Part 17 (1/2)

”I'd like to say that I never heard so much talking and saw so little action,” began Ned, impatiently. ”What's the matter with some one saying something useful instead of just chewing the rag?”

”You tell 'em,” piped a small junior, above the applause and laughter.

”All right! I'll tell you fellows that you're a lot of pikers to hesitate to pledge three or four hundred dollars to keep your team going. Where I come from we had to have a new grand stand two years ago, and we called a meeting like this and we raised seven hundred dollars in thirty-five minutes in cash and pledges. There were a lot more of us, but half of us would have felt like Rockefellers if we'd ever found a whole half-dollar in our pockets! Some of us gave as high as five dollars, but not many. Most of us pledged two dollars; and those who didn't have two dollars went out and worked until they'd made it, by jingo! And we got our grand stand up inside of two weeks, in time for the big baseball game.”

There was real applause this time, and those in the front of the hall had swung around to have a look at the earnest youth who was calling them names.

”That's one way of getting the money,” continued Ned, warming up finely, ”but there's another. Out my way-”

”Say, where do you come from?” called some one.

”I come from California,” answered Ned, proudly. ”Maybe you've heard of it!”

”Attaboy!” shouted Kewpie. ”Swing your leg, Nid!”

”When we want to raise some money out there and folks are too stingy to give it outright, we take it away from them another way. We get up a fete. We give them a good time and they pay for it. Why not try it here?

I don't know how many folks there are in this burg, but I reckon there are enough to part with three or four hundred dollars. Give them an excuse to spend their money and they'll spend it!”

Ned sat down amid loud applause, and Dave Brewster was recognized, although half a dozen others were clamoring for speech.

”Turner's said something, fellows,” declared Brewster. ”The idea's worth considering. We've never tackled the town folks for money, and there's no reason why they shouldn't come across. They've come to our games for years without paying a cent, except for the Farview game, and it wouldn't hurt them to give a little to a good cause. I don't know what sort of a fete Turner has in mind, but I should think we might get up something that would do the business.”

”Mr. Chairman,” said Kewpie, ”I move that a committee of three be appointed by the chair, to include Nid,-I mean Mr. Turner,-to consider the-the matter of giving a fete to raise the money.”

”Seconded!”

”You have heard the motion,” droned Whipple. ”All those in favor will so signify by saying 'Aye.' Contrary, 'No.' Moved and carried. I will appoint the presidents of the senior and upper middle cla.s.ses and Mr.

Turner to the committee, three in all. Is it the sense of this meeting that your committee is to report to it at a subsequent meeting, or is it to have authority to proceed with the matter if it decides that the scheme is a good one?”

”Full authority, Mr. Chairman!” ”Let 'em go ahead with it!” ”Sure!

That's what we want. Let's have action!”

”Is there any other business? Then I declare the meeting adjourned!”

Whipple captured Ned on the way out. ”We'd better get together right away on this, Turner,” he said. ”Can you meet Cooper and me at my room to-morrow at twelve?”

Ned agreed, and he and Laurie and Lee went on. ”What I'd like to know,”

remarked Laurie, after a moment's silence, ”is how you're going to have a fete in a place like this. The weather's too cold for it.”

”Maybe it will be warmer,” answered Ned, cheerfully. ”Besides, we don't have to have it outdoors.”

”It wouldn't be a fete if you didn't,” sniffed the other.

”Well, what's the difference? Call it anything you like. The big thing is to get the money.”

”You had your cheek with you to talk the way you did,” chuckled Laurie.