The Freshman (Holman)/Chapter 7
Having spent a great deal more money on ice cream than he had intended, Harold was now determined that his living quarters, which he must now seek, should be as inexpensive as possible. He remembered that Dave Keay had said such accommodations could be secured on Clark Street.
Harold ventured to intrude upon Joe's rather cursory dish-washing long enough to inquire if the soda merchant knew where Clark Street was.
"Guess I ought to," Joe observed, shifting his cud of tobacco to the other side of his mouth. "Just walk down University Street here three blocks and when you come to that alley between Burnham's grocery and the First National Bank, that's Clark Street."
Out on sunny University Street the various store proprietors had placed benches in front of their shops for the convenience of the loafing studentry. The benches were liberally patronized by the staid Juniors and Seniors. They were forbidden to members of the two lower classes by edict of the Senior Council, the undergraduate governing body of the college. Harold hurried along, striving to appear unaware of the curious, amused, slightly bored eyes that followed him from the white-flanneled worthies lolling upon the benches. He was glad when he reached the head of the narrow street that, according to Joe's directions, must be Clark.
At that moment one of Burnham's deliverytrucks seemed to be blocking the whole street. Beyond the automobile, however, he could glimpse two rows of small white houses all practically alike. They were dwellings of rather ancient vintage, each with a dinky front porch reached by four railed steps up from the sidewalk. Harold took a few paces down the street and then paused uncertainly. He wondered if even on this modest street he could secure accommodations fitting to his modest purse. Of the $485 saved from three Summers' sales of washing machines he had brought $200, leaving the rest in the Sanford bank for emergency use. His pocket also contained the $165 in commissions he had earned the past Summer, plus $200 of the $330 secured from Uncle Peter. For he had been forced to spend $130 for clothes, other supplies and a ticket from Sanford to Tate. Five hundred and sixty-five dollars to last him a whole year at college. No spendthrift's income that!
As he was debating, a brisk little feminine figure turned the corner on the other side of Clark Street and walked rapidly down the narrow thoroughfare. If she had seen Harold, she did not acknowledge his presence. But he had recognized her and, crossing the street, impulsively followed her. She was the girl of the dining car, the pretty brunette whom Johnny Niles had addressed as "Peggy." Harold saw her mount the steps of one of the tiny houses about half-way down the street and disappear inside the front door.
That put a different aspect upon matters! If Clark Street was good enough for "Peggy," it was certainly good enough for "Speedy" Lamb. Harold had made a careful note of the residence that now had the pleasure of sheltering her. He was delighted, upon approaching it, to observe a sign tacked to the newel post at the bottom of the porch steps: "Furnished Rooms. $3 Per Week." He bounded up the steps and pushed the bell.
If Harold expected the dining-car vision to answer his ring, he was disappointed. A tired-eyed middle-aged woman with a dust cap tied around her hair and a broom in her hand opened the door and stood expectantly.
Harold looked his disappointment. But he managed to say, "I came about the room. Is it rented?"
"No-o," replied the lady in a thin yoice as if reluctant to admit it "But you're a student, aren't you?"
"Yes," he admitted. "A Freshman."
She acted as though this were worse than ever.
"I wouldn't be a bit of trouble to you," Harold hastened to explain.
"Well," said the lady, "I don't usually rent to students. They're too noisy and my nerves aren't what they used to be. I'm accustomed to having professors or graduate students. But you look like a quiet boy. Would you like to look at the room?"
He followed her into the house and down the entrance hall, peeking surreptitiously into the living room leading off from the hall. But the girl wasn't there. The dust-cap lady led him up two narrow flights of stairs. Then she opened a door upon a small third-floor bedroom in the front of the house. The room evidently had not been used all summer and was hot and close. It was meagerly furnished with an iron bed, a washstand, a small desk against the wall, a dresser, two chairs and some pictures of an earlier day entitled "The Children's Hour" and "Towser's Dinner." The room appeared strangely dark, although it was a bright day outside. The landlady hastened to remark that this was due to the fact that she had been just cleaning the windows and had not as yet wiped off the soap.
