THREE-BASE BENSON

BY

RALPH HENRY BARBOUR

AUTHOR OF “FOURTH DOWN,” “THE LOST DIRIGIBLE,” “GUARDING HIS GOAL,” “UNDER THE YANKEE ENSIGN,” ETC.

FRONTISPIECE

D. APPLETON AND COMPANY NEW YORK LONDON 1921

COPYRIGHT 1921, BY

D. APPLETON AND COMPANY

PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

CHAPTER I A NEW BOY ARRIVES

A boy of sixteen, dark-eyed, fairly tall and of medium weight, set a very new-looking kit-bag on the floor in front of the news stand in the Baltimore station, shifted an overcoat to his left arm and selected a magazine. In the act of drawing a folding purse from a pocket his attention was attracted by a second youth who ranged alongside. The latter appeared of about his own age, but there all similarity ended. The newcomer was tall and angular and looked overgrown. He had a sallow face, with high cheek bones, pale blue eyes, under lashes and brows that were almost white, and a wide mouth. Underneath a snuff-colored felt hat with a low crown and a narrow, straight brim, his hair, which was a shade or two darker than his eyelashes, had recently been clipped close. Although evidently dressed in his best, his attire looked strange even in a place where strange attires are no novelty. Perhaps his clothes [2]had been made for a much larger person. In any case, they fell in loose folds from every part of his spare frame, almost covering his knuckles and wrinkling

ridiculously above his shoes. In hue they were very like his hair, and they seemed made of some material in which cotton and wool combined, with the odds in favor of the cotton. A bluish gingham shirt was in evidence below a turned-down collar and a black bow tie, which, the first lad suspected, was attached to his collar-button by an elastic. Like his neighbor, he carried his overcoat over one arm and had set a new bag on the floor beside him. But the bag was an old-fashioned valise, aggressively yellow and palpably of imitation leather, and the coat was a khaki-colored army overcoat.

“Got any chewing gum, stranger?”

The man behind the counter offered a choice of many brands and the boy fished a handful of loose change from a capacious trousers’ pocket, purchased, smiled in a neighborly fashion at the lad beside him, showing a set of fine white teeth, and, taking up his bag, ambled off. Tom Hartley and the news stand man exchanged amused smiles, the latter shaking his head humorously.

“Right down from the mountains, I reckon,” he said. He himself pronounced the word “daown,” and Tom, fresh from a fortnight above Mason and Dixon’s [3]Line, smiled again, this time to himself. Then, adding the magazine he had bought to his burdens, he made his way through the near-by gate and along the platform to the waiting “train.” On that electric line they always called it a train, whether it consisted of one car or two. The afternoon travel out of the city had not set in and the two o’clock “Limited”—another word that always aroused Tom’s amusement—held but a handful of persons. He set his bag on a seat, draped his coat over it and went back to the small baggage compartment at the rear to see if his trunk was aboard. Of course it wasn’t. One’s trunk was never known to get on the same train that one traveled by, and had Tom seen it there he would possibly have fallen in a dead faint.

There were, Tom noticed on his way back, several of his school companions present, and to all but one he nodded and spoke. None was a sufficiently close acquaintance to demand more than a brief “Hello.” The single exception was a boy of eighteen, a big, good-looking fellow who, noting Tom’s arrival, turned his face toward a window with a sneering, contemptuous expression. To him Tom neither spoke nor nodded. He and Wayne Sortwell were acknowledged enemies, although neither could have offered a sufficient explanation for the fact. Meeting each other in the very [4]middle of the Sahara Desert, with no one else present, they might have nodded scowlingly, but on ordinary occasions they sedulously avoided recognition.

The car filled slowly. Tom, opening his magazine, hoped that leaving time would arrive before a colored “mammy” toting a pickaninny or a basket of marketing plumped herself beside him. He was spared that, although he was not fortunate enough to keep the seat to himself. At the very last moment, when he had congratulated himself and was settling down to a story in the magazine, he became aware of a disturbance beside him and looked up to see a flash of white teeth and the friendly twinkling of a pair of pale blue eyes under colorless lashes.

“Reckon I’ll have to sit in with you-all,” said the owner of the teeth. Tom murmured politely and drew himself toward the window, and the youth of the chewing gum incident lowered himself to the seat, very careful not to jostle his neighbor as the car swayed over the yard switches, set his valise between his feet, doubled his faded khaki overcoat over his gaunt knees and folded a pair of scarred and rugged hands on the coat. Observing from the corners of his eyes, Tom saw the boy’s jaws working rhythmically over his gum. Tom went back to his story. Evidently his [5]neighbor had the good sense not to attempt conversation.

