Well, we made McTurkle take a solemn oath never to practice after seven o'clock, because it was simply impossible to remember anything with those sounds sobbing along the entry. He was frightfully apologetic and promised at once.
When we went in Bud winked at us to leave the negotiations in his hands. We did so, drawing up in a semicircle behind him and looking very grave.
"McTurkle," said Bud, "we have come to you on behalf of the university."
McTurkle blinked harder than ever and looked a bit scared.
"Out there"—Bud waved his hand toward the window—"out there our college—your college—the college we all love awaits you."
McTurkle gasped and tried to find his glasses, which were hanging over the back of his chair at the end of a black cord which he wore around his neck.
"McTurkle," continued Bud, tensely, "as you know, we are on the eve of a great conflict. Tomorrow the pick of our athletic young manhood does battle with the brawny horde of Yale. Defeat looms ominous above—upon the horizon, but the unconquerable spirit of Harvard arises triumphant and—er—flaps its flaming pinions!"
"A-a-aye!" murmured Withey.