"If you decide to take the room, I'll send my daughter right up to finish the windows," she offered. And from the regions below Harold could hear a piano being played with a light, deft touch. In that moment the bargain was as good as made.
The price was three dollars a week. He would have considered it cheap at twice that.
The lady of the house, he learned, was named Sayre—Mrs. Sayre. The daughter, then—if indeed she was the daughter—was Peggy Sayre. It struck him as a very nice name for a very nice girl.
When the landlady had departed, Harold proceeded to pull off his sweater and make himself at home. He gazed down at his shirt and discovered that it was a mess. Not only was it covered with splotches of dirt, but several bad rents marred its appearance. That kitten! Harold walked over to the bureau in search of a pin with which to effect temporary repairs. An empty pin cushion met his eye. And, as fate would have it, the cushion was in the shape of a kitten. Harold vexedly picked it up and thrust it roughly into the bureau drawer.
He would have to mend those holes. He remembered that his mother had particularly warned him to take care of his clothes, had even provided him with a homemade sewing outfit. He fished this gear out of his suitcase and sat down in the dilapidated Morris chair and set to work awkwardly with needle and thread. This was a new sort of task for Harold and he did not do very well with it. At almost the first push of the needle through the cloth his hand slipped. The needle met Harold's chin, bent low over his toil, and inflicted a gash. He arose and walked over to the mirror hanging over his washstand to inspect his cut and staunch the trickle of blood. The glass in the mirror was soaped just as were the windows. Harold took out his handkerchief and wiped a portion of it clear.
Then suddenly he stopped and stared in credulously.
Framed in the cleaned part of the mirror was reflected a pretty feminine face in a ravishing setting of brown curls. The prettiest girl Harold had ever seen. Harold turned and stared rapturously at Peggy Sayre, who stood uncertainly in the doorway. A dream had come true! Dazedly he pointed at her, as if to fix the fact that it was really she. And, strangely enough, the amazed girl was pointing at him too. It was as if he was asking mutely and gladly, "You?" And she was replying similarly, "You?" Standing there inquiringly, a mop and a pail and a broom by her side, he thought she was the most attractive girl in the world.
He was desperately afraid she would go and hastened to say, "I—er—took this little room so I'd have a quiet place to hide away and study."
He did not want her to know that he had seen her as she walked down Clark Street and had rented her mother's room as a consequence.
"Mother sent me up to clean the windows," she said with an effort at matter-of-factness. She picked up her washing implements and came into the room. Then she caught sight of his torn shirt and wounded chin. "But you've torn your clothes and hurt your face!" she cried sympathetically. "Is there anything I can do to help you?"
He hesitated. The cut was trivial and he now obliterated any evidence of it with his handkerchief.
"Would you like me to repair your shirt for you?" she inquired.
"That would be fine," he exulted. "You can sit right over there."
He led her to the Morris chair and handed her the sewing kit. He seated himself on the arm of the chair and watched her deft, white fingers closing the gaping holes in his garment. His head was bent low over her. She was so adorable. He mentally traced the soft curve of her chin. He could catch the faint perfume of her hair. It was wonderful. Fate had been marvelously kind to lead him to this room. And to lead her there too.
She was sewing a loose button on his shirt now. She was almost finished. He hastily tried to think of ways to detain her further. If he could only find more buttons for her to sew—!
He slyly pulled another button from his shirt. Then he took the scissors from the near-by table and boldly cut a whole row of buttons from his vest, which he had tossed upon a near-by chair. If she detected any of this stratagem, she did not admit it, but kept on patiently sewing whatever he handed her.
When at last there was no further subterfuge with which to hold her, he began to worry about what he must say to her. He must apologize for that incident in the train. He must explain why the kindly old lady had mistaken them for sweethearts. (The word made him feel all warm and pleasant inside now.) He must tell her why he had run out of the car away from her.
