The Lucky Seventh Part 7

"You could make a home run, Fudge!" laughed Lanny. "Only you'd have to hit pretty quick. Why, if you were tall enough to reach the moon, it would be going past you faster than one of Tom's straight ones, Fudge!"

"Quite a bit faster," agreed Gordon. "Still, it would be 'in the groove,' and if you took a good swing and got your eye on it you could everlastingly bust up the game!"

"I think," replied Fudge, who had literary yearnings, "I'll write a story about a giant who did that."

"Well, there are some pretty good hitters among the 'Giants,'" commented d.i.c.k gravely. Fudge snorted.

"You know wh-wh-what I mean!" he said severely.

"Of course he does," agreed Lanny. "d.i.c.k, you oughtn't to poke fun at Fudge's great thoughts. Fudge is a budding genius, Fudge is, and if you're not careful you'll discourage him. Remember his story about the fellow who won the mile race in two minutes and forty-one seconds, d.i.c.k?

That was a peach of a--"

"I didn't!" declared Fudge pa.s.sionately. "The p-p-printer made a mistake! I've told you that a th-th-th-thousand t-t-times! I wrote it--"

"Don't spoil it," begged d.i.c.k. "It was a much better story the way _The Purple_ printed it. Any fellow might run the mile in four-something, but to do it under three shows real ability, Fudge. Besides, what's a minute or two in a story?"

"Aw, cu-cu-cut it out!" grumbled Fudge. "You f-f-fellows m-m-m-m--"

"You'll never do it, Fudge," said Gordon sympathetically. "I've noticed that if you don't make it the first two or three times you--"

"--M-make me tired!" concluded Fudge breathlessly but triumphantly.

"Snappy work!" approved Lanny. "If at first you don't succeed--"

"T-t-try, try again," a.s.sisted Gordon. Fudge muttered something both unintelligible and uncomplimentary, and Gordon turned to d.i.c.k: "How did you get on with Mrs. Thingamabob at the Point, d.i.c.k?" he asked. "What's the kid like?"

"All right. The name is Townsend. They're at the hotel. The boy is thirteen and he's-he's a bit spoiled, I guess. There's an older brother, too, a fellow about seventeen. He confided to me that I'd have a beast of a time with the youngster. His name-the brother's-is Loring Townsend. Anybody know him?"

There was no response, and d.i.c.k continued:

"He seemed rather a nice chap, big brother did. As for the kid-his name is Harold, by the way--"

"Fancy names, what?" said Gordon. "Loring and Harold."

"No fancier than your own," commented Fudge, still a trifle disgruntled.

"Gordon! Gee, that's a sweet name for a grown-up fellow!"

"Not as sweet as Fudge, though," answered Gordon.

"That's not my n-n-name!"

"There, you're getting him excited again," said Lanny soothingly. "Move out of the moonlight, Fudge. It's affecting your disposition. What about the kid, d.i.c.k? Is he the one you're going to tutor?"

"Yes; he's entered for Rifle Point in the Autumn, and he's way behind on two or three things. The worst of it is that he doesn't seem very enthusiastic about catching up. I guess I'll have my work cut out for me. The big brother told me that I was to take no nonsense from young Harold, and that he'd back me up, but-I don't know. I guess Mrs.

Townsend wouldn't approve of harsh measures. She's trying her best to spoil the kid, I'd say. I'm to go over five mornings a week, beginning Monday."

"I'm glad I don't have to do it," commented Gordon. "I'll bet the kid is a young terror, d.i.c.k."

d.i.c.k smiled. "He is-something of the sort. But I guess he and I will get on all right after a while. And if he's got it in him to learn, he will learn," d.i.c.k added grimly. "That is, unless his mother--"

"She's bound to," said Lanny. "They all do. Inside of a week she'll be telling you that you're working her darling too hard."

"How do you know so much about it?" challenged Fudge. "Anyone would think you were a hundred years old!"

Lanny laughed. "I've kept my eyes open, Fudge, sweet child. Mothers are pretty fine inst.i.tutions; no fellow should be without one; but they are most of them much too easy on us. And you know that as well as I do."

"Mine isn't," murmured Fudge regretfully. "She's worse than my father at making me do things!"

"Oh, well, you're an exceptional case," said Gordon gently. "When a fellow shows criminal tendencies like yours, Fudge--"

"Yes, writing stories at your age! You ought to be ashamed!" Lanny spoke with deep severity. Fudge only chuckled.

"Some day," he announced gleefully, "I'm going to write a story and put you fellows all into it. Then you'll wish you hadn't been so fresh. The only thing is"-and his voice fell disconsolately-"I don't suppose, if I told what I know about you, I could get it published!"

"Deal gently with us, Fudge," begged d.i.c.k humbly. "Remember, we used to be friends. I must be getting along, fellows. Coming over to-morrow, Gordie?"

"Yes, I'll drop around in the morning. We've got to get busy and send out some challenges. Who can we get to play with us, Lanny, besides Lesterville and, maybe, Plymouth?"

"I don't know. I think there are plenty of teams, though, if we can find them."

"They have a team at Logan," said Fudge, "but I guess they're older than we are."

"What do we care?" asked Gordon. "Logan's a good way off, though, and I suppose it would cost like the d.i.c.kens to get there."

"Make them come over here," suggested Lanny.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "'Good-night,' responded Gordon and Fudge"]

"Yes, but then they'd want their expenses guaranteed."

"Look here," observed d.i.c.k, "why couldn't we charge admission to some of the games after we got started? I dare say quite a lot of folks would pay a quarter to see a good game."

"They might," conceded Lanny. "We could try it, anyway. If we could get, say, a hundred admissions, we'd have twenty-five dollars, and then we could pay the expenses of any team around here. That's a bully idea, d.i.c.k. As a manager you're all to the good."

"I thank you," replied d.i.c.k, setting his crutches under his arms. "We'll talk it over to-morrow. You come over, too, Lanny; and Fudge if he is not in the throes of literary composition."

"I'll walk around with you," said Lanny. "It's too bully a night to go to bed, anyway. Good-night, fellows."

"Good-night," responded Gordon and Fudge. "Good-night, d.i.c.k."

They watched the two as long as they were in sight in the white radiance of the moon, and then:

"They're two of the finest fellows in the world," said Fudge warmly.

"And wouldn't d.i.c.k be a wonder if he was like the rest of us, Gordie?"

"Y-yes," replied Gordon thoughtfully, "only-sometimes I think that maybe if d.i.c.k was like the rest of us, Fudge, he might not be the splendid chap he is."

Fudge objected to that, but afterward, returning home by way of the back fence, he thought it over. "I suppose," he told himself, as he paused on his porch for a final look at the moon, "what Gordie means is that tribulations enn.o.ble our characters." That struck him as a fine phrase, and he made a mental note of it. Still later, as he lay in bed with the moonlight illumining his room, he began to plan a perfectly corking story around the phrase, with d.i.c.k as the hero. Unfortunately, perhaps, for American literature, sleep claimed him before he had completed it.