Tess of the Storm Country Part 26

Dan nodded and turned with a happier heart toward the Rectory, leaving Frederick looking for "Spuddy," "Shorts," and "Swipes."

CHAPTER XXI

Three hours afterwards the three little freshmen walked zig-zaggedly, arm in arm, up the long hill toward the University Campus.

Shorts had a shaky grasp of one arm of Dillon, and Spuddy the other. On through the cold night they dragged him, until they reached the broad white carriage way that led to the fraternity house. Here Swipes stumbled, loosening himself from the grasp of his companions.

"Well, ju--just look at him," growled Spuddy in a disgusted tone; "he ought to freeze stiff. Look how his le--legs wab--wabble! They lo--look like four--four--"

"Shut up, Spud," cried Shorts. "He's only got--got two legs. What the mat--matter with you?... You're as drunk as he is. Don't let him drop on those stones!"

"I ain't drunk," retorted Preston. "What's the mat--matter with you, yourself? I bet I can ge--get into--that--that fraternity without any of the fe--fellows seeing me!"

"I don't believe you will," returned Shorts in a more sober manner.

"Look there, Spud, the whole house is alight. I say--Swipes--Swipes, it's after midnight, and the fraternity is all lighted up."

"I--I--I don't care if it is," grunted Swipes in a low, thick voice.

"I--I want to go to bed. Tha--that's what I want to do."

He sank into a stupor again but the boys dragged him to his feet.

"Do you want Jordan and Graves to see you like this, Swipes?" demanded Shorts stopping in the center of the carriage drive. "If you don't--you take a mighty quick sneak up the back stairs, and--"

The sentence was never finished for the door opened and Dan Jordan's big form loomed up before their dazed eyes.

"Is that you, Shorts?" called Dan.

"Yes."

"Where have you been for the last three hours?"

"Down there," mumbled Shorts in a smothered tone, desiring to hide their plight if possible.

"For the love of all that's good, Shorts," groaned Spuddy, "let me get into the house and change my clothes.... There goes Swipes again in the snow. Get up, fool, here's the 'Captain.'"

"To--to the devil with the 'Captain,'" muttered Swipes.

But Dan's next sentence completely awoke the senses of all save Swipes.

He only grasped it dimly through the cobwebs of his drunken brain.

"Where's Graves?" demanded Jordan, coming to the top step.

The silence that followed was as grim as the falling snow. Spuddy and Shorts were dragging the limp Swipes up the long steps.

"Graves?... We haven't seen him," interjected Shorty Brown, and Dan Jordan answered gravely:

"Then the soph.o.m.ores have captured him, that's a certainty! He hasn't been here, and he hasn't been to the Rectory."

Shorts, now thoroughly sober, followed the big freshman into the drawing-room, where a dozen or more downcast-looking boys were curled up on divans. Swipes was being urged up the broad oak stairs, Spuddy now and then giving him a severe poke in the ribs. Preston perched the hapless boy against his chamber door with the injunction to get to bed the best he could. Swipes turned helplessly to his room-mate.

"Look here, Spuddy, help a fellow, will you? Just give me my pyjamas."

"Get them yourself!" retorted Preston, shoving Dillon into his bed-chamber. "It's a nice mess we're in with the 'Parson' gone."

With a disgusted kick at Swipes he left him reeling desperately once more. Dillon swayed forward from the center of the room toward the doorway. He had heard as in a dream Spuddy's parting shot about fellows getting drunk and forgetting how to act. Suddenly the floor rose up and hit him on the nose, but the polished boards, so bright that he could see his face in them, fell back politely, leaving Swipes standing, looking helplessly about him. Every piece of furniture, bed, bureau, table and chairs, flew around and around him in the wildest disorder.

His eyes reeled after them, in their flight through the room. Around and around past the bed to the door--once Swipes thought they would fly through. Bracing himself to catch the flying bed, he came up with a bang against the beveled mirror which broke and splintered under his weight.

He was lying in the ruins when some one came and put him to bed.

The regret of the little freshman the next morning when the dismal news of the missing president came to him was intensely genuine. They told him that the whole town had been searched, but that Graves had disappeared as completely as if he were no longer on the earth.

When Dan Jordan left Frederick Graves on the corner of Ithaca's main street, the young president began to search for his three cla.s.smates.

Shorts and the other two must be somewhere near for Dan had told him so.

He turned to the left, walking toward "Jay's" resort, where with his knowledge of the three little freshmen's habits, he would probably find them. It was a nuisance to be followed about and guarded as if he were a criminal, yet he would go through anything rather than be absent from the banquet.

Suddenly he felt a bag thrown over his head and he was dragged completely off his feet. Then with much force he was shoved into a carriage, a heavy hand held over his mouth. He heard a pair of horses whipped into rapid motion. Frederick could not imagine in which direction he was being driven, for the constant turning of corners made it seem to the smothered boy that they were tearing around in a circle.

Suddenly the vehicle came to a sharp standstill. During the ride his ankles and wrists had been tightly corded, and no sooner had the carriage halted than several pairs of hands carried him swiftly up a flight of stairs into a house and along a carpetless hall.

When the cloth was removed from his head, Frederick was in the presence of two soph.o.m.ores, Mathew Armstrong and Paul Howe.

"Hard luck," said Armstrong, looking at Frederick with a grin.

"Rather," he replied, glancing about. "But what can't be cured must be endured. If I am to stay here, I hope I am to be fed."

"Not with banquet cake, Freddy," laughed Howe; "you'll have plain bread--until after the banquet. Now just give us your coat and vest, old chap, and your collar and tie."

Frederick's ready obedience made Armstrong exclaim jovially:

"That's the right att.i.tude, isn't it, Howe? No one would think to look at you, Graves, that you were so docile. You knew what you were saying when you said, 'what couldn't be cured must be endured,' and I say, 'all's fair in love and war,' so you stay here until after that grand supper."

Without answering, Frederick turned his eyes gloomily about his prison.

The room was almost bare. In one corner was a bed, in another a cot with some blankets upon it. A long window ran nearly to the floor, minus a blind on one side while on the other a green shutter hung by one hinge, making a creaking noise as the wind swung it back and forth. Frederick reasoned that the window faced the street for he could hear crunching footsteps in the hard snow as pedestrians pa.s.sed.

A wagon rolled squeakingly by and all was quiet.

In the night Frederick endeavored to plan his escape. He believed the house to be within the city limits, but during the long, dark drive he had lost all sense of direction. Through the flickering of the smoky lamp he saw Armstrong with a revolver in his hand, watching him intently. So the darkness pa.s.sed and the daylight came in at the window, throwing long slant rays upon the dusty floor and lighting the faded paper on the wall.

CHAPTER XXII