Captain of the Crew

“Easy, boys, easy!” Nesbitt called slowly, soothingly to the horses, and then – Well, Hope was clutching desperately at the boards in the grating; he saw the backs of the straining animals turn at an angle to the stage, heard the great wheels slur-r-r across the frozen ground, felt the body of the coach sway far to the left, as though it were on its way across the fence at that side, and opened his eyes again to find a straight road ahead of them, and to see Nesbitt settle himself into his seat once more. “Old Joe” muttered an exclamation of relief. Hope again leaned across Nesbitt’s shoulder.

“I think you’ve shown off enough for to-day,” he said. “Now pull those horses down – if you can.”

Nesbitt glanced back into the other’s face, an angry light in his blue eyes.

“Will you kindly attend to your own affairs?” he asked with suspicious sweetness. Hope smiled in spite of his anger.

“If you don’t think it’s my affair,” he replied, “maybe you’ll acknowledge that the gentlemen ahead have something to say about it.” Nesbitt looked up the road and whistled.

“Just my bally luck!” he murmured. “Professors!” With straining arms he bore back on the lines. Little by little the horses slackened speed, and at last dropped into a trot, but not before the coach had swept by two very serious-faced Hillton professors out for a walk, whose sharp glances presaged trouble. Nesbitt handed over the lines and whip to “Old Joe.”

“My luck again,” he sighed.

“An’ serves you right,” grunted the driver.

Hope crawled into his seat again. His companions were busy explaining the course of events to the inhabitants of the interior of the coach, or as many of them as could get their heads out the doors, and ere the latter had run out of questions the stage turned into the academy grounds and crawled sedately up to the steps of Academy Building.

Hope leaped from the coach and hurried off to his room, while the other boys, laughing and joking, clustered about Nesbitt. “Wheels won’t do a thing to you,” one lad assured him with a grin.

“Well, don’t let it trouble you, Tommy,” he answered gaily. “But, I say, Williams, who was that meddlesome chap on the back seat?”

It was Williams’s turn to grin.

“The fellow you told to shut up, you mean?” Nesbitt nodded.

“Oh, no one much; just Dick Hope, captain of the crew.”

CHAPTER II

INTRODUCING DICK HOPE

The sun was almost out of sight as Dick Hope crossed the yard toward Masters Hall, and the shadows of the buildings, stretching far over the ground, seemed to harbor many little gusts of icy wind, and looked dark and dismal in contrast with the broad expanse of golden, sun-bathed marsh across the river. Dick pulled his coat closer about him, ran up the old, worn granite steps of the dormitory, and gained the hallway with a sense of comfort and homecoming.

Securing his key from the matron’s room, he leaped up the first flight of narrow stairs and, half-way down the corridor, unlocked a dingy door which bore a big black figure 16, and, below it, a card with the inscription “Richard Fowler Hope.” The room was filled with the mellow light of the setting sun, and here and there the rays were caught – by the glass doors of the bookcase, by the metal top of the inkstand, or, less sharply, by the silver and pewter mugs ranged along the mantel – and were thrown back in golden blurs that dazzled the eyes.

Dick laid aside his coat and cap, took off his gloves, and thrusting his hands into his pocket, surveyed the apartment smilingly. It was awfully jolly to get back, he thought happily, as his gaze took in the shabby, comfortable furnishings and the hundred and one objects about the room so intimately connected with three and a half years of pleasant school life. An array of worn and soberly bound books lined an end of the leather-covered study table, and he took one up and fluttered its pages between his fingers; it was a good deal like shaking hands with an old friend. With the volume still in his clasp he moved to the mantel and examined the knickknacks thereon, the cups and photographs and little china things, all cheap enough viewed from a money standpoint, yet to Dick priceless from long possession. He felt a momentary heart-flutter as his eyes fell on one pewter mug ornately engraved with his name.