Finally he cleared his throat. "Miss Sayre, I just want to say that that thing on the train was just a misunderstanding. I didn't mean to embarrass you. I—er—just want to say that."
She was biting the thread off with bent head and even white teeth. He saw to his relief that her eyes were twinkling with merriment.
"Oh, I've forgotten that long ago," she declared. "I was confused at first because that lady was grinning at us so. But I realize how we must have sounded. It was funny, wasn't it? Imagine!"
She laughed merrily. He joined her. The ice was broken.
"You live here, don't you?" he asked hopefully.
"Why, yes," she replied. "My mother owns this house. Since father died two years ago she's been letting out this room."
He questioned her discreetly further and learned a lot. Her name was indeed Peggy Sayre. She had graduated from Tate High School the June previous and had had to give up plans to enter Wellesley College on account of the sudden death of her father. Instead she had taken a position at the Hotel Tate. She was to have charge of the cigar counter and the cloakroom. She had been visiting a relative in Indiana. Yes, she knew many students, having lived in Tate all her life. Chester Trask? She knew him. Yes, he was, probably, the most popular man in college. Dave Keay? Was he a thin boy, very well dressed and with light hair parted in the middle? Ye-es, she believed she had met him last year at the Fall Frolic. Sheldon? Garrity? Were they the two who had been suspended last spring for a month for stealing the bell-clapper in the tower of Webster Hall? Harold said he was sure they were too nice a pair of chaps to do that. And Peggy replied, "Oh, some Freshman always steals the clapper every year. It's a point of honor to do it. Most of them, though, are too clever to get caught."
Then Peggy suddenly arose and said guiltily that she must be going. She promised, however, that there would be plenty of opportunities to talk over Tate University later.
When she had gone, the room seemed again to have become drab and uninviting, even though the sun was now pouring warmly in through the two front windows. He fingered the places she had repaired and pronounced the job perfectly executed. He whistled merrily. If there had been the slightest doubt in Harold's mind but that Mrs. Sayre's third-story room was the finest abode in Tate, it had now vanished utterly.
Completing his toilet and donning fresh linen, Harold consulted his Freshman Bible. It occurred to him that possibly he was required to announce his presence in Tate in some official way. The little leather-bound guide book confirmed this idea. He walked over to Webster Hall, on the campus, and joined the mob of his bewildered classmates outside the door marked "Registrar's Office." Having stood in line there for half an hour, he finally was ushered into the presence of a fat-faced, worried-looking little man behind an enormous desk. The latter asked him questions in an irritated tone of voice and entered his pedigree on a card.
"All right," said the Registrar impatiently, having concluded his scribbling.
He handed Harold an enormous folio of closely printed white paper. "Here's your schedule of classes. They begin to-morrow. Look in the main entry of Cowan Hall for your divisions and their meeting places. Good Luck, Lamb. Trust you'll be a credit to us. Next man."
When Harold returned to the group of waiting Freshmen outside, some of them were grumbling that they would lose their dinners if they had to hang around there much longer. "Where do we eat, anyway?" a fat cherub asked. Harold, with an air of importance, volunteered the information that Freshman meals were served down at the University Commons, a huge dining hall that could be seen from the windows of Webster Hall. Peggy had told him this.
Having attained the open air, Harold decided that he was hungry himself. Accordingly he walked down the gravel path to the Commons and entered with the stream that was already flowing through the big double doors in search of sustenance. He came upon a vast region of clattering dishes, Freshmen absorbing food and negro waiters shuffling about. There seemed to be few, if any, empty tables. Around the festive board nearest him three slickly brushed young gentlemen were chatting quietly as they awaited the arrival of their order. Harold thought he recognized them. Yes, he did. All three of them had been huddled with him back stage in the auditorium that afternoon. Bred in the easy democracy of a middle west small town, where to see an empty chair at a table is to occupy it, Harold approached and made himself a fourth at their meal.
