"He must be somewhat lacking, then, in grace and agility, sir," said Westby; and the boys broke into a shout, and Irving gave way to a faint smile.

At that moment Collingwood came up the stairs.

"h.e.l.lo, Lou," said Westby, with a welcoming wink. "We're just congratulating Mr. Upton on his brother; did you know that he has a brother playing on the Harvard Freshmen?"

"Yes," said Collingwood. "I've just heard it from Mr. Barclay."

The boys stared at Collingwood, then at Irving, whose eyes were twinkling again and whose smile had widened. Then they looked at Westby; he was gazing at Collingwood unbelievingly,-stupefied.

"What's the matter with you?" asked Collingwood.

And then Irving broke out into a delighted peal of laughter. He could find nothing but slang in which to express himself, and through his laughter he e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed,-

"Stung, my young friend! Stung!"

They all gave a whoop; they swung Westby round and rushed him down the corridor to his room, shouting and jeering.

When Irving went down to lunch, Carroll, the quizzical, silent Carroll, welcomed him with a grin. Westby turned a bright pink and looked away.

At the next table Allison and Smythe and Scarborough were all looking over at him and smiling; and at the table beyond that Collingwood and Morrill and Dennison were craning their necks and exhibiting their joy.

Westby, the humorist, had suddenly become the b.u.t.t, a position which he had rarely occupied before.

He was quite subdued through that meal. Once in the middle of it, Irving looked at him and caught his eye, and on a sudden impulse leaned back and laughed. Carroll joined in, Westby blushed once more, the Sixth Formers at the next table looked over and began to laugh; the other boys cast wondering glances.

"What's the joke, Mr. Upton?" asked Blake.

"Oh, don't ask _me_," said Irving. "Ask Westby."

"What is it, Wes?" said Blake, and could not understand why he received such a vicious kick under the table, or why Carroll said in such a jeering way, "Yes, Wes, what _is_ the joke, anyhow?"

When the meal was over, Westby's friends lay in wait for him outside in the hall, crowded round, and began patting him on the back and offering him their jocular sympathy. To have the joke turned on the professional humorist appeared to be extremely popular; and the humorist did not take it very well. "Oh, get out, get out!" he was saying, wrenching himself from the grasp of first one and then another. And Irving came out just as he exclaimed in desperation, "Just the same, I'll bet it's all a fake; I'll bet he hasn't got a brother!"

He flung himself around, trying to escape from Collingwood's clutch, and saw Irving. The smile faded from Irving's face; Westby looked at him sullenly for a moment, then broke away and made a rush up the stairs.

CHAPTER VIII

THE HARVARD FRESHMAN

For two or three days the intercourse between Irving and Westby was of the most formal sort. At table they held no communication with each other; in the cla.s.s-room Irving gave Westby every chance to recite and conscientiously helped him through the recitation as much as he did any one else; in the dormitory they exchanged a cold good-night. Irving did not press Westby for a retraction of the charge which he had overheard the boy make; it seemed to him unworthy to dignify it by taking such notice of it. He knew that none of the boys really believed it and that Westby himself did not believe it, but had been goaded into the declaration in the desperate effort to maintain a false position. Irving wondered if the boy would not have the fairness to make some acknowledgment of the injustice into which his pride had provoked him.

And one day at luncheon, Westby turned to Irving and with an embarra.s.sed smile said,

"Mr. Upton, do you get any news from your brother about the Harvard Freshman eleven?"

Carroll directed at Westby the quizzical look under which Irving had so often suffered. But Westby did not flinch; he waited for Irving's answer, with his embarra.s.sed, appealing smile.

"I had a letter from him this morning," said Irving. "He writes that there is a chance of their coming up here to play the School eleven; I had asked him if that couldn't be arranged."

"Oh, really!" exclaimed Westby, in a tone of honest interest.

"When, Mr. Upton?" "Does he think they'll come?" "Does Lou Collingwood know about it?"

"I guess he knows as much as I do." Irving tried to answer the flood of questions. "He wrote officially to the captain at the same time that I wrote to Lawrence. If they come at all, it will be about a week before the St. John's game."