As he looked the mantel and wall faded from sight, and he saw a stretch of cinder track, pecked by the spikes of runners’ shoes; at a little distance a thin white tape. He saw himself, head back, eyes staring, struggling desperately for that white thread across the track. Again he heard the thud and crunch of the St. Eustace runner’s feet almost beside him; heard, far more dimly, the shouts of excited onlookers, and again felt his effortful gasps as he gained inch by inch. The captain of the track team had been the first to reach him as the tape fluttered to the ground and he turned, half reeling, onto the turf. And he had thrown an arm about him and lowered him gently to the welcome sod and had whispered three short words into his ear, words that meant more than volumes of praise:

“Good work, Dick!”

The vision faded and the boy, with a sigh that expressed more happiness than a laugh could have done, turned away from the mantel. The crimson silk sash-curtains, drawn to the sides of the two windows, glowed like fire, but the shafts of sunlight had traveled up the walls to the ceiling, and the study was growing dim. In the fireplace a pile of wood and shavings was ready to light, and Dick, scratching a match along the mantel edge, set it ablaze and drew an easy chair to the hearth. With the shabby school-book in his hands, he settled comfortably against the cushions, and, his gaze on the leaping flames, let his thoughts wander as they willed.

There was plenty to think of. Before him lay five of the busiest, most important months of his school life, months that would be filled with plenty of hard work, much pleasure, and probably not a little worriment, and which might be crowned with a double triumph for him, for his hopes were set upon graduating at the head of his class and upon turning out a crew which in the annual boat-race with Hillton’s well-loved rival, St. Eustace, would flaunt the crimson above the blue in a decisive victory. To attain the first result many long hours of the hardest sort of study would be necessary, while the last would require never-flagging patience, tact, courage, and skill, and would demand well-nigh every moment of his time not given to lessons. The outlook did not, however, frighten him. He had returned to school feeling strong and confident and eager to begin his tasks.

When, the preceding June, after a sorrowful defeat by St. Eustace, the members of the Hillton crew had met to elect a new captain, Richard Hope had been chosen because he above all other candidates possessed the directness of purpose, the gift of leadership, and the untiring ability for hard work requisite to form a winning eight from unpromising material; even the defeated candidates for the post, which at Hillton was the highest and most honorable in the gift of the school, applauded the choice, and, with a possible exception, honestly felt the pleasure they expressed. The possible exception was Roy Taylor, one of the best oarsmen at Hillton. Taylor had striven hard for the captaincy and had accepted defeat with far less graciousness than had the other three candidates, though he had tried to hide his disappointment under a mask of smiling indifference. The recollection of Roy Taylor was this evening almost the only source of uneasiness to Dick as he watched the mellow flames leap and glow.

Presently he pushed back his chair, lighted the drop-light on the table and drew the blinds. It was almost supper time. Throwing aside his coat, he unpacked his satchel, distributing several presents about the study. Then, with his toilet articles in hand, he opened the door into the bedroom and started back in surprise. Between the two narrow iron bedsteads stood a pile of luggage. A dilapidated tin trunk, painted in ludicrous imitation of yellow oak, flanked a handsome leather portmanteau, while upon these was piled a motley array of bundles and bags; a tennis racquet and two cricket bats were tied together with three brightly colored neckties; a battered golf bag fairly bristled with sticks; a pair of once white flannel trousers were tied about at the ankles with strings, and were doing duty as a repository for discarded shoes, golf, tennis, and cricket balls, and sundry other treasures. The improvised bag had fallen open at the larger end and had disgorged a portion of its contents in the manner of a huge, strangely formed horn of plenty. Crowning all was a soiled clothes bag, vivid with purple lilies on a yellow ground, whose contour told plainly that it held books.

