Chapter 15

HICKS HAS A "HUNCH"

"Ladies and gentlemen, Seniors, Juniors, Sophomores, human beings, and--_Freshmen_! Mr. Thomas Haviland Hicks, Jr., the Olympic High-Jump Champion, holder of the World's record, and winner at the Panama-Pacific International Exposition National Championships, in his event, is about to high jump! The bar is at five feet, ten inches. Mr. Hicks is the Herculean athlete in the crazy-looking bathrobe."

T. Haviland Hicks, Jr., his splinter-structure enshrouded in that flamboyant bathrobe of vast proportions and insane colors, that inevitably attended his athletic efforts, shaming Joseph's coat-of-many-colors, gazed despairingly at his good friend, Butch Brewster, and Track-Coach Brannigan, with a Cheshire cat grin on his cherubic countenance.

"It's no use, Butch, it's no use!" quoth he, with ludicrous indignation, as big Tug Cardiff, the behemoth shot-putter, through a huge megaphone imitated a Ballyhoo Bill, and roared his absurd announcement to the hilarious crowd of collegians in the stand. "Old Bannister will _never_ take my athletic endeavors seriously. Here I have won two second places, and a third, in the high-jump this season, and have a splendid show to annex _first_ place and my track B in the Intercollegiates, but--hear them!"

It was a balmy, sunshiny afternoon in late May. The sunny-souled, happy-go-lucky T. Haviland Hicks, Jr., had trained indefatigably for the high jump, with the result that he had won several points for his team--however, he had not realized his great ambition of first place, and his track letter.

As Hicks now exclaimed to his team-mate and Coach Brannigan, no matter, to the howling Bannister youths, if he _had_ won three places in the high jump, in regularly scheduled meets; his comrades had been jeering at his athletic fiascos for nearly four years, and even had Hicks suddenly blossomed out as a star athlete, they would not have abandoned their joyous habit. Still, those football 'Varsity players to whom good Butch had read Hicks, Sr.'s, letters, and explained the sunny youth's persistence, despite his ridiculous failures, though they kept on hailing his appearance on Bannister Field with exaggerated joy, understood the care-free collegian, and loved him for his ambition to please his Dad. Since Hicks had absolutely refused to accept his B, for any sport, unless he won it according to Athletic Association eligibility rules, the eleven had kept secret the contents of the letters Butch Brewster had read to them, for Hicks requested it.

The Bannister College track squad, under Track Coach Brannigan and Captain Spike Robertson, had been training most strenuously for that annual cinder-path classic, the State Intercollegiate Track and Field Championships. The sprinters had been tearing down the two-twenty straightaway like suburban commuters catching the 7.20 A.M. for the city. Hammer-throwers and shot-putters--the weight men--heaved the sixteen-pound shot, or hurled the hammer, with reckless abandon, like the Strong Man of the circus. Pole-vaulters seemed ambitious to break the altitude records, and In so doing, threatened to break their necks; hurdlers skimmed over the standard as lightly as swallows, though no one ever beheld swallows hurdling. The distance runners plodded determinedly around the quarter-mile track, broad-jumpers tried to jump the length of the landing-pit. And T. Haviland Hicks, Jr., vainly essayed to clear five-ten In the high-jump!

It was the last-named event that "broke up the show," as the Phillyloo Bird quaintly stated, somewhat wrongly, since the appearance of that blithesome youth in the offing, his flamboyant bathrobe concealing his shadow-like frame, had _started_ the show, causing the track squad, as well as a hundred spectator-students, to rush for seats in the stand. The arrival of T. Haviland Hicks, Jr., to train for form and height in the high-jump, though a daily occurrence, was always the signal for a Saturnalia of sport at his expense, because--

"You can't live down your athletic past, Hicks!" smiled good-hearted Butch Brewster. "Your making a touchdown for the other eleven, by running the wrong way with the pigskin, your hilarious fiascos in every sport, your home-run with the bases full, on a strike-out-are specters to haunt you. Even now that you have a chance to win your B, just listen to the fellows."

The track squad's "heavy weight--white hope" section, composed of hammer-heavers and shot-putters--Tug Cardiff, Beef McNaughton, Pudge Langdon, Buster Brown, Biff Pemberton, Hefty Hollingsworth, and Bunch Bingham, equipped with megaphones, and with the _basso profundo_ voices nature gave them, lined up on both sides of the jumping-standards, and chanted loudly:

"All hail to T. Haviland Hicks! He runs like a carload of bricks; When to high jump he tries From the ground he can't rise-- For he's built on a pair of toothpicks!"