Presently the conductor came, and Tom, yielding his own ticket to North Bank, saw with surprise that the boy beside him gave up a similar ticket. That this raw-boned, countrified fellow could be on his way to North Bank School was too ridiculous for credence, and yet, if he was not going to the school, where could he be going? Broadly speaking, the school was all there was at North Bank in the winter. In summer the houses and bungalows that lined the river were occupied, but at this time of year, the first week in January, only one or two would be open. Tom stole a puzzled look at his traveling companion, and at the same moment the latter turned his blue eyes on Tom. The blue eyes twinkled before Tom could look past and away, and the broad mouth curved in a likable smile. Unconsciously, Tom smiled back. If, he reflected, you lost sight of the fellow’s impossible attire, he wasn’t so bad!

“Reckon you-all are goin’ to the school,” said the boy questioningly. Tom nodded.

“I’m going to North Bank,” he agreed pleasantly.

“That’s what I thought. I’m goin’ there, too.” The blue eyes moved past Tom to stare calmly through the window.

[6]

“Oh!” said Tom, not thinking of anything better at the moment. His gaze swept the oddly dressed youth again. He hated to think what would happen when this new acquaintance was seen by his future schoolmates! After a moment he asked: “What class are you in?”

“The feller that wrote to Pap said I’d be in the third class. I ain’t had much schoolin’. Reckon I’m kind of old for the third.”

“How old are you?”

“Seventeen.”

Tom hesitated. Looking closely at the other he could see that his first guess of sixteen had been wrong. Now he could have accepted even eighteen as the chap’s age, for in spite of the boyish smile and the uncouth appearance there was a settled, mature expression in the face. “Well,” Tom said finally, “seventeen is a bit old for the third class, but I wouldn’t let that trouble you.”

The other shook his head placidly. “I ain’t reckonin’ to let it trouble me none, neighbor,” he said in his not unpleasant drawl. “I ain’t never goin’ to get any younger. Reckon that’s your class, too.”

“No, I’m in the second.” Tom, to his surprise, spoke almost apologetically.

“Are you? Well, then I reckon you-all can tell me [7]somethin’ about this class I’m goin’ in. Do they learn you pretty hard?”

“Learn you—oh, are the studies hard, you mean? No, I don’t think so. The regular stuff; algebra, English, Latin, geography and so on.”

“Mh-mh. Reckon that Latin’s goin’ to stump me, though. I never had any Latin. The feller that wrote Pap said I’d have to do a sight of work on that Latin so’s to catch up with the other fellers.”

“Third class Latin’s not very hard,” said Tom consolingly. “Coming in like this, though, in the middle of the year, makes it a bit stiffer. If you’d started in with your class, you know——”

“Mh-mh, that’s what the feller said. But I couldn’t of come last September. Pap didn’t have any one in the store and he couldn’t get any one, either, and so I had to stay by him. Seems like since the War nobody wants to do any work. Then some of the fellers didn’t come back at all. Gene Simpkins and Bill Tolliver was killed, and Lee Nash—nobody knows what happened to Lee. He just dropped out of sight. His mammy’s still lookin’ for him, but I reckon he’s a goner. A couple of the fellers got jobs in New York. Pap ain’t as young as he used to be and I sort of hated to leave him.”

[8]

“I see,” said Tom. “But he found some one finally, eh? Your father, I mean.”

“He ain’t my father. I never had any father, any rate not as I can remember. Nor any mammy, neither. Reckon I did have ’em once, but they died before I knowed ’em. Pap Huckins brung—brang me up, but he ain’t any kin of mine. I always called him Pap because I never had any real Pap.”

“Where do you live?” asked Tom.

“Huckinsburg, North Carolina. It’s named for Pap. Pap’s folks was quality before the war; the old war, I mean, where we-all fought you-all.”

Tom laughed. “You think I’m a Northerner, then, do you?”

The other smiled with twinkling eyes. “Reckon you must be,” he answered. “Any rate, you ain’t a Southron. Ain’t you a Yank?”

“I guess that’s what you’d call me. My name’s Hartley, by the way.”