Quickly following his first moment of surprise came to Dick a knowledge of what the presence of the luggage meant, and his grin of amusement was succeeded by a frown. The boy who had shared his quarters with him at the beginning of the year had left the academy in October, and Dick had held sole possession of the rooms until now. He had been told that with the commencement of the winter term he would have a roommate, but until that moment he had forgotten the fact. He wondered as he spluttered at the wash-stand what sort of a chap his future chum was, and drew ill augury from the queer collection of luggage. With towel in hand he walked around the pile and studied the labels and the initials that adorned trunks and bags. The former were numerous; plainly the owner of the yellow tin trunk had traveled, for a Cunard steamship label flanked a red-lettered legend “Wanted,” and the two were elbowed by the paper disk of a Geneva hotel. The initials “T. N.” told him nothing, save that the owner’s name was probably Tom. Well, Tom was a good enough name, he thought, as he applied the brush vigorously to his brown hair, and as for the rest he would soon learn.

Drawing on his coat and lowering the light, he hurried across to Warren Hall and supper. The dining-room was well filled, and as he made his way to his seat at a far table he was obliged to return a dozen greetings, and had he paused in response to every detaining hand that was stretched out he would scarcely have reached his seat in the next half hour. It was pleasant to be back again among all those good fellows, he thought as he laughingly pulled himself free from the clutches of his friends, and pleasanter still to know that they were glad to have him back. His heart beat a little faster than usual, and his cheeks were a little more flushed as he clapped his nearest neighbor on the shoulder and sank into his chair, only to leave it the next moment and detour the table to shake hands with Professor Longworth, who had bowed to him smilingly across the board.

“Vacation seems to have agreed with you, Hope; you look as hearty as you please. You must let Mr. Beck see you before the bloom wears off; he’d rather see one of you boys looking fit than come into a legacy.”

“I’m feeling fine, sir,” laughed Dick, “and I’m so glad to get back that even trigonometry doesn’t scare me.”

“Hum,” replied the professor grimly. “Just wait until you see what I’ve got ready for you.”

Dick was soon busy satisfying a huge appetite and listening to the veritable avalanche of information and inquiry that was launched at him.

“St. Eustace has chosen the negative side in the debate, Hope, and old Tinker’s tickled to death; says he’s certain we’ll win, because – ” “Dick, come up to my cave Saturday afternoon, will you? Burns isn’t coming back, and he’s written me to sell his stuff, and we’re going to have an auction; Smith junior’s going to be auctioneer, and we’re going to hang a red flag out the window, and – ” “Did you hear about that upper middle chap they call ‘’Is ’Ighness’? He nearly upset the coach this afternoon, they say, and Professor Wheeler’s going to put him on probation. Chalmers says he told Wheeler that – ” “We’ve got some dandy hockey games fixed, Hope; Shrewsburg’s coming down Monday next if the ice holds and St. Eustace about the first of Feb.” “You ought to’ve been with us, Hope, last Saturday. We went fishing through the ice, and Jimmy Townsend caught four regular whales; and we cooked them at the hut on the island and had a fine feast, only the silly things wouldn’t get quite done through, and tasted rather nasty if you didn’t hold your nose and swallow quick.” “Say, have you seen Carl Gray? He told me to tell you that he’d be up to your room after supper; wants to see you most particular, he says. Don’t forget I told you, ’cause I promised I would.” “I’m going to try for the boat, Hope. When shall I report?” “When you make the crew, youngster, I’ll win a scholarship; and that won’t happen in a thousand years!” “Speaking of the crew, Dick, Roy Taylor says we’re goners this year.”

Dick helped himself generously to the blackberry jam.

“How’s that?” he asked calmly.

“Says we haven’t got good material.”

“If we had seven other fellows as good as Taylor we’d be all right,” responded Dick. “And as it is, we’ve turned out cracking fine crews before this from even less promising stuff. Well, I’m off. Never mind what Todd says, Jimmy; show up with the others and have a try. I only wish there were other chaps as plucky!”

And amid mingled groans of reproach and derision Dick pushed back his chair and left the hall. When he reached the second floor of Masters he saw that the door of Number 16 was ajar, and that some one had turned up the light.

“Gray’s waiting, I guess,” he told himself. “Wonder what he wants?” He pushed the door open, and then paused in surprise on the threshold.

