Sube Cane Part 41

But Sube was not so easily disposed of. "What's it about?" he asked casually.

"Nothing that you would care to hear--the proper discipline of children or something of that sort," returned his mother hurriedly. "Run along now, boys; mother's very busy. You may stay to see the pictures through twice if you'll be very quiet and behave like gentlemen. And Henry, you take good care of Sim. Remember he's a little boy--"

Before starting for the Theatorium, Sube slipped out in the back yard and made a thorough though futile search for evidences of ice-cream. But for some reason this did not satisfy him; when once his suspicions were aroused it was very difficult to allay them. All through the first show he was pondering over his mother's unprecedented conduct. He felt sure there was some ulterior motive.

During the intermission Sube announced that he was going to try the seats further back.

"I know I can't see so good," he explained, "but my neck kinda hurts from bending it up so far."

"My neck don't hurt," declared Cathead. "I'll stay here."

"My neck don't hurt," echoed Sim. "I'll stay here too."

None of the other youthful occupants of the bald-headed row was willing to exchange front seats for rear, so Sube was forced to try the experiment alone. This was as he had antic.i.p.ated and desired, for he had deep-laid plans which could best be carried out by himself. As soon as the second show was under way he slipped out of the theater and started for home, gliding silently from tree to tree with a skill that had been acquired by long continued study of the methods of Old Sleuth.

He reached the parlor window just too late to hear the last of a group of Spanish chansonettes rendered in the original tongue by Miss Netta Podger, who had spent the summer abroad. This was unfortunate for Sube, as foreign languages always interested him.

When the applause evoked by Miss Podger's artistry had died away into random coughings and throat-clearings, Sube heard the president of the Mothers' Club struggling to give expression to the pleasure she took in introducing the exceedingly reverend J. Mills Mossman, D.D., who, she said, would deliver this evening his famous lecture ent.i.tled, "Moral Suasion; or Spare the Rod and Save the Child." Under cover of the burst of applause which greeted this announcement Sube scrambled up and seated himself precariously on the window sill. Of course he wanted to see as well as hear.

He understood that Dr. Mossman was the new Baptist minister. He had seen the much-discussed gentleman on the street once or twice, but rumors of football prowess and heavyweight champions.h.i.+ps during college days had aroused in Sube a curiosity to look him over at closer range.

As Dr. Mossman began to speak Sube pressed his face against the shutters and peered in. He found himself perilously near the doctor's large left ear. Then he noted the enormous size of the white but muscular hands, little dreaming that he would ever fall into them. But his attention was not long held by the speaker's personal appearance, for Sube was electrified by what he was saying.

He began to comprehend at once why his mother had not wanted him to hear the lecture. He felt outraged at the thought that she should thus seek to restrict his education, and stunt his mental and spiritual growth. He was converted to "Moral Persuasion" on first sight, and made up his mind to affiliate himself with their organization at the earliest opportunity.

When Dr. Mossman waggishly declared that the hairbrush should be used solely for arranging one's locks, and that the good old slipper should be devoted exclusively to the humble task of comforting tired feet, Sube joined heartily in the laugh that followed. And when the good doctor concluded his lecture with the impa.s.sioned statement that "willfully inflicted pain never improved anything!" Sube partic.i.p.ated so enthusiastically in the applause that he lost his balance and fell to the ground, taking with him the greater part of his father's cherished ivy.

For an instant he was dazed. He could not seem to comprehend where he was. Then he recovered his bearings and hurried back to the Theatorium.

As he reached the lobby the doors swung open and the crowd began to emerge. Cathead and Sim were among the last to come out.

"How's your neck?" asked Cathead as he approached Sube, who stood looking at a poster of the next day's bill.

"My neck?" asked Sube, momentarily off his guard. "Who said an'thing--Oh! my _neck_! Oh, yes; my neck is fine! It was all right jus'

as soon as I sat in the back seat a little while." He gave his head a few experimental twists, and then added in confirmation: "Yup, it's all right."

The hour was late when the theatergoers reached home. The last guest had departed, and their father was unamiably engaged in carrying out the folding chairs, which had been donated for the occasion by the local undertakers, and piling them on the front porch.

The boys, preferring almost anything to going to bed, offered their a.s.sistance, which their father rather reluctantly declined. Cathead dallied, asking numerous questions about the lecture, but Sube trudged off to bed without a word.