“Pleased to know you.” The boy seized Tom’s hand in a crushing grip and shook it heartily. “My name’s Jerry Benson. I’m powerful glad to meet up with a friend, ’cause I reckon a lot of those high-toned fellers at school won’t have much use for a feller like me.”

Tom, a trifle dismayed, muttered something as he [9]surreptitiously examined his mangled fingers. Jerry Benson went on placidly.

“Reckon I ain’t really got any right at this school, seeing I’m a sort of country feller, but Pap allowed the best was the cheapest in the long run, and he knows a man over to Brattleville whose boy went to North Bank and so he made up his mind I was to go here too. I wanted to go to the school over to Major’s Run. It’s a right good school, too. But Pap, he’d set his heart on this place. Reckon there’s a heap of trouble ahead of me, don’t you?” The pale blue eyes were twinkling again and Tom had the thought that even if his acquaintance anticipated trouble he certainly didn’t look concerned about it!

“Well, I don’t know,” he began. “Perhaps a few fellows may rag you, but I guess they’re not worth considering, Benson. You see——”

“Say,” the other interrupted, “I’d sort of like you to call me Jerry. No one ain’t never called me Benson before, and it sounds unnatural. Reckon you didn’t say what your first name is.”

“Tom.”

“Mh-mh. Tom’s a good easy name to handle, ain’t it? Reckon you and me’s goin’ to be friends, Tom.”

[10]

What answer Tom would have made he never knew, for at that moment the car began to slow and the conductor’s voice came as a welcome diversion:

“North Bank! North Bank!”

[11]

CHAPTER II TOM ASSUMES A RESPONSIBILITY

Tom got separated from Jerry Benson on the way out, though it came about through no effort of his. However, that he was somewhat relieved I won’t deny. To have appeared on the platform of the tiny station in the rôle of sponsor to the uncouth North Carolinian would have required some courage! In all, six boys disembarked. The school carriage, a three-seated, covered conveyance known locally as a “hack,” capable of accommodating nine passengers and drawn by a pair of sleek black mules that were the pride of Cicero, the negro driver, was waiting, and into it clambered all save Tom. As the train had pulled up at the station Tom had descried Joe Kirkham there to meet him, and now, tossing his bag to Cicero, he elected to walk the short distance to school with Joe. He noted Jerry Benson question the driver of the vehicle and then climb into a back seat, as he did so sending a surprised glance after his newly-found friend. Tom experienced a pang of self-reproach at his desertion [12]of the other and, impulsively, he walked back and called to Jerry.

“I’m going to walk, Jerry,” he said. “See you later. Go to the Office and they’ll look after you.”

Jerry smiled and nodded as the carriage moved away, and Tom, aware of the amused expressions on the faces of the other boys, returned to the waiting Joe. Joe’s expression was less amused than bewildered.

“Who’s that fellow?” he gasped.

Tom explained as they began their walk, ending with: “He’s in for a tough time, I guess, Joke, and it’s sort of too bad, for he seems a decent chap. I feel rather mean for shaking him just now, too. The fellows will rag the life out of him when they see him.”

“Joke” chuckled. “Reckon they will,” he agreed. His nickname had evolved itself naturally from the sound of his first and last names and was not intended to indicate his character or habits, for although he was a cheerful chap he had no special gift for joking. “Some one,” he went on, “ought to make him get some decent clothes, first thing. Say, who’s he rooming with?”

“Room—” Tom stopped short, struck speechless by a horrible thought, and gazed at Joe in wide-eyed dismay.

[13]

“What’s the matter?” asked the other. “Lost something?”

“You don’t suppose he—they—” He swallowed and made a fresh start. “Joke, they might—might put him in with me!”

“With you? Gee, that’s so! I’d forgotten Tim was gone!” Joe stared back at Tom’s troubled countenance and a look of unholy glee overspread his face. Then he gave a whoop of joy and doubled up in laughter. “Oh, boy!” he gurgled. “Oh, me! oh, my! That’s rich!”

“Oh, shut up! Listen, there are two or three fellows in Follen without roommates, aren’t there? Birkenside’s alone, and that red-headed fellow who played on the scrub last spring, Joyce or Royce or something like that.” Tom was recovering his spirits.

“I know,” gasped Joe, “but—but something tells me you’ll be the lucky guy, Tom! You’ll win the prize! I fu-feel it!”

“You’ll feel my fist if you don’t shut up that cackling,” threatened Tom, starting on scowlingly. “Anyway, I won’t have him. They haven’t any right to. I—I’ll leave school first!”

