Chapter 2

"LEAVE IT TO HICKS"

Head Coach Patrick Henry Corridan, known to toil-tortured Gold and Green football squads from time immemorial as "the Slave-Driver," Captain Butch Brewster, and serious Deacon Radford, the star Bannister quarter-back, foregathered around a table in the Camp Bannister grub-shack.

It was ten-thirty of the morning whose dawn T. Haviland Hicks, Jr., had blithesomely hailed with an impromptu musicale and saengerfest on "Lookout There!" rock, and the football triumvirate were in togs. The squad, over in the bunkhouse, noisily donned gridiron armor for the morning practice, and the pestiferous Hicks was maintaining a mysterious silence, somewhere.

This football trio, on whom rested the responsibility of rounding out a winning Bannister eleven, vastly resembled a coterie of German generals, back of the trenches, studying a war-map. Before them was spread what seemed to be a large checker-board. It was a miniature gridiron, with the chalk-marks painted in white; there were thumb-tacks stuck here and there, some with flat tops painted green and gold, others, representing the enemy, were solid red. The former had names printed on them, Butch, Roddy, Beef, and so on. By sticking these on the board, the three directors of Bannister's football destiny could work out new plays, and originate possible winning lineups.

"We've just got to win the State Championship this season, Coach!" declared Butch, banging the table emphatically, as he stated a self-evident fact. "It's my last year for Old Bannister, and so with Beef and Pudge. I'll give every ounce of strength I possess In every game, to make that pennant float over Bannister Field!"

"Bannister _will_ win it!" vowed the behemoth Beef, his good-natured countenance grim, and his jaw set. "Not for five years has a Gold and Green team won the Championship--not since the year before Butch and I were Freshmen! We've got a splendid bunch of material to build a team with, and--"

"Our biggest problem is this," spoke Coach Corridan, as with a phenomenal display of strength he took Beef McNaughton between thumb and forefinger and placed him on the field. "We must strengthen both line and backfield, for we lost by graduation Babe McCabe, Heavy Hughes, and Jack Merritt. Now, to replace that lost power--"

Just then, from directly beneath the open window by which they had gathered, like the midnight serenade of a romantic lover, sounded the well-known foghorn voice of T. Haviland Hicks, Jr., as to the plunkety-plunk of a banjo accompaniment, he warbled melodiously:

"Gone are the days--I used to spend with Car-o-li-nah! She had the sunshine in her laughter (_plunkety-plunk_) Just like that state they named her after--"

"_Hicks_!" announced Butch, stealthily approaching the window, and beckoning his companions. "Easy--look at him, Deke, there he is, Hicks, the irrepressible! We might as well attempt to stab a rhinocerous to death with a humming-bird's feather, as to try and reform _him_!"

Arrayed like a lily of the field, a model of sartorial splendor, Hicks occupied a chair beneath the window, tilted back gracefully against the side of the grub-shack. He had decked his splinter-structure with a dazzling Palm Beach suit, and a glorious pink silk shirt, off-set by a lurid scarf. A Panama hat decorated his head, white Oxfords and flamboyant hosiery adorned his feet, while the inevitable Cheshire cat grin beautified his cherubic countenance. A latest "best seller" was propped on his knees, and as he perused its thrilling pages, he carelessly strummed his beloved banjo, and in stentorian tones chanted a sentimental ballad:

"Gone are the days--the golden days I'm dreaming of, I think I hear her softly calling (plunkety-plunk) 'Will you be back? Will you be back? (plunk-plunk) Back to the Car-o-li-nah you love?'"(plunkety-plunk),

For three golden campus years T. Haviland Hicks, Jr., had gayly pursued the even tenor (or _basso_, since he possessed a foghorn, subterranean voice) of his Bannister career. He absolutely refused to take life seriously, and he was forever arousing the wrath--mostly pretended, for no one could be really angry with the genial youth--of his comrades, by twanging his banjo and roaring out rollicking ballads at all hours. He was never so happy as when entertaining a crowd of happy students in his cozy quarters, or escorting a Hicks' Personally Conducted expedition downtown for a Beef-Steak Bust, at his expense, at Jerry's, the rendezvous of hungry collegians.

