The Purple Pennant/Chapter 16
THAT Sunday evening there was an informal meeting at Guy Felker's house in the interests of the Track Team. Guy had asked a half-dozen fellows to come and talk over affairs, and Lanny, Harry Partridge, Arthur Beaton and Toby Sears had responded. Orson Kirke had excused himself by telephone and Jack Toll had simply failed to appear. Toby Sears was Senior Class President, the School's best broad-jumper and a fair quarter-miler. Sears was eighteen and a rather earnest chap on whose judgment the school always placed the utmost reliance. It was Sears who was talking now.
"What Guy has said is just about so. There isn't now and never has been enough interest in track and field athletics with us. Every year it's been increasingly difficult to get fellows to come out for the team. Considering the lack of material we've had to contend with, I think we've done very well. But this spring a lot of us have been hoping that things would be easier for the captain and the coach, for we want to make this year's victory over Springdale decisive. But, as Guy has told us, as things stand now the team is very one-sided. That is, we've got a lot of candidates for the field events and mighty few for the track. And here it is the first of May and the Springdale meet is little over a month off. Even if we found fellows now to come out and work for track positions there is scarcely time to develop them. And, for my part, I doubt that we can get any. Guy made a pretty good canvass of the school last month and I think he's got hold of about all the talent there is. Seems to me, then, that the only thing to do is for us fellows to see if we can't come to the rescue and round out the team better. I've never run a half-mile in competition and don't know what I could do, but I'm willing to try. That would give me three events but if they didn't come too close together I guess I could manage them. And it seems to me that there are others who could attempt more than they are attempting now. How about you, Harry? You're down for the shot and hammer, aren't you?"
"Yes, but I'll try anything once, Toby. The trouble is that I don't think I'm good for anything else, and a month is short time to learn new tricks."
"Well, you know what you can do and can't do. Still, I think that some others of us could double up, so to speak. We haven't but one miler on the team, as you know. Smith is doing his best, but unless he travels faster than he did last year he won't get a point. Springdale, from what I can learn, is especially strong this year at the mile, half and quarter and we've got to get some seconds and thirds in those events to have a chance at winning. Presser is willing to do all he possibly can, but he can't turn out runners if he isn't given material to work on. So, as I've said, it seems to me it would be a good plan to induce some of the fellows who are trying for field events to go in for track work. I don't suppose it's possible to take, say, a chap who has never done anything but jumping and make a good half-miler of him in a month, but if we can make him good enough to capture a third we're helping our chances."
"I think that's a splendid idea," said Captain Felker. "Of course, there are some of us who couldn't take up more than we are taking. I, for one. I'd be willing enough, but you simply can't run sprints or distances and do yourself justice at the pole-vault. Besides that, the arrangement of events interferes. But I do think there are fellows on the team who will be willing to enter two or, in some cases, even three events. I wish we could get up some enthusiasm for the mile and the half-mile. Fellows seem to hold off from those events as if they were poison. I dare say they think they're harder work. In a way they are, or, at least, they require a more sustained effort than the sprints and hurdles. And speaking of hurdles, we need a bigger field there. Lanny's got all he can manage with the sprints, although he intends to try the high hurdles too. The only fellow we have in sight now for the low sticks is Arthur here. We ought to have four men for every event on the program, and that's the truth of it."
"I'm willing to try the sprints if you think it will do any good," said Arthur Beaton. "I might push some Springdale fellow out in the trials, anyway."
"I'd suggest," said Partridge, "that Guy and Skeet get together and go over the list and see what can be done in the way you suggest, Toby. As I said before, I'll try anything anyone wants me to. Anything, that is, except the pole-vault. I don't want to break my neck!"
"There are about ten fellows trying for the sprints," said Lanny. "We don't need more than half of them. Why can't some of them be turned into hurdlers, Guy? Any fellow who can do the hundred on the flat can do it over the sticks if he's once shown how."
"Sure he can," agreed Harry. "Call a meeting of the candidates, Guy, and tell each one what's expected of him. Don't just say, 'Will you do this?' but tell 'em they've got to! Get Toby to talk to 'em and put some pep in 'em. Make 'em understand that we've got to lick Springdale next month and that"
"The trouble is," interrupted Lanny, "that the fellows don't take track athletics seriously. It's got to be sort of the style to smile when you mention the subject. We've run so to football and baseball that we don't think anything else is worth while. Even the fellows who are on the team go around with a half-apologetic grin, as much as to say, 'I'm on the Track Team. Isn't it a joke?' What ought to be done in this school is to get track athletics back where they belong as a major sport."
"And the best way to do that," said Sears, "is to everlastingly wallop Springdale."
"Yes, but"
"I think there ought to be more incentive for fellows to come out for the team," said Harry Partridge. "Of course, if a chap is fond of running or jumping or hurdling he's going to do it without persuasion, but there are lots of fellows, I guess, who have the making of good track or field men who don't realize it and don't think about it. Of course, it's too late this year, but next"
"Well, it's this year that's worrying me," broke in Guy. "Whoever comes after me can bother about next year."
"Still," said Sears earnestly, "we've got to work for the future as well as the present; or we should anyway. I've sometimes wondered if we couldn't enlarge the interest by holding a meet about the middle of the season, a handicap meet between classes. Once get a fellow interested and if he has anything in him he wants to get it out. And so he keeps on."
