CHAPTER V
THE TABLES TURNED
"Well, Joe, what do you think about it?" Tom Davis glanced at his chumacross the room as he asked this question. It was several hours afterthe snow battle, and the two lads were studying, or making a pretense atit.
"Think about what, Tom?"
"Oh, you know what I mean--what happened to-day, and how it's going toaffect your chances for the nine. They look rather slim, don't they?"
"Well, Tom, I don't mind admitting that they do. I didn't know Hiram wassuch a high-mucky-muck in baseball here. But there's no use crying overspilled milk. He and I would have had a clash sooner or later, anyhow,and it might as well be first as last."
"It's too blamed bad though," went on Tom.
"Yes," agreed Joe, "especially as I picked out Excelsior Hall becausetheir nine had so many victories to its credit, and because it had agood reputation. That's what partly induced you to come here, too, Iguess."
"Well, yes, in a way. Of course I like baseball, but I'm not so crazyafter it as you are. Maybe that's why I'm not such a good player. If Ican hold down first, or play out in the field, it suits me; but you----"
"I want to be pitcher or nothing," interrupted Joe with a smile, "butI'm afraid I'm a long way from the box now."
"Yes, from what I can hear, Hiram has the inside track in the baseballgame. He's manager chiefly because he puts up a lot of money for theteam, and because his friends, what few he has, are officers in theorganization."
"Who's captain?" asked Joe. "Maybe I could induce him to let me playeven if Hiram is down on me."
"Nothing doing there," replied Tom quickly. "Luke Fodick is captain, or,rather he was last year, I hear, and he's slated for the same positionthis season. Luke and Hiram are as thick as such fellows always are.When Hiram is hit Luke does the boo-hoo act for him. No, Luke will bedown on you as much as his crony is. But maybe we can get up a secondnine, and play some games on our own hook!"
"None of that!" Joe exclaimed quickly. "I'm not an insurgent. I playwith the regulars or not at all. They'd be saying all sorts of thingsagainst me if you and I tried to start an opposition team."
"That's so. Still it mightn't be a bad idea, under the circumstances, tohave another team, if it wasn't for what the school would say."
"What do you mean?"
"Why, Excelsior got dumped in the interscholastic league last season.They play for the blue banner you know--a sort of prize trophy--and itwas won by Morningside Academy, which now holds it. That's why I say itmight be a good thing to have some more ginger in the team here. I knowyou could put it in, after the way you pitched on the Silver Stars whenthey licked the Resolutes."
"Well, it can't be done I'm afraid," Joe rejoined. "There can only beone first team in a school, and I don't want to disrupt things or playsecond fiddle. If I can't get on the nine I'll have to stay off, that'sall. But it's going to be mighty tough to sit still and watch the otherfellows play, and all the while just itching to get hold of theball--mighty tough," and Joe gazed abstractedly about the room.
"I wish I could help you, old man, but I can't," said Tom. "I supposethis clash with Hiram had to come but I do wish it had held off untilafter the season opened. Once you were on the nine you could show thefellows what stuff you had in your pitching arm, and then Hiram and Lukecould do their worst, but they couldn't get you off the team."
"That's nice of you to say, but I don't know about it," remarked Joe."Well, I'm about done studying. I wish----"
But he did not finish the sentence, for there came a knock on thedoor--a pre-arranged signal in a certain code of raps, showing that oneof their classmates stood without.
"Wait a minute," called Tom, as he went to open the door.
His quick view through the crack showed the smiling faces of Teeter andPeaches, and there was an audible sigh of relief from Joe's roommate.For Tom had fallen behind in his studies of late, and had been warnedthat any infractions of the rules might mean his suspension for a weekor two.
"Gee, you took long enough to open the door," complained Teeter,"especially considering what we have with us."
"Don't you mean 'whom' you have with you?" asked Joe, nodding towardPeaches.
"No, I mean 'what,'" insisted Teeter with a grin as he unbuttoned hiscoat and brought into view several pies, and a couple of packages doneup in paper.
"Oh, that's the game, is it?" asked Joe with a laugh.