The three young gentlemen abruptly ceased their conversation to stare at him. They did not at first fancy his presence there too much.
"Hello, fellows," he said, a little abashed, "I see you found the restaurant too."
The trio hesitated, looking at each other. Then one of them broke the ice with a doubtful "Hello. Trask is my name."
Harold regarded him with doubled interest. Yes, he looked like a less mature edition of the great Chester.
"Brother of Chester Trask?" Harold asked.
"Why, yes," admitted the diner. "My name's Leonard. Have you met my brother?"
"I should say I have," Harold replied heartily. "We had a great time in Cleveland together when he was out there this Spring."
"Is that so?" the younger Trask said with greatly increased cordiality. "Well, I'm mighty pleased to meet any friend of my brother's. This is Joe Bartlett and this red-headed chap is Don Haddon. And your name's—"
"Lamb. Harold Lamb."
"Oh, yes, I remember now. You're the chap who knocked 'em dead with the jig this afternoon. The one they all started calling 'Speedy.'"
Trask spoke with the careful accent that one acquires at our more frightfully expensive preparatory schools. His friends, when later they joined in the conversation, affected the same aristocratic drawl. They were extremely well groomed, rather supercilious youngsters. If Tate took some of the conceit out of them, as colleges have the habit of doing, given half a chance, they might turn into worthy citizens of the better as well as richer class. If, on the other hand, their present tendencies were coddled, their chances of flunking out of Tate before the end of Freshman year and developing into loafers, mere decorations for the society pages of the Sunday newspapers, were excellent.
As young Trask identified Harold as the effervescent "Speedy," the other two youths at the table took a vastly increased interest in him. They, however, seemed to regard him as more of a curiosity, an object of amusement, than as an equal. Harold, in his innocence, did not get this. His whole conception of the "Speedy" episode was that he had made a big hit, that the entire university was ready now to receive him with open arms. Moreover, he was making preparations to live up to the name of "Speedy." If popularity meant treating the whole college to ice cream daily, he would do it. Probably that was the way Chester Trask had got where he was. It was undoubtedly a Tate habit of recognizing a good fellow by eating ice cream at his expense.
"Where did you prep. Lamb?" Leonard Trask was asking him suavely.
"Sanford High School," Harold replied, and wondered why for the first time in his life he was a little ashamed of it.
"We three prepped at Westover," offered Joe Bartlett, a wizened lad with a rather mean little face set in a peanut head.
Harold knew Westover by reputation. The bare tuition there, the story ran, was two thousand dollars a year, exclusive of board or any extras. And one had to come of Westover ancestors and be enrolled at birth in order to enter. It was the crème de la crème of preparatory schools for lads born with golden spoons in their mouths. Harold's three dinner companions acted as if they were quite aware of this and were anxious for him to be impressed. In this they were not disappointed. Quite abashed, he said hardly a word the rest of the meal. The trio talked among themselves about others of their prep school cronies who were in the Freshman class. They blithely ignored Harold, beyond casting curious, half-smirking glances at him every now and then. The four rose together at the end of the meal and walked out into the September moonlight.
"Beastly meal," commented Donald Haddon in carefully clipped accents. "It's an outrage that we have to take our meals there."
"Blame Leonard here," suggested Bartlett, only half joking. "He persuaded us to come to Tate instead of going to Harvard."
"Oh, quit your crabbing, you two," Leonard Trask laughed. "You're acting like a couple of spoiled darlings. And put out that cigarette, Joe. You know darned well Freshmen are not supposed to smoke on the streets."
"Bother the fool regulations," Bartlett exclaimed. "Now at other colleges they allow a man to do exactly as he chooses. He can drink or smoke anywhere about the place to his heart's content."