“Yes, you will,” jeered Joe.

“I will! You see if I don’t!” Tom spoke very determinedly. After a moment, during which Joe, at [14]his side, viewed him with secret amusement, his brow cleared. “He’s only in the third class,” he said hopefully. “They’ll put him in Follen as sure as shooting. Gee, but I had a fright, just the same. I sort of took to the fellow, Joe, because he seemed sort of pathetic and all that, but I wouldn’t care a whole lot to have him for roommate.”

“Oh, I reckon you’ll get to like him,” chuckled the other.

“Dry up and tell me the news. Who’s back?”

“Not many. Lory and Danny and Billy Conger and a dozen or so others. The crowd won’t begin to get here until late. How’d you happen to come so early?”

“Got in New York at eight-forty; went down to the city with dad, you know; and thought I might as well take the nine o’clock as wait around. How did you know I’d be on that train?”

“Didn’t know, Tom, but just took a chance. There wasn’t much to do. Rod isn’t back yet.”

“Have a good time at Christmas?”

“So-so. Pretty quiet. We had some skating for a couple of days. Mother was sick for three or four days, though, and that kind of spoiled the fun. How about you?”

“Corking! I was in New York until Christmas [15]morning with dad and my sister. Went to two plays and three movies and had a lot of bully eats. What did you get, Joe?”

Joe enumerated his presents and Tom followed suit, and for the rest of the distance they swapped reminiscences of the holidays. The road wound picturesquely through the winter woods, the sunlight was warm and the air brisk. Here and there the entrance to some summer home appeared and occasionally a clearing gave them a glimpse of the Severn, very blue under the cloudless sky. So far the Maryland winter had been fairly mild and on the southern slopes the grass still held more than a hint of green. When they had walked unhurriedly something over a half mile a hedge of privet appeared at their left and a comfortable and commodious house met their gaze. From the chimneys blue smoke drifted away to the line of nearly leafless poplars that marked the boundary of the estate, and an automobile stood before the doorway.

“Hello,” said Tom. “The Laurences are here.”

“Yes, been here right along, Cicero says. If I had a house in the country like that I’d spend Christmas in it, too. It’s a lot more fun than being in town.”

“Ye-es,” agreed Tom doubtfully. “Still, you can have a pretty good time in the city. I mean a real [16]city, of course. I dare say it’s different in Philadelphia.”

Joe, who lived in Philadelphia, grunted, but refused the challenge. It was an old subject of debate between them, that matter of the superiority of New York and Philadelphia. A moment later the grounds of North Bank School came into view, adjoining the Laurence place. A small grove of trees hid the buildings until they were opposite the ball field. A wooden stand stood between the iron fence and the first base line and beyond it, interrupting their view again, was a similar but larger stand at the north side of the football gridiron. The school boundaries encompassed some six acres of field and woods. Near the center of the grounds was Founders’ Hall, a large and imposing brick building graced by a wooden tower that shone dazzlingly white in the afternoon sunlight. The sun shone, too, on the big bell in the open cupola, striking coppery rays from its surface. The Hall held class rooms, chapel, commons and offices within its three ivy-draped stories. On the side nearer the road the four dormitories were arranged in a half circle,

their entrances facing the front of the Hall, their back toward the thoroughfare. At the farther end of the arc was McCrea House. Then came Baldwin, then Follen and, last, Ellicot. Although the Houses were [17]all of wooden construction, they differed in age, size and appearance. Follen, at the right of the entrance driveway, was the largest, a timber and cement edifice of many gables containing forty rooms. McCrea was a modest structure, the oldest of them all, and accommodated but thirty students. These five buildings, if we omit the stable, near by, the boathouse below the gently sloping bank, and the row of bathhouses beyond, comprised the plant with one important exception. The exception was the Sharples Gymnasium. This building, standing behind Ellicot House, its glassed roof almost shaded by the trees that followed the boundary on that side to the river’s edge, had been presented to the school by the parents of a former student who had died in the service of Great Britain in the first few months of the World War, as a bronze tablet beside the handsome entrance informed one.

Passing through the entrance, where an ivied gate house presented two inquiring windows toward the passers, the boys made their way to Founders’ Hall. A hail from the steps of Baldwin House, where three boys were loitering in the sunlight, delayed them an instant. In the Office, Tom signed the register, Joe waiting outside. As he laid the pen down the assistant spoke.

[18]

“Mr. Ledyard would like to see you a minute,” he said.