The Grammar School Boys in Summer Athletics.

by H. Irving Hanc.o.c.k.

Chapter I

A JOLT ON A QUIET DAY

"There's just one thing that I keep thinking about on a day like this," Dave Darrin sighed contentedly.

"What's that?" Tom Reade wanted to know. "Supper?"

Darrin turned, favoring Reade with a flash of disgust from his large, dark eyes.

"I'm still waiting for the information," insisted Tom after a short pause.

"You may as well wait," retorted Dave. "You wouldn't understand what I feel, anyway. Any fellow who can keep his mind on supper, on a grand June day like this-----"

"I imagine that you'll keep your mind on the meal when you reach the table," predicted Tom, grinning.

"That'll be time enough," Dave rejoined. "But I'm not going to profane the woods, on a perfect June day, by thinking of kitchen odors."

"Say, aren't you feeling well?" asked Tom gravely.

"That's just the point, I guess," broke in d.i.c.k Prescott, with a light laugh. "Dave is feeling so extremely well and happy-----"

"Now, you're shouting," Darrin a.s.sented. "But it's no use for poor Reade to ponder over the glories of nature. All he can think of is the region bounded by his belt."

"Glories of nature?" repeated Reade. "If that's what you're talking about, why didn't you announce your subject earlier? Yes, sir; nature is at her greenest best to-day. Just look off through that line of trees, and see how the light breeze moves the tops in that field of young corn, and-----"

"Corn?" flared Dave. "Something to eat, of course! Tom, you're hopeless when it comes to the finer things of life. You ought to have been born in a pen, close to a well-filled trough. Corn, indeed!"

"This country would probably be bankrupt if there were no corn crop, and you'd be digging hard for a living, instead of being a lazy schoolboy," retorted Reade, with an indulgent smile. "Let me see; how many hundred million dollars did Old Dut tell us the annual corn crop brings in wealth to this country?"

All of the other boys, save Dave, glanced at Tom, but all shook their heads. Statistics do not mix well in a Grammar School boy's head.

"Oh, well, it was a lot of money, anyway," Tom pursued his subject.

"I wouldn't mind having all the money that the American corn crop brings."

"So you could buy the fanciest kinds of food, I suppose?" jeered Dave Darrin.

"Never mind, Darry; if I had a lot of money I'd buy you the biggest and softest mattress I could find, so that you'd have nothing to do but lie off by yourself, look up at the green leaves and dream your summers away. That lying on your back and looking up at the sky is what you call reverie, isn't it?"

"Quit your kidding!" ordered Dave.

"Is it reverie?" asked Harry Hazelton, "or just plain laziness that ails Dave?"

"Laziness, of course," laughed Tom. "Dave, I guess Harry has more sense in naming things than any of us. Yes; that's it!

And d.i.c.k thought it was merely poetic temperament."

"Temperament? What's that?" grinned Dan Dalzell. "Is that what you get in June by adding up the column of figures in the thermometer?"

To signify his lack of interest in the talk, Darrin rolled over on his side, turning his gaze away from the other boys. In another minute Dave's eyes were closed, his lips open and his breath coming regularly and audibly.

Such was the droning effect of the warm June breezes on this glorious afternoon.

"Give Dave the chorus of 'He Was the Sleepiest Boy,'" whispered Greg to the others. "Put a lot of steam into every line!"

At a sign from young Holmes the drowsy chorus rolled out, punctuated by timely yawns.

Darry rolled over, yawning, too, an easy-going smile on his face.

"Greg," he charged, "I'm certain that you put the crowd up to that outrage. When I summon up energy enough I'm going to thrash you."

"All right," agreed Greg, "I'll take boxing lessons within a year or two, so as to be prepared for you."

"I wish this were to-morrow afternoon," grumbled Harry Hazelton.

"I'm glad it's to-day," sighed Dave easily.

"But to-morrow will be Monday, and we can play baseball."

"And just because to-morrow will be Monday," retorted Dave, "Old Dut will expect us to bring in those fifteen examples in insurance."

"We'll be all past that, by afternoon," Dan broke in. "Then, as soon as the bell rings to dismiss school, we'll all pile outside and have a ripping practice on the diamond."

"Yes; we'll have to get a lot of practice," d.i.c.k a.s.sented. "Otherwise, you know, the North Grammar will just wipe up the field with us Wednesday afternoon."

"The North Grammar!" sniffed Greg scornfully. "Hi Martin's crowd?

Huh!"

"Those North Grammar boys have been practising," d.i.c.k insisted.

"Hard work is what tells in athletics."

"Well, hang it, didn't you keep us running all through the spring?"

demanded Dalzell. "Didn't you say that would put us away at the top in Grammar School baseball?"

"It will help us a long way," a.s.sented d.i.c.k. "Yet it won't do everything. Each of us has to be as nearly perfect as possible in the position that he has to play. That's why we really need a lot more practice than we've had on the real field."

"The worst of it is" suggested Tom, "that we've got all of the best players in the school on our regular nine, and the scrub nine isn't made up of fellows who can really give us any work."

"Don't croak, d.i.c.k," begged Dave. "This day is too perfect to have it spoiled by any calamity howling."

Presently Darrin rolled over on his side once more. Greg took a peep, became suspicious, and started to hum:

"He was the Sleepiest Boy."

Smack! came a small sod, with which Dave had slyly provided himself in advance.