"Believe me, Joe, you will have all the chance you want to become an ass here without going anywhere else, if you want it," Leonard commented rather sharply. He had much better stuff in him than either of his two companions, though his character had its weakness and was dominated at times by his more worldly-wise companions. Bartlett and Haddon came of New York society families. They had traveled extensively, were familiar with the vices and mannerisms of Europe, were cosmopolitans at the age of eighteen. Though Trask's father was wealthy, he came of rather staid Boston Back Bay stock. His two friends frequently irritated him, but he rather envied them their worldly-wiseness and deferred to them at times.
Harold walked down University Steet with the Westover graduates as far as Clark Street and then said, "I'll say good-by to you fellows here. I live down this street. Hope to see you again some time."
"Same here," said Leonard Trask promptly. "We're all three rooming together in Maury's Private Dorm on Hill Place. Number 15. Drop around."
Harold thanked him and said that he would, though he secretly doubted it. He did not feel comfortable with these pseudoaristocrats. Leonard Trask, he conceded, might be all right alone. He must be all right. Wasn't he a brother of the great Chester?
Harold saw no signs of Peggy as he walked through the front hall of the Sayre house and up to his room. He surmised correctly that she was on duty at the Hotel Tate. However, he was not to want for company. Hardly had he closed his room door and settled into the less rickety of his two chairs when there was a knock on the door. Harold called out, "Come in," in true middle western fashion. A tall old—young man, bareheaded and with a wisp of straw-colored hair in his eyes, walked briskly into the room. He had a bundle under his arm. A rectangular bundle, thin but of large dimensions. He slowly and impressively denuded it of its crackling wrapping paper and revealed a large framed reproduction of a lion showing its teeth in a most unfriendly manner. An artist might have branded the picture a crude reproduction of a very crude original. But Harold was quite impressed.
"You a Freshman?" asked the stranger cheerfully.
"Yes," Harold admitted, wondering what was coming next.
"Well, my name's Parsons. Parsons '25. Senior, you know. Pleased to meet you. See that picture? Isn't it a dandy? Lion's the Tate mascot, you know. This lion was particularly posed for this picture. The official Tate lion picture. Everybody's got one in his room. Old Pennypacker himself has one in his private study. 'S fact. You aren't a Tate man till you have a lion picture. No, sir. What do you think this work of art costs, hey? Looks like about fifteen bucks' worth, doesn't it? Well, I'll tell you what I'll do. I like Freshmen. Once one myself. Special reduction for to-night only to members of the Freshman class. Three dollars and a half. Can't deliver the picture to-night, of course. Only got this sample to show. I get them special from a prominent art gallery on Fifth Avenue, New York. They're private agents for the painter. By the way, the painter's a very prominent artist. Yes, sir. You'd recognize him in a second if I told you his name. One of America's best. Just paints these lions as a hobby. What do you say? Three bucks and a half—and cheap at twice the price. Sign here."
The salesman had reeled all this off with the speed and facility of a Coney Island barker. After such a display of pep and elocution, Harold could not turn him down. Besides, it was a fine, upstanding, fire-eating lion. He signed in a daze. Parsons '25, having given him a receipt for his three dollars and a half, breezed out as quickly as he had sailed in.
Hardly had his footsteps stopped echoing down the hall when there was a second knock at Harold's door. A swarthy youth with a flaming red tie answered the invitation to come in. He approached Harold waving a narrow book.
"Take your subscription for the Tate Tattler,'" sang out the newcomer. "Five bucks a year. Everybody has to take it. Has all the university notices as well as news of the campus and the world at large. Sign here."
Of course he wanted the "Tattler," Harold thought. He signed. The solicitor swung out of the room with a hurried "Thanks. Good night."
The "Tattler" had the best graft of all the campus salesmen, the college was agreed. You had to take the "Tattler." Else you might accidentally miss reading the notice the one morning of your four years in college that your professor was ill and was not holding his class!