However, despite his butterfly existence, Hicks, possessed of a scintillating mind, always set the scholastic pace for 1919, by means of occasional study-sprints, as he characteristically called them. But when it came to helping his beloved Dad realize a long-cherished ambition to behold his only son and heir shatter Hicks, Sr.'s, celebrated athletic records, it was a different story. T. Haviland Hicks, Jr., ever since he committed the farcical _faux pas_ of running the wrong way with the pigskin in the Freshman-Sophomore football contest of his first year, had been a super-colossal athletic joke at old Bannister.

His record to date, beside that reverse touchdown that won for the Sophomores, consisted of scoring a home-run with the bases congested, on a strike-out; of smashing hurdles and cross-bars on the track; endangering his heedless career with the shot and hammer; and making a ridiculous farce of every event he entered, to the vast hilarity of the students, who, with the exception of Butch Brewster, had no idea his ridiculous efforts were in earnest. In the high-jump, however, Hicks had given considerable promise, which to date the grasshopper collegian had failed to keep.

Hicks, the lovable, impulsive, and irrepressible, with his invariable sunny disposition, his generous nature, and his democratic, loyal comradeship for everybody, was loved by old Bannister. The students forgave him his pestersome ways, his frequent torturing of them with banjo-twanging and rollicking ballads. His classmates idolized him, Juniors and Sophomores were his true friends, and entering Freshmen always regarded this happy-go-lucky youth as a demigod of the campus.

Big Butch Brewster, who was forever futilely lecturing the heedless Hicks, thrust his head from the grub-shack window, fought down a grin, and sternly arraigned his graceless comrade:

"Hicks, you frivolous, campus-cluttering, infinitesimal atom of nothing, you labor under the insane delusion that college life is a continuous vaudeville show. You absolutely refuse to take your Bannister years seriously, you banjo-thumping, pillow-punishing, campus-torturing nonentity. You will never grasp the splendid opportunities within your reach! You have no ambition but to strum that banjo, roar ridiculous songs, fuss up like a tailor's dummy, and pester your comrades, or drag them down to Jerry's for the eats! You won't be earnest, you Human Cipher, Before you entered Bannister, you formed your ideas and ideals of campus life from colored posters, moving-pictures, magazine stories, and stage dramas like 'Brown of Harvard'; you have surely lived up, or down, to those ideals, you--"

"Them's harsh words, Butch!" joyously responded the grinning Hicks, unchastened, for he knew good Butch Brewster would not, for a fortune, have him forsake his care-free nature. "Thou loyal comrade of my happy campus years, what wouldst thou of me?--have me don sack-cloth and ashes, strike 'The Funeral March' on my golden lyre, and cry out in anguish, _'ai! ai_! 'Nay, nay, a couple of nays; college years are all too brief; hence I shall, by my own original process, extract from them all the sunshine and happiness possible, and by my wonderful musical and vocal powers, bring joy to my colleagues, who--_Ouch_, Butch--look out for that nail, you inhuman elephant--"

Big Butch, at that juncture of Hicks' monologue, had effectively terminated it by leaning from the window, grasping his unsuspecting comrade by the scruff of the neck, and dragging him over the window-ledge, into the grub-shack, and the presence of Coach Corridan and Deacon Radford. Strenuous objection was registered, both by the futilely struggling Hicks, and a nail projecting from the sill, which caught in the Palm Beach trousers and ripped a long rent in them; fortunately, Hicks' anatomy escaped a similar fate.

"A ripping good move, eh-what?" chuckled Hicks, twisting like a contortionist, to view the damage done his vestiture, "Hello, what have we here?--the German field-map, by the Van Dyke beard of the Prophet! I bring the Kaiser's order, ham and eggs, and a cup of coffee. No, that's a mistake. General Hen Von Kluck, lead a brigade of submarines up yon hill to thunder the Russian fort! Von Hindering-Bug, send a flock of aeroplanes and Zeppelins to the Allied trenches, the enemy is shooting Russian caviare at--"

"Hicks," said Head Coach Corridan, smiling at Butch Brewster's indignation, "you are such a wonder at solving perplexing problems by your marvelous 'inspirations,' suppose you turn the scintillating searchlight of your colossal intellect upon the question that Bannister must solve, to produce a championship eleven!"

