CHAPTER XXI
THE COASTING RACE
Astonishment, surprise, chagrin and anger are some of the words thatmight be used to describe the feelings of Ned, Bob and Jerry as theylooked at the accusing card.
“Who put it there?”
“How did they find it out?”
“Somebody must have seen us!”
Thus spoke the three.
The card was typewritten, so there was no ready clue to its author.
“Which of the fellows have typewriting machines?” asked Ned.
“Oh, a dozen. You can’t tell that way,” answered Bob.
“I’m going to make a try,” declared Ned, vindictively. “I’ve heard thateach typewriting machine has some peculiarity, and I may be able totrace this one.
“If I do find out the sneak who gave us away what I won’t do to himwon’t be worth doing,” Ned went on. “The idea of spoiling a perfectlygood joke this way! It’s a shame, and I’ll wager a lot it was thatFrank Watson!”
“There you go again!” cried Jerry. “Jumping at conclusions.”
“I’ll jump on his head if I get a chance,” muttered Ned.
Then they lowered the picture and carried it back to the chapel, amidthe grins of their companions and the stern looks of the members offaculty. Such a sacrilege had rarely, if ever before, been committed.Each professor seemed grave and angry, save Professor Snodgrass, andhe looked at the boys with sympathy. He would have helped them if hecould, but it was beyond his power.
“You may set the portrait down against the wall where it belongs,”announced Dr. Cole. “I will have the janitor hang it later.”
In the prayer that followed, Dr. Cole made reference to the “misguidedand rash spirit of youth,” from which he asked that all might bedelivered.
“He means us!” whispered Bob.
“Shut up!” retorted Ned, fiercely. “Don’t I know it!”
It is feared that our heroes--shall I call them that now, Iwonder?--did not fully enter into the devotional spirit that morning.Nor, for that matter, did many of the others.
When the chapel exercises were over, Dr. Cole again arose.
“Hopkins, Slade and Baker will be excused from classes to-day,” thepresident announced, “and they will report at my office in half anhour.”
He gave the signal of dismissal.
“Say, you fellows sure have nerve all right!” exclaimed George Fitch,as a group of students gathered about Ned, Bob and Jerry when they cameout of chapel.
“That’s what!” added Tom Bacon.
“But why you wanted to give yourselves away is more than I can figureout,” came from Harry French.
“Getting the picture was sure some nifty little stunt,” commented ChetRandell, “but sticking that card on was only inviting trouble. Did youthink they wouldn’t believe it?”
“Say, when you fellows get through talking, I’ll have something tosay!” Ned broke in, rather sarcastically. “We did get the picture, Imay as well admit that, for I suppose we gave ourselves away in chapelwhen Proxy made the crack. But we weren’t foolish enough to go andadvertise the fact. Some fellow squealed on us, just as some one did atthe time of our feed. And when I find out who it was I’m going to makeit so hot for him he’ll leave college.”
Frank Watson was passing at the time, but neither by look nor word didhe show that he was concerned, though Ned had gazed in his direction,and had made his voice purposely loud.
“Do you mean him?” asked Newt Ackerson, nodding toward Frank.
“I’m not saying all I mean,” retorted Ned.
“No, you’d better not,” cautioned Jerry. “Never mind, we’ve got to takeour medicine.”
“More leave-stopping, I suppose,” groaned Bob.
“If you’re not suspended, you’ll be getting off lucky,” commented TedNewton.
While the other students hurried, more or less willingly, to theirdifferent lectures and classrooms, Ned, Bob and Jerry strolled overtoward the office of the president.
They were admitted by Dr. Cole’s secretary, a young man studying forthe ministry, who ushered them into the office, and gave them chairs.The three chums did not feel much like talking, so they sat in glumsilence, waiting for Dr. Cole to come in. They were beginning to thinktheir offence was graver than they had imagined it. Suspension had notoccurred to them. But, on the other hand, they had not figured on beingfound out. Something was wrong.
“Frank might have heard us talking about it from his room,” said Ned ina low voice. “His transom is right opposite yours, Jerry, and voicescarry easily in that corridor, I’ve noticed. It’s a regular sound-box.”