This saengerfest was greeted with vociferous cheers from the vastly amused youths in the stands, who hailed the grinning Hicks with jeers, cat-calls, whistles, and humorous (so they believed) remarks:

"Say, Hicks, you won't _never_ be able to jump anything but your board-bill!"

"You're built like a grass-hopper, Hicks, but you've done lost the hop!"

"If you keep on improving as you've done lately, you'll make a high-jumper in a hundred more years, old top!"

"You may rise in the world, Hicks, but never in the high jump!"

"Don't mind them, Hicks!" spoke Coach Brannigan, his hands on the happy-go-lucky youth's shoulders. "Listen to me; the Intercollegiates will be the last track meet of your college years, and unless you take first place in your event, you won't win your track B. Second, McQuade, of Hamilton, will do five-eight, and likely an inch higher, so to take first place, you, must do five-ten. You have trained and practiced faithfully this season, but no matter what I do, I _can't_ give you that needed two inches, and--"

"I know it, Coach!" responded the chastened Hicks, throwing aside his lurid bathrobe determinedly, and exposing to the jeering students his splinter-frame. "Leave it to Hicks, I'll clear it this time, or--"

"Not!" fleered Butch, whom Hicks' easy self-confidence never failed to arouse. "Hicks, listen to me, _I_ can tell you why you can't get two inches higher. The whole trouble with you is this; for almost four years you have led an indolent, butterfly, care-free existence, and now, when you must call on yourself for a special effort, you are too lazy! You can dear five-ten; you ought to do it, but you can't summon up the energy. I've lectured you all this time, for your heedless, easy-going ways, and now--you pay for your idle years!"

"You said an encyclopedia, Butch!" agreed the Coach, with vigor. "If only something would just _make_ Hicks jump that high, if only he could do it once, and know it is in his power, he could do it in the Intercollegiates, aided by excitement and competition! Let something _scare_ him so that he will sail over five-ten, and--he will win his B. He has the energy, the build, the spring, and the form, but as you say, he is so easy-going and lazy, that his natural grass-hopper frame avails him naught."

"Here I go!" announced Hicks, who, to an accompaniment of loud cheers from the stand, had been jogging up and down in that warming-up process known to athletes as the in place run, consisting of trying to dislocate one's jaw by bringing the knees, alternately, up against the chin. "Up and over--that's my slogan. Just watch Hicks."

Starting at a distance of twenty yards from the high-jump standards, on which the cross-bar rested at five feet, ten inches, T. Haviland Hicks, Jr., who vastly resembled a grass-hopper, crept toward the jumping-pit, on his toe-spikes, as though hoping to catch the cross-bar off its guard. Advancing ten yards, he learned apparently that his design was discovered, so he started a loping gallop, turning to a quick, mad sprint, as though he attempted to jump over the bar before it had time to rise higher. With a beautiful take-off, a splendid spring--a quick, writhing twist in air, and two spasmodic kicks, the whole being known as the scissors form of high jump, the mosquito-like youth made a strenuous effort to clear the needed height, but--one foot kicked the cross-bar, and as Hicks fell flat on his back, in the soft landing-pit, the wooden rod, In derision, clattered down upon his anatomy.

"Foiled again!" hissed Hicks, after the fashion of a "Ten-Twent'-Thirt'" melodrama-villain, while from the exuberant youths in the grandstand, who really wanted Hicks to clear the bar, but who jeered at his failure, nevertheless, sounded:

"Hire a derrick, Hicks, and hoist yourself over the bar!"

"Your _head_ is light enough--your feet weigh you down!"

"'Crossing the Bar'--rendered by T. Haviland Hicks, Jr.!"

"Going up! Go play checkers, Hicks, you ain't no athlete!"

While the grinning, albeit chagrined T, Haviland Hicks, Jr., reposed gracefully on his back, staring up at the cross-bar, which someone kindly replaced on the pegs, big Butch Brewster, who seemed suddenly to have gone crazy, tried to attract Coach Brannigan's attention. Succeeding, Butch--usually a grave, serious Senior, winked, contorted his visage hideously, pointed at Hicks, and sibilated, "_Now_, Coach--now is your chance! Tell Hicks--"

Tug Cardiff, Biff Pemberton, Hefty Hollingsworth, Bunch Bingham, Buster Brown, Beef McNaughton, and Pudge Langdon, who had been attacked in a fashion similar to Butch's spasm, concealed grins of delight, and made strenuous efforts to appear guileless, as Track-Coach Brannigan approached T. Haviland Hicks, Jr. To that cheery youth, who was brushing the dirt from his immaculate track togs, and bowing to the cheering youths in the stand, the Coach spoke:

"Hicks," he said sternly, "you need a cross-country jog, to get more strength and power in your limbs! Now, I am going to send the Heavy-Weight-White-Hope Brigade for a four-mile run, and you go with them. Oh, don't protest; they are all shot-putters and hammer-throwers, but Butch, and they can't run fast enough to give a tortoise a fast heat. Take 'em out two miles and back, Butch, and jog all the way; don't let 'em loaf! Off with you."