Following in rapid succession after the lion-picture and "Tattler" salesmen, came undergraduate tradesmen offering athletic supplies, the "Tate Totem Pole," season ticket to the football games, the services of the University Laundry (including free laundry box), a handsome framed reproduction of Kipling's "If," coupons good for twenty shines at the Student Shoe Shining Parlors, coupons good for twenty pants-presses at the Student Pressing Plant, Freshman caps ("the regulation uniform after to-day, Freshman. Better buy one"), Freshman corduroy trousers, Freshman black sweater, and the official Freshman pipe with 2T9 inlaid in the bowl.
And Harold patronized them all. He listened, completely awed, to their polished line. He thought he was duty-bound to buy.
Finally, around ten o'clock, when he was wondering how many more of these itinerant merchants would discover his room, he extended another invitation to enter in response to a knock at the door. And gazed upon the blinking presence of Thomas Harrington ("Shelley") Logan. Dave Keay's friend had a copy of a rather highbrow-looking magazine under his arm. He leafed its pages hesitantly under Harold's nose. Near-sighted, he had not recognized Harold.
"Shelley" swung rather falteringly into his line. He was not good at this sort of business. All the Tate Literary Monthly editorial board were required to dash out among the Freshmen and rustle up subscriptions. The entering men were almost their only prospects. The other students would sooner flunk out than be caught with the "Lit" on their study tables.
"I represent the Tate Literary Monthly. Only purely literary review published here," Logan attempted to rattle it off. "Publishes all the good stuff written at Tate. You'll want to write for it yourself. No Freshman can get along without the 'Lit.' Two dollars and a half. Ten issues."
Harold already had his pocketbook out. Had only been waiting to learn how much more money would be required. Suddenly Logan got a square look at his victim. What he saw was a pathetically eager, bewildered, innocent face. The face of a Freshman who has been steadily mulcted for three hours and has been paying out oodles of cash for junk that he would probably never use. The most pitiful sight in the world—a man who is too badly cowed to say "No." Logan knew the look so well. He remembered having possessed it himself four years previously. He had been seeing it on the faces of Freshmen all evening. He was pretty thoroughly sick of this soliciting business. It was not as if he were selling these poor kids something they needed. Only one man in a hundred liked the "Lit." The rest would glance at the first copy and throw the remaining numbers, unopened, into their waste baskets.
He blinked at Harold, stared more closely and asked, "Did you come out from Cleveland with Dave Keay and me?"
"Yes," Harold replied eagerly.
"Sure you did. I remember. Well, listen, Freshman, forget what I just said. You don't want the 'Lit.' Here's your money back."
Harold was inclined to protest. Sure, he wanted the "Lit." He wanted all the publications. He was anxious to get the "Lit" especially. Didn't Logan edit it? Well—
But Logan was obdurate. He would not accept him as a subscriber. He did accept Harold's invitation to take the other chair for a few minutes.
"Have you been bothered much to-night with fellows selling stuff?" asked the Senior. Harold nodded a vigorous affirmative. Logan continued, "You want to be very careful or they'll take every nickel you've got. There'll be more to-morrow night and for the rest of this week. It's the same every year. The trouble is that most of them are selling plain junk. Parsons nicked you for one of those terrible lions? I thought so. He's been paying his way through college with those awful things for three years now. He buys the picture for fifty cents in New York, and gets 'Cheap George,' the picture-framer here in town, to stick a frame around it for fifty cents more. Two dollars and a half profit. Not bad. The rest of the salesmen are just as generous. They all figure that somebody has to sting Freshmen, so it might as well be they. The only thing you bought that's worth anything to you is the 'Tattler.' You almost have to subscribe to that. If you were living in a dormitory room there'd be two or three nervy Sophomores around by this time selling you your radiator and the paper on your wall. You can be thankful you've escaped that. Well, I must be running along. I've stuck fifty of your poor classmates for subscriptions to the 'Lit.' That's my quota for this evening."
He smiled lugubriously at Harold, arose from his chair and departed.
And the next night Harold again bought everything in sight from the campus gold-brick peddlers.