The Crimson Sweater Part 4

"Get up and don't make any noise," commanded a voice at his ear.

Sleepily, he strove to get his thoughts together. For a moment nothing was very clear to him. Then the command was repeated a trifle impatiently and Roy began to understand.

"What for?" he asked, temporizing.

"Never you mind. Just you do what we tell you, and mind you make no fuss about it. There are a dozen of us here and we won't stand any nonsense."

Roy hadn't given any thought to hazing, but now he concluded that, to use his own inelegant expression, he "was up against it." Of course, if it was the custom to haze new boys there was no use making a fuss about it, no use in playing baby. The only thing that bothered him was that the speaker's voice sounded unpleasantly like Horace Burlen's and there was no telling to what lengths that youth's dislike might lead him.

However, his companions, whoever they were, would probably see fair play. So Roy, with a sigh, tumbled softly out of bed. He could just see indistinct forms about him and hear their breathing.

"Hold still," said the voice, and Roy, obeying, felt a bandage being pressed against his eyes and secured behind his head. Then, with a hand grasping each arm, he was led silently across the floor. Down two flights of stairs he was conducted, through the lower hall and then the chill night air struck his face. More steps, this time the granite flight in front of the hall, and his bare feet were treading uncomfortably on the gravel. So far there had been no sounds from his captors. Now, however, they began to whisper amongst themselves and, although he couldn't hear what was being said, he gathered that they were undecided as to where to take him. The procession halted and all save the two who stood guard beside him drew away. The night air began to feel decidedly chill and he realized that cotton pajamas aren't the warmest things to wear for a nocturnal jaunt in late September.

Presently the others returned and they started on again. In a moment the path began to descend and Roy remembered with a sinking heart that he had trod that same path earlier in the evening and that at the end of it lay the river!

By this time his teeth were chattering and he was quite out of sympathy with the adventure. For a moment he considered escape. But if, as the leader of the expedition had stated, there were a dozen fellows in the party, he would be recaptured as sure as fate. Unconsciously he held back.

"None of that," said the voice threateningly, and he was pulled forward again. For a few steps he tried digging his heels in the ground, but it hurt and did no good anyhow. So he went on without further resistance.

In a minute the procession stopped. Then he heard the keel of a boat grate lightly on the pebbles.

"Step up," was the command. Roy obeyed and felt the planking of the float under his bare feet. Then,

"Get into the boat," said the voice. Roy did so very cautiously and found a seat. Oars were dipped into the water and the boat moved softly away from the landing.

"Can you swim?" asked the voice, and this time Roy was certain that it was Horace Burlen's. For an instant he wondered what would happen if he said no. Probably they would devise some punishment quite as uncomfortable as a ducking in the lake. The latter wasn't very terrifying, and, at all events, the water couldn't be much colder than the air was! So,

"Yes," he answered, and heard a chuckle.

"Good, you'll have a chance to prove it!"

For what seemed several minutes the boat was paddled onward. By this time, thought Roy, they must be a long way from sh.o.r.e, and he suddenly wondered, with a little sinking at his heart, whether the current was very strong thereabouts and how, when he was in the water, he was to tell in which direction the land lay. Then the oars had ceased creaking in the rowlocks and the boat was rocking very gently in the water.

"Stand up," said the voice. Hands guided him as he obeyed and steadied him.

"When I count three you will jump into the water and swim for land,"

continued the leader.

"You've got to take this thing off my eyes, though," protested Roy.

"That may not be," answered the voice sternly, and Roy caught a giggle from behind him which was quickly suppressed.

"Then I'm hanged if I'll do it," he said doggedly.

"Better to jump than be thrown," was the ominous reply.

Roy considered.

"Which way do I swim?" he asked. "Where's the landing?"

"That you will discover for yourself. We may tell you no more."

"Don't see that you've told me much of anything," muttered Roy wrathfully. "How do you fellows know that there isn't a big old rock here? Want me to bust my head open?"

"We are in clear water," was the answer. "And"--and now the formal phraseology was abandoned--"if you don't hurry up and get ready we'll plaguey soon heave you in head over heels."

"Oh, go to thunder, you old bully!" growled Roy. "Go ahead and do your counting. I'd rather be in the river than here with you."

"Take him out farther," said the voice angrily. But the order wasn't obeyed. Instead there was a whispered discussion and finally the voice said:

"All right. Now then, all ready, kid! One!... Two!... Three!"