It was T. Haviland Hicks, Jr.'s, inveterate habit, whenever a baffling situation, or what the French call an "_impasse_" presented itself, to state with the utmost confidence, "Oh, just leave it to Hicks!" On most occasions, when he made this remark, accompanied by a swaggering braggadocio that never failed to make good Butch Brewster wrathful, the happy-go-lucky youth possessed not the slightest idea of how the problem was to be solved. He just uttered his rash promise, and then trusted to his needed inspiration to illuminate a way out! And, as the Bannister campus well knew, Hicks had solved more than one torturing question by an inspiration that flashed on his intellect, when all hope of a satisfactory solution seemed dead.

For example, in his Sophomore year, when the Freshman leader, James Roderick Perkins, that same Titian-haired Roddy who was now a bulwark at right end, became charged with a Napoleonic ambition, and organized a Freshman Equal Rights campaign, paralyzing Bannister football by refusing to allow Freshmen to try for athletic teams, unless their demands were granted. Hicks, when his inspiration finally smote him, smashed the Votes-for-Freshmen crusade, and quelled Roddy, Futilely racking his brain for a counter-attack, having blithely told the troubled campus, "Just leave it to Hicks," he had ceased to worry, and then the inspiration had come, By The Big Brotherhood of Bannister giving the upper-classmen full government over Freshmen, a scheme successfully carried through, the peril had been thwarted.

"I got a letter from Dad yesterday," began Hicks, somewhat irrelevantly, considering the Coach's remarks, "and he said--"

"'--Inclosed find the check you wrote for,'" quoth Deacon Radford, humorously. "'If you keep up this pace, I shall have to turn my steel mills to producing war munitions, to pay your college bills.' Say, Hicks, seriously, listen to our problem, and suggest what Coach Corridan should do."

While Hicks' athletic powers were known to equal those of the paralyzed oldest inhabitant of a Civil War Veterans' Home, the sunny youth knew football thoroughly; often he originated plays that the team worked out with success, and his suggestions were always weighed carefully by the football directors. So, after he had adjusted his lurid scarf at the correct angle, and gazed ruefully at his torn habiliments, the sunshiny Senior seated himself at the table, before the "war-map," and gave heed to the Coach.

"Here's the problem, Hicks," said the Slave-Driver, indicating the Bannister eleven, represented by the gold and green topped thumb-tacks. "From the line we lost Babe, a tackle, Heavy, a guard, and Jack Merritt, a star end. Now, Monty Merriweather will hold down Jack's place O. K.--I can shift Beef from right half to guard, and put Butch at right-half, while Bunch Bingham can take care of Babe's old berth at tackle. But I have no one to shoot in at full-back, when I shift Butch; you see, Hicks, my plan is to build an eleven that can execute old-time, line-smashing football, and up-to-date open play as well; I want fast ends and halves, with a snappy quarter, and I have them; also, the backfield is heavy enough for line-bucking, if I get my beefy full-back. I must have a big, heavy, fast player, a giant who simply can't be stopped when he hits the line. With Butch and Biff at halves, Deke at quarter. Roddy and Monty ends, and my heavy line--why, a ponderous, irresistible Hercules at full-back will--"

"Say!" grinned the irrepressible Hicks, as Coach Corridan warmed up to his vision, "you don't want _much_, Coach! Why don't you ask Ted Coy, the famous ex-Yale full-back, to give up his business and play the position for you? Maybe you can persuade Charlie Brickley, a _fair_ sort of dropkicker, to quit coaching Hopkins, and kick a few goals for old Bannister! I get you, Coach--you want a fellow about the size of the _Lusitania,_ made of structural steel, a Brobdingnagian Colossus who will guarantee to advance the ball fifteen yards per rush, or money refunded!

"Why, Coach, while you are wanting things, just wish for a chap who will play the entire game himself, taking the ball down the field, while the rest of the team are pushed along in rolling-chairs, while imbibing pink tea. Get a prodigy who will instill such terror into our rivals that instead of playing the schedule, Bannister will simply arrange with other teams to mark themselves down defeated, and then agree what the scores shall be."