"That's a good scheme," agreed Guy. "Funny we've never thought of it. But it's too late for this spring. What we might do, though, is to hold an open meet and work up some enthusiasm that way. It would be a good thing, anyway, for the team."
"Couldn't we get a meet with some other school?" asked the manager. "Highland Hall or someone."
"Guy's scheme would answer the same purpose," said Sears. "We could talk it up, get the candidates themselves interested in it and get the school interested, too. It might show us some material we didn't know of. Some fellows will do stunts in competition that they wouldn't think of in practice."
"Ought to be prizes, I suppose," said Lanny. "How about it?"
"Ought to be, yes," agreed Guy; "but where'd we get them? There isn't enough money to fix the track up decently."
"Instead of individual prizes for each event," offered Manager Beaton, "we might have a single prize for the best performance, or something like that."
That was discussed and eventually abandoned. As Guy pointed out, it would be a mighty difficult matter to decide which was the best performance and the awarding of the prize might lead to a lot of dissatisfaction amongst the less fortunate contenders. "We don't need prizes," he said. "We'll publish the names of the winners and that will be enough."
"Arthur's idea might be used, though," said Sears thoughtfully, "in the Springdale meet. How would it do to have some sort of a trophy to go to the fellow winning the most points for us?"
"What sort of a trophy?" asked Lanny.
"Well, nothing expensive, of course. It would be something to work for, and just now, when we want to induce fellows to take up new stuff, it mightn't be a bad idea to give them something—er—tangible to go after. Maybe just a pewter mug would do."
"Suppose two or three fellows scored the same number of points?" asked Arthur. "That might easily happen, mightn't it?"
"Yes, I suppose it might." Sears considered. "Then let each have possession of the mug for a certain time."
"Oh, your idea is to have the thing competed for each year?"
"Yes, don't you think so?"
"Tell you what," said Lanny. "Get some of the girls to make a stunning purple banner—no, pennant—and give it to the fellow who does the best work for us, as Toby suggests. In case two or more win the same number of points, take into consideration the fellows' performances. If two chaps each won, say, eight points for us, the one who made the better record for his event would get the flag. And then let him keep it and we'll find a new one for next year. Call it the Track Trophy and have it understood that, next to the Victoria Cross, it's the biggest honor you can win!"
"That's all right," assented Harry Partridge, "but it strikes me that a silver or even a pewter mug would make more of a hit than a pennant."
"I don't think so," responded Lanny. "Besides," he added, with a smile, "that mug would cost us money, and the pennant won't!" The others laughed.
"Still," said Arthur Beaton, "a few of us might dig down for it. You can get a pretty good-looking mug for three dollars."
"Speak for yourself, old scout," protested Guy. "I'm poorer than the Athletic Committee, and that's pretty poor! Let's make it a pennant. It doesn't matter what it is, really, so long as it is understood that the thing's worth winning. It could be made of silk and have a suitable inscription on it, like 'For Valor' No, that wouldn't do. 'For Worth?' 'For'"
"For Instance," laughed Lanny. "Never mind an inscription. Just have 'C. H. S.' on it."
"With a winged foot," suggested Arthur.
"Then if I won it throwing the hammer," said Harry Partridge, "it wouldn't be what you'd call appropriate, would it?"
"In a general way" began Arthur.
"I've got it," interrupted Lanny. "A purple silk pennant with a green laurel wreath inclosing the letters 'C. H. S.' in white. How's that?"
"Sounds mighty good-looking," replied Sears, and the rest agreed. Guy Felker, however, was a trifle impatient of the subject.
"We can find a design easy enough later," he said. "The question is whether it's worth doing."
"It certainly is," asserted Sears, and the others agreed.
"Anything that will convince the fellows that it's worth while trying to do all they can for the team, is worth doing," said Lanny decidedly. "Remember, Guy, that you and Skeet have got to persuade chaps to go in for stunts they've never tried, in many cases."
"But won't it look," asked Arthur, "as if we were offering this pennant just to—to"
"I get your idea," said Lanny. "How would it do if we kept out of it and let the girls offer it? We might suggest it to them and let them do the whole thing. Louise Brent would be a good one to start it up."
"That's better," said Guy. "We'll keep out of it entirely. Suppose you attend to the—the negotiations, Lanny. You're a popular chap with the ladies!"
"Let Toby do it," Lanny replied.
"It is moved and seconded that Lanny be appointed a committee of one to negotiate with Louise Brent in the matter of a purple silk pennant. All those in favor will so signify by raising their right hands. One, two, three, four. It is a vote, gentlemen." Toby bowed gravely to Lanny.
"All right," laughed the latter. "It's all up when Toby's in the chair, anyway! Any other business before the meeting, Guy?"
"No, I guess not. We'll see what can be done with persuading the fellows to try new stunts. Maybe it'll work out fine. I hope so. Much obliged for coming around, anyhow. I was getting a bit discouraged, to tell the honest truth. Skeet's been growling for days and wanting to know how I expected him to make a team out of nothing. And the trouble was I couldn't tell him! You fellows needn't run off so early, though."
"I'm going home and pile into bed," replied Lanny gravely. "From now on I shall take the very best care of myself because, you see, I mean to get that purple pennant."
"You?" jeered Harry Partridge. "You haven't the ghost of a show, you old tow-head! I only have to close my eyes to see that thing hanging over my mantel!"
"Huh! Open 'em again and wake up! Good-night, all!"