The Forbidden Trail Part 9

"Be careful, Hallock! I can't permit you to talk this way to me about a member of the faculty."

"Then you're no better than he!" shouted Hallock. "The d.a.m.ned Dutch run this college and I'm sick of it."

There was a sudden murmur of agreement from the highly edified audience now grouped behind Hallock. This was an old sore that had existed in Roger's own days under Rosenthal.

"Pshaw, I know all about Mr. Rosenthal's peccadillos, Hallock," he said.

"But he's a teacher and scholar of the first water. Girls always take general remarks personally. Miss Anderson had better forget it, whatever it was. Girl hysteria, probably."

Hallock suddenly began to cry with rage. "Hysteria, d.a.m.n you, don't you insult her too!" Then, as an angry sneer appeared on Roger's face, he unexpectedly leaned over the table and punched Roger on the nose.

Roger vaulted over the table and with a rapid clip laid Hallock flat.

The boy was on his feet in a moment, crying, but game. The edified audience held the two apart.

"You don't know what the Dutch slob said! You don't know," sobbed Hallock.

Roger did not speak. In fact he could not. He stood white and trembling for some time, a scarlet trickle of blood running from one nostril. His struggle for control was so obvious that even Hallock perceived it and was silent. With the other lads he stood in embarra.s.sment while the laboratory clock ticked and the end of the winter sunset filled the room.

It seemed to Roger that the fight was as difficult now as it had been years before, when he had struck his mother's soothing hand from his shoulder and later had kissed that same hand and had wept his heart out with his cheek upon it. In the brief moment as he stood with clenched fists and bowed head, waiting for the red mist to give way to his normal vision it seemed as if all his life pa.s.sed in review before him tinged with the hot glare of his mental and spiritual tempests. Then, as many, many times before, he seemed to feel the gentle hand, that he had struck, laid softly on his forehead. He heaved a great sigh and looked up.

"The cla.s.s is dismissed," he said. "Hallock, hold a s...o...b..ll to your chin as you go home."

When the cla.s.s had left the room, Roger washed his face at the sink in the corner, wiping his hands on a towel that was gray with age. Then, he dropped the towel and stood leaning against the table, head bowed, arms folded.

The gloaming increased. A cheerful whistle sounded in the hall and Ernest came in.

"Well, old top? Ready to go home?"

"Ern, do you know a girl named Anderson?"

"Yes, very pretty. Engaged to young Hallock, they say. What about her?

Don't tell me you've begun to be interested again in petticoats."

"I had the deuce of a row with Hallock, just now," said Roger.

"Change your clothes as you tell me about it," suggested Ernest. "It's late."

Roger obediently started for the closet, talking from the door as he dressed. Ernest lighted his pipe and listened thoughtfully under the electric light he had turned on. He was a shorter man than Roger and stockily built. He was still very fair, with soft yellow hair already receding from a broad forehead. His eyes were beautiful, a deep violet, soft dreaming eyes that men as well as women trusted instinctively.

"I'm sure you've seen Miss Anderson," he said when Roger had finished.

"She's a funny foolish little thing. Just the kind to attract an unsocialized grind like Hallock. I guess there was a good deal of a row in Rosenthal's cla.s.s this morning. One of the seniors told me. Rosenthal said to Miss Anderson--say, Rog, you're not listening."

Roger picked up his hat. "I don't care what Rosenthal said. He always was a boor. The point with me is that I've lost my temper in the cla.s.sroom for the last time. Come on, Ern."

They were crossing the snowy campus before Ernest spoke. Then he laid his hand on his friend's arm.

"The fool kid brought it on himself. I can see how he got worked up. You can be exasperating and he gave you what he'd like to have given Rosenthal. Nevertheless, no man can take a crack on the chin with a thank you, Roger."

Roger did not reply. They turned into River Street where the street lights flashed through the bare branches of the elms. An occasional sleigh jingled by. Lights glowed from pleasant windows where children were silhouetted against the curtains. Ernest stopped before the big, comfortable Wolf house.

"Come in to supper, Roger."

"I'll not be good company, Ern," but Roger's voice was wistful.

"Come along! Mother doesn't mind your grouches, and I guess the rest of us can endure one more."

Roger turned up the brick path that led to the door.

"h.e.l.lo, boys!" Elsa called, as the front door slammed. "You're late!"

Elschen at twenty-nine was still very pretty in an un.o.btrusive way. Her yellow hair was thick and curly. Her eyes were like Ernest's and her skin was fair, with a velvety flush in her delicately rounded cheeks.

"Supper's ready," she went on. "Papa just came in. Don't keep him waiting, children."

Roger and Ernest went quickly into the dining room where Papa Wolf was just sitting down. He nodded to them over his spectacles, then helped himself to a slice of meat.

"Where's Mamma?" asked Ernest, pa.s.sing the bread to Roger.

"Here, liebchen!" Mamma Wolf came in, carrying a steaming coffee pot.

She set it down, then hurried round the table to kiss first Ernest, then Roger.

"You know Rog can't eat without you, Mutterchen," laughed Ernest.

"He doesn't get his manners from the Germans," snapped Elsa.

"Never mind! I've gotten the only home life I've known in eight years from them," returned Roger. He and Mamma Wolf exchanged an affectionate glance.

"Pa.s.s the biscuits, Elsa," said Papa Wolf.

"Going anywhere to-night, Elsa?" asked Ernest.

"Yes, we have choir practice every night from now to Christmas."

"The carols are beautiful!" exclaimed Mamma Wolf. "I heard them last night when I stopped by the church for Elsa. Ernest, pa.s.s your papa the preserves and put the cake where he can reach it. It's fresh, Papa, never fear. I only finished frosting it as you came in." Mamma Wolf looked at her husband a little anxiously.

"That Smithsonian man telephoned you again this afternoon, Ernest," said Elsa. "He wanted to call this evening and I told him to come along."

"I wonder what he wants," mused Roger. "He's been hanging round for a long time."

"Pa.s.s the biscuits, Ernest," from Papa Wolf. "The cake is very bad, Mamma."

"Oh, Papa, is it? And I took such trouble!" The distress in the gentle voice made Roger scowl.

"In America, Papa," Elsa's voice was mocking, "where you have lived for some forty years, it is not considered courteous to criticize the food at the table."

"Hush, Elschen! Papa can say what he wishes, always, to me. Is it not so, Karl?"

Papa Wolf pushed away his plate, wiped his mustache and leaned back in his chair with a smile and a sigh of repletion.