Part 10 (2/2)

”Well, Neale,” he asked, ”what are you up to these days?”

This was his opportunity, Neale knew it was, to introduce the subject of Princeton, but he could not think of any way to do it. Instead he said vaguely, ”Oh, nothing much. Sort of hanging around.” And then with a great effort, he brought out, for once, a vital piece of news, ”I'm learning to play tennis.”

”That's _good_,” said Father. ”It's a great game.”

This seemed to be final. He looked back at his newspaper. But after a while, as though something had occurred to him he asked, ”Who's teaching you? Where do you play?”

”I ran across Don Roberts, over in Nutley. They used to live here, on Central Avenue. He used to go to Number Two School.” He wanted to go on and tell about Don's being in Princeton, but could not propel himself past the full-stop, where an inadvertent cadence of his voice had dropped him.

Next morning he found Don with a whitewash brush touching up the marking of the court. For three hours they practised--a most exhausting three hours! He thought he began to make a little progress. He knew he was almost all in, when noon came, worn out far more by the mental strain of struggling his way into a new technique, than by the physical effort, although that had been enough to leave him blown and panting, as they went into the house to have lunch.

The two boys were alone at the table. Don swaggered a little as he served his guest. ”No one at home,” he explained. ”Mother and the girls are down at Asbury. The old man doesn't get back from the office till the 5.45. I can hear his train whistle from here. He finds his loving son deep in his books, you bet.”

Through luncheon Don fired Neale's enthusiasm with stories of Big Bill Edwards, Arthur Poe, Lady Jayne and other heroes of his Alma Mater.

Afterwards he strolled to the living-room, sat down at the piano, and sang ”The Orange and the Black,”--”There's a college we call Princeton.”

Then lowering his voice, with many nods and knowing winks, he sang a long song with the refrain, ”Keep your eye on tricky little Sarah.”

Neale's play on the streets and in vacant lots with perfectly heterogeneous and casual little boys had given him quite enough of a vocabulary to understand the words of this song; and odds and ends of the older boys' talk overheard in the locker-room at Hadley made the spirit of it by no means unfamiliar. But this was the first time that either words or spirit had ever been more than one of the casual by-products of boy-life. What put it in the center of his attention now was his admiration of Don as the model of colorful, sophisticated life.

Evidently this was a part of such life. Neale applied his mind therefore to the words and the spirit and learned to hum the air.

That evening Father read another uneventful letter from Mother; then they sat in silence till, as father was filling his pipe, he remarked, as if it had just come into his mind, ”Oh, I thought you ought to have a racket of your own, Neale. I got one. It's in the hall on the coat-rack.”

Neale bounded upstairs and carried his prize to his room. There was not only a Sears racket, but three Wright and Ditson b.a.l.l.s, Spalding's ”Tennis Guide,” and a little pamphlet on ”How to Play Lawn Tennis.”

Neale dropped into his Morris chair and devoured both books before going to bed.

The hard protective husk of his little boyhood was so newly sloughed off, that his adolescence had as yet received scarcely a mark upon its new freshness to impression. Ready now, responsive with an inward quiver to a whole range of experience to which he had been blind and deaf before, he was catching up from the chance materials about him, the stuff with which to construct his new world. And here was material ready to his hand. The editor, an enthusiast, an idealist of sportsmans.h.i.+p had put a great deal in his little treatise beside his copious advice as to the proper grip on the racket and the laying out of a court. Without the slightest self-consciousness (because he had the not-to-be-imitated single-heartedness of the sincere devotee) he had charged every section of his treatise with the spirit of the game, the spirit of sport, not of border warfare. So matter-of-factly was this message conveyed that even the adolescent soul, half-crusader, half-Hun, did not guess that it was being preached to. The word ”honor” was never mentioned, yet Neale understood perfectly the significance of what he read, under the caption ”Tournaments:” ”The committee should provide adequate linesmen, for while the contestants themselves can generally tell whether a ball is good or not, yet close decisions occur in every match and it is obviously unfair to force a player to penalize himself (as he naturally would feel bound to do) by giving his opponent the benefit of the doubt on all uncertain cases.” He nodded approvingly over the phrase, ”as he naturally would feel bound to do.” It did not strike him as a new idea, but merely a clearer statement of something he had always felt was in the air about sports. Yes, that was how a college man would act, how Don would act.

Again, among the ill.u.s.trations he was struck by a photograph of the winner and runner-up shaking hands after the Newport tournament. Neale looked long at the expression of cordial congratulation and admiration on the loser's face. He moved uneasily in his chair at the recollection of a nine of disgruntled urchins muttering after a defeat, ”Aw, you bunch of stiffs, wait till we get you on our own diamond.” Neale had been one of those who muttered, one of those so stung by defeat that the idea of admiring the better playing which had beaten them would have been inconceivable to him. Neale knew himself well enough to know the fierceness of his l.u.s.t for victory. He knew it was going to be a job to tame that l.u.s.t to this civilized code. But he would try. Morally on tip-toe, he resolved to be worthy of Don's friends.h.i.+p.

When he turned the last page, relaxed the intense concentration with which he had been absorbing the essence and spirit of the book, and stood up to stretch and yawn before going to bed, he felt that he had learned a lot. And he had. Silently, with the incalculable silence of natural processes, an ideal had crystallized in his heart around a standard of conduct.

And yet this was all under the surface. As he dropped off to sleep, his mind retained as the chief lesson of the book a ma.s.s of stimulating suggestions about rolling strokes, the reverse twist service, and the advice for a solitary beginner to practise against a brick wall.

He knew where such a wall could be found; in a vacant lot on Poplar Street, just off Summit Avenue. He often had played hand-ball there in the old days. Next morning he went there after breakfast, postponing his ride to Nutley till after lunch. The result was so good that thereafter he spent every morning there.

The summer days went by. Neale progressed far in his imitation of Don and Don's manner and standards. He learned after practising with a box of his own, to accept the cigarettes Don constantly offered him. To be like Don, he learned to call the girls by their first names without choking, although he never could bring himself to squeeze their hands or pat their shoulders or stroke their hair as Don did so casually; and he did manage to pick up a fair game of tennis.

When he challenged Natalie to singles and beat her 7-5, Don looked at him with a new expression, and a few days later announced great news.

”It's all arranged. Tournament here next Sat.u.r.day, lemonade, lawn party, picnic-supper, dance. The old man's agreed not to b.u.t.t in and spoil things. I've got four fellows from here, Peterson, and a friend of his from Montclair. You and I make eight. Just right for a day's tournament on one court.”

”But I don't play well enough,” protested Neale.

”You'll be put out in the first round of course,” Don admitted, ”but I need you to make the even eight, and you can chase b.a.l.l.s and make yourself useful. Entry fee's a dollar. That'll buy a Pim racket as a prize. I _need_ a new racket.”

The great day came and Neale, fl.u.s.tered and tense, was put out in the first round according to schedule. It didn't surprise him, although deep in his heart he had had a fluttering hope--but no matter. What happened to him was of no consequence. Don came through easily, of course. After lunch Neale sat with Natalie and together they gasped and clapped and cried, ”played!” as Don captured his match in the semi-finals.

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