The following day a cold rain kept the boys indoors. Throughout the morning frequent observations were made, but no cheering patch of blue large enough to make the mythical Dutchman's breeches could be seen.

Although the rain began before seven it failed to stop before 'leven. In fact, it was three o'clock before it let up at all.

By lunch time the boys had resigned themselves to the weather, and with the aid of the telephone had succeeded in interesting Gizzard and Cottontop in the "gym" that had sprung into being in the upper story of the barn.

The earlier part of the afternoon was spent by the four boys in improving the equipment of the gym and in demonstrating their abilities as death-defying athletes. It was the performance by Sube of a feat called the "muscle-grinder or Hindu punishment" that really started the trouble, for it threw him into a state of perspiration which caused him to remark that he would enjoy taking a swim.

"I guess you wouldn't find the water pretty cold!" suggested the practical Gizzard. "Oh, no!"

"But s'posin' we had it fixed so's it would be warm! S'posin' we had a little shack built right over the swimmin'-hole!"

"Water'd be cold jus' samee!"

"But I can _s'pose_ it would be warm, can't I? I can s'pose anything, can't I? I can s'pose boilin' ice-water if I want to, can't I?"

"You can s'pose it," admitted Gizzard grudgingly, "but that won't make it so. Who'd want boilin' ice-water, anyway?"

"But jus' s'posin' we had a place fixed like that," continued Sube quite unperturbed. "I'd take a swim every day in the year. And when I'm a man I'm goin' to have a swimmin'-hole made right in my own house, and then I can go in whenever I want to!"

"You'd oughta be a Baptis'," suggested Gizzard.

"What's bein' a Baptis' got to do with goin' in swimmin'?" asked Sube cautiously.

"Why, _they've_ got a swimmin'-hole right inside their church!" declared Gizzard with an air of omniscient loftiness.

"A swimmin'-hole in the Baptis' Church!" howled Sube derisively. "You make me laugh! Say, Giz, who's been stringin' you?"

"n.o.body ain't been stringin' me," defended Gizzard stoutly. "Jus' shows you don't know much! There's one there, 'cause my dad painted it jus'

last week with two coats of white 'namel and--"

"What in the d.i.c.kens would they have a swimmin'-hole in a church for?

Jus' tell me that!" demanded Sube conclusively.

"To bap-_tize_ people!" replied Gizzard, apparently greatly bored at this display of ignorance. "Didn't you know the Baptis'es don't jus'

squirt a little water on a baby's bean? They let 'em grow up and then duck 'em all over."

Sube had a vague recollection of something of the sort, but his interest in the matter was material rather than doctrinal. "How big is this wonderful swimmin'-hole?" he asked guardedly.

"Big enough to swim in, all right," Gizzard a.s.sured him.

"Where do they keep it?" Sube was feeling his way carefully, fearing a hoax of some sort.

"It's down under the minister's desk," Gizzard told him with an air of vast importance. "You can't see it when you go in the church, but all you got to do is press a little b.u.t.ton, and _Bingo!_--There's your swimmin'-hole!" A sort of "Behold!--" movement of the hand accompanied this exposition.

Sube was torn between belief and skepticism. He hoped that what Gizzard was telling him was the truth. But the appearance of secret places at the pressing of b.u.t.tons was a.s.sociated in his mind with hip-pocket literature, rather than with the House of G.o.d. However, Gizzard's responses to his persistent questioning were so earnest and so convincing that Sube had just about concluded to become a Baptist, when Gizzard chanced to remark that he knew what the mysterious indoor pool was called.

"What?" asked the others in a chorus.

"My dad says they call it 'mershum,'" was the lofty response.

Sube's Baptist leanings collapsed like a house of cards. "Now I _know_ you're lyin'," he growled disgustedly, "'cause that's a kind of a pipe you smoke. My father's got one."

For a few moments conflict seemed inevitable. Then the discussion took a new angle and developed into an argument as to the knowledge of their respective fathers of the correct meaning of the word "mershum." After this had waged for a few minutes with honors about equally divided, Gizzard had a brilliant idea.

"Look here, Sube!" he cried. "We could keep chewin' about this all day long and not get nowhere. But if I could _show_ it to you, then you'd have to b'lieve it!"

"I'll b'lieve it jus' soon as I _see_ it," Sube admitted; "and not before."

"All right!" shouted Gizzard, starting for the stairs. "Come on! I'll show it to you!"