"I knew it!" growled Butch Brewster, glowering at the jocular youth. "We should never have consulted him on this problem, for it is not one within his power to solve, even though he performed the miracle of talking seriously about it Now--"

"Now--" echoed Hicks, with pretended seriousness, "Coach, you just hand me the blue-prints and specifications of said Gargantuan Hercules, and I'll try to corrall just such a phenomenon as you desire. Never hesitate to consult me on such important matters, for I am ever-ready to cast aside my own multifarious duties, when my Alma Mater needs my mental assistance, or--"

"Hicks, are you _crazy_?" fleered Deacon Radford, moved to excitement, despite his great faith in the versatile youth. "Full-backs like that do not grow on trees; the only one I ever read of was _Ole Skjarsen_, in George Fitch's 'Siwash College Stories,' and he was purely fictitious. We know you have accomplished some great things by your 'inspirations,' but as for this--"

"Just leave it to Hicks" quoth the irrepressible youth, swaggering toward the door with an affected nonchalant self-confidence that aroused Butch to wrath, and vastly amused his companions. "I'll admit a human juggernaut like Coach Corridan dreams of will be hard to round up, but, I'll have an inspiration soon. Don't worry about your old eleven, your problem will be solved, and you will have a team that can play fifty-seven varieties of football. _Raw revolver_, my comrades."

When the graceless T. Haviland Hicks, Jr., had sauntered gracefully out of the grub-shack, big Butch Brewster, almost exploding with suppressed wrath, stared at Slave-Driver Corridan and staid Deacon Radford a full minute; then he grinned,

"That--Hicks!" he murmured, struggling against a desire to laugh. "What a ridiculous prophecy! 'Just leave it to Hicks!' Well, that means the problem goes unsolved, for though I confess he _is_ brilliant, and his so-called 'inspirations' have helped old Bannister; when it comes to rushing out and lassoing a smashing. Herculean full-back--_bah_!"

Ten minutes later, when Coach Corridan and the Gold and Green squad climbed the bluff to the field back of Camp Bannister, for morning signal drill, their last memory was of T. Haviland Hicks, Jr., arrayed in radiant vestiture, his chair tilted against the bunkhouse--the chords of the banjo, and his foghorn voice drifting to them on the warm September air:

"Oh, father and mother pay all the bills (_plunk-plunk_) And we have all the fun (_plunkety-plunk_) With the money that we spend in college life!"

Two hours afterward, as a tired, perspiring squad scrambled down the bluff, and made for the cool waters of Lake Conowingo, a mysterious silence, like a mighty wave, literally surged toward them. Camp Bannister seemed deserted, the sun was still shining, the birds sang as cheerily as ever, but instinctively the collegians felt an indescribable loneliness, a sense of tremendous loss.

"_Hicks_!" shouted Butch Brewster, loudly, his voice shattering the stillness. "Hicks--ahoy! I say, Hicks--"

Old Hinky-Dink, a letter in his hand, hobbled from the cook-tent toward them; like a sinister harbinger of evil he advanced, grinning deprecatingly at the squad:

"Mistah Hicks am gone!" he announced importantly. "He done gib me fo' bits to row him ober to de village, to cotch de noon 'spress fo' Philadelphy! Heah am a letter what he lef'--"

Big Butch Brewster, to whom the _billet-doux_ was addressed in T. Haviland Hicks, Jr.'s, familiar scrawl, tore open the envelope, and while the squad listened, he read aloud the message left by that sunny-souled youth;

"DEAR BUTCH:

"Coach Corridan will have to use the alarm clock from now on! I'm called away on business. See that my stuff gets to Bannister O.K. Stow it in the room next to yours. I'll be back at college some time in the next century. Give my _adieux_ to Coach Corridan and the squad.

"Yours truthfully,

"T. HAVILAND HICKS, JR.

"P.S.: Tell Coach Corridan he should worry--_not_! I'm hot on the trail of a fullback that will make Ted Coy at his coyest look like the paralyzed inmate of an old man's home. Just leave it to Hicks!"