The unsuspecting Hicks might have detected the nigger in the woodpile, had he not been so anxious to make five-ten in the high-jump. However, willing to jog with these behemoths, with whom even he could keep pace, so as to develop more jumping power, the blithesome youth cast aside his garish bathrobe, pranced about in what he fatuously believed was Ted Meredith's style, and howled:

"Follow Hicks! All out for the Marathon--we're off! One--two--three--_go_!"

With the excited, track squad, non-athletes, and the baseball crowd, which had ceased the game to watch the start, yelling, cheering, howling, and whistling, T. Haviland Hicks, Jr., drawing his knees up in exaggerated style at every stride, started to lead the Heavy-Weight-White-Hope-Brigade on its cross-country run. Without wondering why Coach Brannigan had suddenly elected to send _him_ along with the hammer-throwers and shot-putters, on the jog, and not having seen the insane facial contortions of the Brigade, before the Coach gave orders, the gladsome Senior started forth in good spirits, resembling a tugboat convoying a fleet of battleships.

"'Yo! Ho! Yo! Ho! And over the country we go!'" warbled Hicks, as the squad left Bannister Field, and jogged across a green meadow. "'--O'er hill and dale, through valley and vale, Yo! Ho! Yo! Ho! Yo! Ho!'"

"Save your wind, you insect!" growled Butch Brewster, with sinister significance that escaped the heedless Hicks, as the behemoth Butch, a two-miler, swung into the lead. "You'll _need_ it, you fish, before we get back to the campus! Not _too_ fast, you flock of human tortoises. You'll be crawling on hands and knees, if you keep that pace up long!"

A mile and a half passed. Butch, at an easy jog, had led his squad over green pastures, up gentle slopes, and across a plowed field, by way of variety. At length, he left the road on which the pachydermic aggregation had lumbered for some distance, and turned up a long lane, leading to a farm-house. Back of it they periscoped an orchard, with cherry-trees, laden with red and white fruit, predominating. Also, floating toward the collegians on the balmy May air came an ominous sound:

"Woof! Woof! Woof! Bow-wow-wow! Woof!"

"Come on, fellows!" urged Butch Brewster. "We'll jog across old Bildad's orchard and seize some cherries--the old pirate can't catch us, for we are attired for sprinting. Don't they look good?"

"Nothing stirring!" declared Hicks, slangily, but vehemently, as he stopped short in his stride. "Old Bildad has got a bulldog what am as big as the New York City Hall. He had it on the campus last month, you know! Not for mine! I don't go near that house, or swipe no cherries from his trees. If you wish to shuffle off this mortal coil, drive right ahead, but _I_ will await your return here."

T, Haviland Hicks, Jr.'s, dread of dogs, of all sizes, shapes, pedigrees, and breeds, was well known to old Bannister; hence, the Heavy-weights now jeered him unmercifully. Old "Bildad," as the taciturn recluse was called, who lived like a hermit and owned a rich farm, did own a massive bulldog, and a sight of his cruel jaws was a "No Trespass" sign. With great forethought, when cherries began to ripen, the farmer had brought Caesar Napoleon to the campus, exhibited him to the awed youths, and said, "My cherries be for _sale_, not to be _stole_!" which object lesson, brief as it was, to date, had seemed to have the desired effect. Yet--here was Butch proposing that they literally thrust their heads, or other portions of their anatomies, into the jaws of death!

"Well," said Bunch Bingham at last, "I tell you what; we'll jog up to the house and ask old Bildad to _sell_ us some cherries; we can pay him when he comes to the campus with eggs to sell, Come along. Hicks, I'll beard the bulldog in his kennel."

So, dragged along by the bulky hammer-throwers and shot-putters, the protesting T. Haviland Hicks, Jr., in mortal terror of Caesar Napoleon, and the other canine guardians of old Bildad's property, progressed up the lane toward the house.

"I got a hunch," said the reluctant Hicks, sadly, "that things ain't a-comin' out right! In the words of the immortal Somebody-Or-Other, 'This 'ere ain't none o' _my_ doin'; it's a-bein' thrust on me!' All right, my comrades, I'll be the innocent bystander, but heed me--look out for the bulldog!"