"When shall we know for sure?" asked Westby.

"It appears to be a question whether the Freshmen will choose to play us or Lakeview School. They want to play whichever team seems the stronger, and they're going to discuss the prospects and decide in a few days."

"I'm sure we're better than Lakeview," declared Blake. "You'll tell your brother we are, won't you, Mr. Upton?"

"I'll tell him that I understand we have a very superior team," said Irving. "I fancy he knows that it's as much as I can do to tell the difference between a quarterback and a goal post."

"You will admit, then, that there was some reason for my not believing you had a football brother, won't you, Mr. Upton?" Westby tried thus to beat a not wholly inglorious retreat.

"Every reason-until it became a matter of doubting my word," said Irving.

Westby crimsoned, and Irving felt that again he had been too severe with him; the boy had been trying to convey an apology, without actually making one; it might have been well to let him off.

But Irving reflected that the account was still far from even and that perhaps this unwonted adversity might be good for Westby. Irving did not realize quite how much teasing had been visited upon Westby in consequence of his disastrous error, or how humiliated the boy had been in his heart. For Westby was proud and vain and sensitive, accustomed to leadership, unused to ridicule; for two days now the shafts of those whom he had been in the habit of chaffing with impunity had been rankling. Because of this sensitive condition, the final rebuke at the luncheon table, before all the boys, cut him more deeply than Irving suspected. Afterwards Westby said to Carroll,-

"Oh, very well. If he couldn't accept my acknowledgment of my mistake, but had to jump on me again-well, it's just spite on his part; that's all. I don't care; I can let him alone after this. That seems to be what he wants."

"A month ago he wouldn't have asked more than that of you," observed Carroll. "And you didn't feel like obliging him then."

The implication that Irving had worsted him galled Westby.

"Oh," he retorted, "the best of jokes will wear out. Kiddy was a perfectly good joke for a while-"

Carroll annoyed him by laughing.

For one who had hitherto been indifferent to all forms of athletics, Irving developed a surprising interest in the game of football. Every afternoon he went to the field and watched the practice of the Pythian and Corinthian elevens. He had once thought the forward pa.s.s a detail incapable of engaging one's serious attention, and worthy of rebuke if attempted in dormitory; but after Lawrence wrote that in executing it he was acquiring some proficiency, Irving studied it with a more curious eye.

He wondered if Lawrence was as skillful at it as Collingwood, for instance; Collingwood had now learned to shoot the ball with accuracy twenty or twenty-five yards. Occasionally Irving got hold of a football and tested his own capacity in throwing it; his attempts convinced him that in this matter he had a great deal to learn. Looking back, he could comprehend Louis Collingwood's indignation and amazement at a master who would coldly turn away when a boy was trying to ill.u.s.trate for him the forward pa.s.s.

One afternoon from watching the football practice Irving moved aside for a little while to see the finish of the autumn clay-pigeon shoot of the Gun Club.

There were only six contestants, and there were not many spectators; most of the boys preferred to stay on the football field, where there was more action; the second Pythians and second Corinthians were playing a match. But Irving had heard Westby talking at luncheon about the shoot and strolled over more from curiosity to see how he would acquit himself than for any other reason.

The trap was set in the long gra.s.s on the edge of the meadow near the woods; Allison was performing the unexciting task of pulling the string and releasing the skimming disks. When Irving came up, Smythe was finishing; he did not appear to be much of a shot, for he missed three out of the seven "birds" which Irving saw him try for.

Then it was Westby's turn. Westby had got himself up for the occasion, in a Norfolk jacket and knickerbockers and leggings; he was always scrupulous about appearing in costumes that were extravagantly correct.

He saw Irving and somewhat ostentatiously turned away.

Irving waited and looked on. Westby stood in an almost negligent att.i.tude, with his gun lowered; the trap was sprung, the clay pigeon flew-and then was shattered in the midst of its flight. It seemed to Irving that Westby hardly brought his gun to his shoulder to take aim.

It could not all be luck either; that was evident when Westby demolished ten clay pigeons in rapid succession. It was Carroll's turn now; Westby, having made his perfect score, blew the smoke from the breech and stood by.