“I don’t know what to think,” Jerry said. “We’re found out, that’ssure.”
“And I’ll find out who squealed,” declared Ned, taking the card out ofhis pocket to gaze at it. Then Dr. Cole came in, and Ned quickly putaway the bit of evidence.
“Young gentlemen, before I say what I intend to, I wish to be perfectlyfair and just to you,” began the president. “Did you, or did you notput the picture on the flagpole. Answer me on your honor as gentlemenand students at Boxwood Hall.”
There was a moment of silence, and then Jerry spoke in a low voice.
“We did it, Dr. Cole,” he said.
“So I was informed.”
Ned just ached to ask who had been the informant, but he knew he didnot dare.
Dr. Cole seemed to be thinking deeply, and then he began to speak.
He gave the boys a straight-from-the-shoulder talk--a good, manlylecture, in which he explained to them why he regarded their offenseseriously. They might have played other pranks that would not havehad such a possible effect as the irreparable damage of the founder’spicture. If that had been torn it would have been a grave loss.
And from that Dr. Cole went into a general exposition of boyish pranksin general. It was a talk along the same lines as had been given to theboys by their parents before they were sent to Boxwood Hall. They werereminded that they were now growing up, and should give some evidencesof it.
Ned, Bob and Jerry, rather angry at first that they had been caught,and filled with perhaps righteous indignation against the informer,began to see matters in a different light. They were rather ashamed ofthemselves, and Jerry frankly admitted that the entire idea was his,and that he had persuaded Bob and Ned to join him. In view of that facthe asked that he alone be punished.
“No,” said Dr. Cole. “I can’t do that. But I will make yours theheaviest, for I think you deserve it. You are older than your chums,not much it is true, but a little, and they look to you as to a naturalleader. You should lead them along different lines.”
And then came the punishment. It was heavy, but justly so. There wasto be a period of confinement to the college grounds, longest in thecase of Jerry, and there was also prohibition to take part in any gamesor amusements, or to attend their fraternity meetings for a certainperiod.
“Whew!” exclaimed Ned as they emerged from the president’s office,“that was bitter medicine all right.”
“Well, I guess we deserve it,” observed Jerry.
“But we _did_ stir things up,” Bob said, with a smile.
“Yes, we stirred up a hornet’s nest,” remarked Ned. “And I’d like toget it around the ears of the fellow who told--Frank it was, to my wayof thinking.”
“You’ll have your own troubles proving it,” remarked Jerry.
The three chums spent a miserable time when they were on probation, soto speak, unable to join in the fun the others had. And though the timeof Bob and Ned was up before that of Jerry, the two refused to accepttheir restored privileges, and stuck to their chum, not going anywherehe could not go.
Perhaps it was this that led Dr. Cole to shorten Jerry’s term ofpunishment, for on the night following a big snow storm, when half thecollege was out on the hill on big bobsleds, coasting, word was sent toJerry that he was given back his full privileges.
Just outside the college grounds was a lo
ng hill, most excellent forcoasting, and it was the custom at Boxwood Hall to have impromptubobsled races for class and school championships. Ned, Bob and Jerryhad bought a big bobsled from a former student, and they had done somecoasting earlier in the season.
“But this is the best yet!” cried Ned. “The hill is in prime shape.We’ll get up a race.”
Laughing, shouting, calling to one another, the three chums, nowrestored to full rights of collegeship, hastened out with theircompanions to the coasting place.
It was a bright moonlight night, and many of the boys and girls fromFordham were on the hill.
“Get up a party and we’ll see if we can’t have a race,” suggested Jerryto his chums.
Getting up a party for the fine, big bobsled was easy. There were soonmore than enough to fill it. As the three chums were getting the sledto the top of the hill ready for a start, Frank Watson came alongdragging his bobsled, which was slightly larger than that Jerry wasgoing to steer. Frank had his party made up, in it being Bart Haley andBill Hamilton.
“Want a race, Jerry?” asked Bart, good-naturedly.
Without thinking, for the minute, of the feeling against Frank, Jerryanswered:
“Yes!”
“Come on then!” cried Bart. “The losers buy the hot chocolates!”
Frank nodded his assent.