"And there's more to it," added Peaches, as he produced two bottles fromthe legs of his trousers. "This is the best strawberry pop that can bebought. We'll have a feast as is a feast; eh, fellows?"
"Lock the door!" exclaimed Tom, and he did it himself, being nearest toit. "There may be confiscating spirits abroad in the land to-night."
"Old Sixteen is abroad, anyhow," spoke Teeter with a laugh, "but I guesswe'll be safe. I have a scheme, if worst comes to worst."
"What is it?" asked Joe.
"You'll see when the time comes--if it does. 'Now, on with the dance--letjoy be unconfined!' Open the pop, Peaches, and don't sample it untilwe're all ready. Got any glasses, you fellows? This is a return game forthe treat you gave us the other night."
"Then we'll find the glasses all right," spoke Joe with a laugh. "Butwhat's your game, not to let old Sixteen catch us at this forbiddenmidnight feast? Have you dummies in your beds?"
"Not a dum. But watch my smoke."
From the parcels he carried, Teeter produced what looked to bebooks--books, as attested by the words on their covers--books dealingwith Latin, and the science of physics.
"There are our plates," he said as he laid the books down on the table.Then Joe and Tom saw that the books were merely covers pasted over asort of box into which a whole pie could easily be put. "Catch theidea," went on Teeter. "We are eating in here, which is against therules, worse luck. But, perchance, some monitor or professor knocksunexpectedly. Do we have to hustle and scramble to conceal ourrefreshments? Answer--we do not. What do we do?"
"Answer," broke in Peaches. "We merely slip our pie or sandwiches orwhatever it happens to be, inside our 'books,' and go right on studying.Catch on?"
"I should say we did!" exclaimed Joe. "That's great!"
"But what about the bottles of strawberry pop?" asked Tom. "We can'thide them in the fake books."
"No, I've another scheme for that," went on Teeter. "Show 'em, Peaches."
Thereupon Peaches proceeded to extract the corks from the bottles ofliquid refreshment. From the packages Teeter had brought he took someother corks. They had glass tubes through them, two tubes for each cork.And on one tube in each cork was a small rubber hose.
"There!" exclaimed Teeter as Peaches put the odd corks in the bottles."We can pour out the pop with neatness and dispatch into our glasses andat the same time, should any one unexpectedly enter, why--we are onlyconducting an experiment in generating oxygen or hydrogen gas. Thebottles are the retorts, and we can pretend our glasses are to receivethe gas. How's that?"
"All to the horse radish!" cried Joe in delight.
"Then proceed," ordered Teeter with a laugh; and when all was inreadiness each lad sat with a fake book near him, into which he couldslip his piece of pie at a moment's warning, while on the table stoodthe bottles of pop with the tubes and hose extending from theircorks--truly a most scientific-looking array of flasks and glassware.
"Now let's talk," suggested Teeter, biting generously into a pie. "Thatwas a great fight we had to-day, all right."
"And there might have been one of a different kind," added Peaches."Hear anything more from Hiram, Joe?"
"No, I don't expect to--until the next time, and then I suppose we'llhave it out."
"I guess Joe's goose is cooked as far as getting on the nine isconcerned," ventured Tom.
"Sure thing," agreed Peaches.
"Yet we're going to need a new pitcher," went on Teeter. "Probably twoof 'em?"
"How's that?" asked Tom interestedly.
"Why Rutherford, our star man of las
t year, graduated, and he's gone toPrinceton or Yale. Madison, the substitute who was pretty good in apinch game, graduated, too; but we thought he was coming back for anextra course in Latin. I heard to-day that he isn't, and so that meanswe'll have to have two new box-men. There might be a show for Joe."
"Forget it!" advised Peaches. "Not the way Hiram and Luke feel. Theywent off by themselves right after supper to-night, and I heard themsaying something about Joe here, but I couldn't catch what it was. Oh,they're down on him all right, for Joe backed Hiram to a standstillto-day, and that hasn't happened to the bully in a blue moon."