In Dick’s big green leather armchair, his slippered feet to the blaze, a book in his hands, reclined very much at his ease the youth who had driven the stage-coach.

CHAPTER III

“’IS ’IGHNESS”

At the sound of the closing door the boy in the chair glanced up, laid aside his book, and pulled himself to his feet. Despite his annoyance at what he considered the other’s cheekiness in having taken possession of the study without explanation or apology, Dick was forced to a grudging admiration for the appearance of the boy who confronted him. He was such a healthy, wholesome-looking duffer, Dick thought, that it was a shame he hadn’t better sense. What Dick saw across the length of the study table was a broad-shouldered youth of sixteen years, attired in a ludicrous red dressing-gown, much worn and faded, which, despite the efforts of a knotted cord about the waist, failed by several inches to envelop his form. His face was somewhat square in contour, with a chin a trifle too heavy for beauty, but, as Dick reflected, undoubtedly appropriate to the rest of the features. The eyes were intensely blue and the hair was neither brown nor straw-colored, but of some indescribable shade between. The cheeks were full of very healthy color. For the rest, the youth was of medium height, sturdily built, and, save for an easy smile of unembarrassed greeting which annoyed Dick at the moment, was decidedly prepossessing.

During the moment of silence that followed the closing of the door, employed by Dick in a mental stock-taking of his future roommate, the latter’s eyes were not idle. He had been told that Richard Hope was the captain of the crew, a position of honor which he reverenced as devoutly as only an English lad can, and he was curious to see what manner of boy filled that important office at Hillton. He saw a tall youth, muscular rather than heavy, with shoulders that filled out the coat almost to the bursting point, and a fairly small head set well back. He saw a face with clean-cut features; a straight, sensitive nose, rounded and prominent chin, eyes rather far apart, and high cheek-bones that gave a look of thinness to the face. The eyes were brown, and the hair under the cloth cap was of the same color. Above the nose were two distinct short vertical lines, the result of a habit of drawing the brows together into something approaching a frown when anxious or puzzled. Just at present the lines were deep, and the general expression of the face was one of ill-concealed annoyance. It was the boy in the queer red dressing-gown that first broke the silence.

“I fancy you’re Hope,” he said smilingly. “My name’s Nesbitt, Trevor Nesbitt, upper middle; I’m to share your quarters, you know.”

“I’m very glad to know you,” answered Dick, without, however, much of delight in his tones. “I saw your luggage in the room before supper, although, of course, I didn’t know that it belonged to – er – ”

“To the beggar that was so cheeky on the coach, eh?” said Trevor. “I didn’t know it myself – that is, until I went to the office. They told me before recess that they’d put me in a room in Masters, but I didn’t know who I was to be with. I – ” He paused, with the slightest look of embarrassment. “Fact is, I want to apologize for what I said on the coach. I didn’t mean to be waxy, but those bally gees pulled so like thunder – and I didn’t know who you were, of course, and – ”

“It’s all right,” answered Dick. “I wouldn’t have interfered only I thought you were going to upset us, and, being a senior, it was my duty, you understand.”

“Of course, I see that,” responded Trevor earnestly. “You were right to do what you did, and you ought to have beat my silly head for me. You can now, you know, if you like.”

Dick smiled, and then was sorry. He had meant to maintain a lofty expression of hauteur, in order to impress Trevor with the fact that while he was willing to pass the other’s impertinence on the coach he could never bring himself to an approval of a youth who so needlessly endangered the lives of his companions in order to satisfy a selfish whim, and who had so stubbornly transgressed the Rules of the School (the latter suddenly appeared unusually sacred to Dick, and he mentally spelled it with capital letters). But the smile had, he feared, somewhat spoiled his effort. He hastened to reassume his expression of calm disapprobation, and asked:

“Did Professor Wheeler learn of it?” He had thrown aside his coat and had seated himself before the hearth. Trevor perched himself on an arm of the big chair and smiled a trifle ruefully.