“I don’t want a dormitory letter,” said Gerald. “I want to get something worth while. I’m going to ask Alf if he will let me on the hockey team.”
“He will let you on without being asked if you show that you deserve a place,” said Dan soberly. “But don’t try to swipe, Gerald.” Gerald looked a bit sulky for a minute, but he made no answer. “I don’t see, though,” Dan continued, “why you shouldn’t try for the hockey team. You’re a mighty good skater and you seem to know how to handle a stick pretty well, although I’m not much of a judge. The only thing against you is that you’re pretty light.”
“Well, I’m going to try, anyhow,” said Gerald more cheerfully. “Are you?”
“I don’t know. I promised Alf last year that I would, and he says he’s going to hold me to it. But I’m a poor skater and what I don’t know about hockey would fill a book, and a pretty big one.”
“I wish you would,” said Gerald. “When do they start practice?”
“Oh, some time in December; about the middle, I think. But there isn’t usually much doing until after Christmas vacation. I suppose it’s a question of ice. Alf’s got a scheme of flooding that bit of meadow near the river just this side of the boat house and having the rink there. He says the trouble with playing on the river is that the ice is always cracking. Well, I’m going to bed. You’d better, too, Gerald.”
“All right,” replied Gerald, coming out of his dreaming. “I’m awfully glad they made you captain, Dan. But I knew they would.”
“Did you? That’s more than I knew,” laughed Dan, as he pulled the bed clothes up and stretched his aching limbs. “I thought it might be Roeder. He deserved it.”
“No more than you,” asserted Gerald stoutly. “Not as much. Look what you did last year!”
“Well, what interests me now is next year. The fact is, chum, I’m in rather a funk about it. I never realized until to-night what a feeling of responsibility goes with the captaincy. I almost wish that Roeder had got it!”