"Oh, well, I guess I can live if I don't get on the nine my first seasonhere," spoke Joe. "I'll keep on trying though."
Thus the talk went on, chiefly about baseball, and gradually thestrawberry pop was lowered in the bottles, and the pie was nearlyconsumed.
"Guess you had all your trouble for nothing, Teeter," remarked Tom. "Wearen't going to be interrupted to-night."
Hardly had he spoken than there was the faint rattle of the door knob.It was as if some one had tried it to see if the portal was unlockedbefore knocking. Slight as the noise was, the lads heard it.
"Quick! On the job!" whispered Teeter. He crammed the rest of his pieinto the fake book, as did the others.
"Study like blazes!" was Teeter's next order.
There came a knock at the door.
"Young gentlemen have you any visitors?" demanded the ominous voice ofProfessor Rodd.
Teeter placed the ends of the rubber tubes one in each of two glassesbefore Joe could answer.
"I heard voices in there--more than two voices," went on the Latininstructor grimly, "and I demand that you open the door before I sendfor Dr. Fillmore and the janitor."
Tom slid to the portal and unlocked it. Professor Rodd stepped into theroom and his stern gaze took in the two visitors. But he also sawsomething else that surprised him.
On the table was apparatus that very much resembled some used forexperiments in the physics class. And, wonder of wonders, each of thefour lads held a book in his hand--a book that the merest glance showedto be either a Latin grammar or a treatise on chemistry.
"What--why----?" faltered the professor.
"_Aliqui--aliquare--aliqua_," recited Teeter in a sing-song declensionvoice. "_Aliquorum--aliquarum--aliquorum._" Then he pretended to look upsuddenly, as if just aware of the presence of the instructor.
"Oh, good evening, Professor Rodd," said Teeter calmly.
"What does this mean?" exclaimed the teacher. "Don't you know it isagainst the rules for students to visit in each others' rooms afterhours without permission?"
"I knew it was--that is for anything but study," replied Teeter frankly."I didn't think you minded if we helped each other with our Latin." Oh!what an innocent look was on his face!
"Oh!--er--um--and you are studying Latin?" asked the professor, while apleased smile replaced his frown.
"Yes, Professor," put in Peaches. "And I can't seem to remember, norfind, what the neuter plural accusative of 'some' is. I have gone as faras _aliquos--aliquas_, but----"
"_Aliqua--aliqua!_" exclaimed the Professor quickly. "You ought not toforget that. We had it in class the other day."
"Oh, yes, so we did!" exclaimed Teeter. "I just remember now; don't you,Joe?"
"Yes," murmured Joe, wondering whether or not they had turned the tableson the teacher.
"I am glad to see you so studious," went on Mr. Rodd. "And I see you donot neglect your physics, either. Ah--er--what is the red liquid in thebottles," and he looked at what remained of the strawberry pop.
It was the question Tom and Joe had feared would be asked. But Teeterwas equal to the emergency.
"Professor," he asked innocently, "isn't there some rule regarding_quis_ used in the indefinite in connection with _aliquis_?"
"Yes, and I am glad you spoke of that," said Mr. Rodd quickly, rubbinghis hands, much pleased that he had a chance to impart some Latininformation. "_Quis_ indefinite is found in the following compounds:_aliquis_--someone; _si quis_, if any; _ne quis_, lest any; _ecquis_,_num quis_, whether any. I am very glad you brought that up. I willspeak of it in class to-morrow. But I must go now."
The boys began to breathe easier and Teeter, who had been whisperingdeclensions to himself, left off.
"Oh, by the way," spoke the Professor, as if he had just thought of it:"I don't mind you boys studying together, if you don't stay up toolate. But it is better to ask permission. However, I will speak to Dr.Fillmore about it, and it will be all right from now on. I am pleasedthat some of my students are so painstaking. I wish more were."
With a bow he left them and they tried not to give way to theirexultation until he was far down the corridor.
"Say, talk about pulling off a stunt! We did it all right!" exclaimedJoe.
"I should say yes," agreed the others.
Baseball Joe on the School Nine; or, Pitching for the Blue Banner Page 5