The grasp on Roy's arms was relaxed, he raised them above his head and sprang outward. But just as he was clearing the boat a hand shot forward and grasped his ankle just long enough to spoil his dive. Then he had struck the water flat on his stomach and, with the breath gone from his body, felt it close over his head.

CHAPTER IV

ROY CHANGES HIS MIND

For an instant his arms thrashed wildly. Then he was standing, gasping and sputtering, with the bandage torn away and the ripples breaking against his thighs! From the bank, only a few feet away, came roars of laughter, diminis.h.i.+ng as his captors, having drawn the boat up onto the little pebbly beach, stumbled up the path toward the school. And Roy, s.h.i.+vering and chattering, stood there in a scant three feet of icy water and impotently shook his fist in the darkness!

At first, as he scrambled with his bare feet over the sharp pebbles to the sh.o.r.e, he could not understand what had happened. Then he realized that all the rowing had been in circles, or possibly back and forth along the sh.o.r.e. For some reason this made him madder than if they had really made him dive into deep water beyond his depth. They had made a perfect fool of him! And all the way back up the hill and across the campus he vowed vengeance--when his chattering teeth would let him!

A few minutes later, divested of his wet pajamas, he was under the covers again, striving to get some warmth back into his chilled body.

When he had tiptoed noiselessly into the dormitory whispers had greeted him and unseen persons had asked softly whether he had found the water warm, how the walking was and how he liked diving. But Roy had made no answer and soon the voices had been stilled. Sleep was long in coming to him and when it did it brought such unpleasant dreams that he found little rest.

At breakfast, when the announcements were read by Mr. Buckman, Roy found himself one of four boys summoned to call on Dr. Emery at the office in School Hall after the meal was over. Looking up he encountered the eyes of Horace Burlen fixed upon him threateningly. Roy smiled to himself. So they were afraid that he would tell on them, were they? Well, they'd see!

When Roy's turn to enter the office came, after a few minutes of waiting in the outer room in company with the school secretary, he found himself a little bit nervous. Perhaps the Princ.i.p.al had already learned of last night's mischief and held him to blame in the matter.

But when, five minutes or so later, Roy came out again he looked quite contented. In the outer office he encountered Mr. Buckman, who nodded to him, paused as though about to speak, apparently thought better of it and pa.s.sed on into the Princ.i.p.al's room. Roy hurried over to the Senior Dormitory, armed himself with books, pad and pencils and managed to reach his first cla.s.s just as the doors were being closed. Lessons went well enough that first day, and when, at four o'clock, Roy trotted onto the gridiron for afternoon practice he hadn't a worry in the world.

Perhaps that is one reason why he did such good work at quarter on the second squad that Jack Rogers patted him once on the shoulder and told him to "keep it up, Porter," while Mr. Cobb paid him the compliment of almost remembering his name!

"Good work, Proctor!" said the coach.

There were several absentees that afternoon, notably Horace Burlen and Otto Ferris, and there was much discussion amongst the fellows as to the reason. Before practice was over the report had got around that the absent ones had been "placed on inner bounds." Roy didn't know just what that meant, but it sounded pretty bad, and he was almost sorry for the culprits. When, after practice was over, Roy did his two laps with the others, he looked across the hedge as he pa.s.sed the stables. The doves were circling about in the late suns.h.i.+ne and the wicked Spot was sunning himself on the edge of the shed roof, but the girl with the red hair was not in sight.

At supper Roy found a decided change in the att.i.tude of the fellows toward him. Instead of the friendly, half curious glances of the night before, the looks he received were cold and contemptuous. For the most part, however, the fellows avoided noticing him and all during the meal only Jack Rogers and Mr. Cobb addressed him, the former to inquire where he had played football before coming to Ferry Hill and the latter to offer him a second helping of cold meat. Later Roy accidentally overheard a conversation not intended for his ears. He was in the study room, whither he had taken his books. The window beside him was open and under it, on the granite steps outside, was a group of the younger boys.

"Emmy called them to the office at noon," one boy was saying, "and raised an awful row with them. Said hazing was forbidden, and they knew it, and that he had a good mind to send them all home. He tried to get them to tell who started it, but they wouldn't. So he put them all on inner bounds for a month."

"How'd he know who was in it?" asked another boy.

"Why, the new chap squealed, of course!" was the contemptuous answer.

"Horace Burlen says so. Says he doesn't know how he guessed the other fellows, but supposes he recognized him by his voice. A mighty dirty trick, I call it."

"That's the way with those public school fellows," said a third speaker.

"They haven't any principles."