CHAPTER XXVIII
FAINT HEARTS
"Pretty punk; wasn't it?"
"Regular ice wagon as far as we were concerned."
"I didn't think they had that spurt in 'em."
"And yet we seemed to be rowing pretty well. I guess it takes more thanone season to make a winning eight."
Silence followed these discouraging observations on the part of the fourinseparables as they sat in their room the evening following the beatingof the first and second shells by the Boxer Hall crew. There had been ameeting of the coaches with the Randall rowers immediately after comingoff the water, and several plans had been talked over, involving ashifting of the crews. But in the end it was decided to wait another dayor so.
There was no disputing the fact that Randall had expected at least thevarsity boat to keep up to, if not beat, their rival. And they hadfailed. It was a bitter pill to swallow, with the time of the regatta soclose at hand.
"It sure was rotten," said Tom musingly, as he sat staring vacantly atnothing. No one took the trouble to comment on his last remark. They hadabout exhausted their stock of bitter reflections and observations.
"Something's got to be done," went on Tom. Still no one answered him.The fussy little alarm clock ticked on, as though trying to be cheerfulin the midst of all that gloom. It was as though it said:
"Cheer--up--I'm--here-- You'll--win--next--year!"
"I wonder what we can do?" Tom mused on.
Sid shifted uneasily in one of the easy chairs. Phil duplicated in theother. Frank turned to a more comfortable position on the old sofa,thereby bringing forth creaks, groans and vibrations of protest from theancient piece. Tom was trying to get used to an old steamer chair, thathad been picked up, with other relics, at an auction held by a retiringsenior the previous June, but as the chair had lost one leg, which hadbeen replaced by part of a Turkish rocker, and as the foot-rest had, insome former day, been broken off and put back upside down, Tom's effortto be at ease was more or less of a failure.
"Something has got to be done!" went on the pitcher. Once more thesilence.
"Say, for the love of tripe!" Tom finally burst out. "Have none of youany tongues?"
He sat up so suddenly that the steamer chair, probably rotted by toomuch salt air on many voyages, collapsed, letting him down with a bump,and raising a cloud of dust from the old rug.
"Good!" cried Phil.
"See if you can do it again," urged Sid. "Frank had his head turned, anddidn't see it all."
"Yes, do," begged the Big Californian, chuckling.
"Humph!" grunted Tom. "I thought I'd make you find your tonguessomehow--you bunch of mourners!" and he limped across the room, to leanagainst the mantle, surveying the wreck of the chair.
"Hurt yourself much?" asked Phil, solicitously.
"A heap you fellows'd care," was the retort.
"Think you can row?" Sid wanted to know.
"What's the good of rowing if Boxer walks away from us like that?"demanded Tom, fiercely. "That's what I've been putting up to you fellowsall evening, and you never opened your mouths. We're going to lose, Ican see that. What's the good of trying?"
He was so bitter--it was so unlike Tom's usually cheery self--that hischums looked at one another in some alarm. As the pitcher went to thebathroom to get some arnica for a slight bruise that had resulted fromthe chair's collapse, Sid murmured:
"I guess Boswell has gotten on his nerves."
"How Boswell?" asked Frank.
"Ruth," Sid further enlightened him.
"Don't you believe it," broke in Phil. "Sis wouldn't have anything to dowith Bossy, while Tom was around."
"Talking about me?" suspiciously demanded the tall pitcher, entering theroom at that moment.
"Oh, nothing serious," replied Phil, coolly. "We were just wonderingwhat gave you the grouch."
"Grouch! Wouldn't anyone have a grouch if he'd practiced in the shellall Summer, and rowed his heart out, only to be beaten by Boxer--and notin a regular race, either? Wouldn't he?"
"You're no worse off than the rest of us," declared Frank, sharply. "Wefeel it just as badly as you do, Tom."
"You don't act so. You've been sitting here as mum as oysters!" camethe bitter retort. It was the nearest in a long time Tom had come to abreach with his chums.
"What was the good of talking?" asked Sid. "Talking and shooting off alot of hot air isn't going to make the varsity eight the head of theriver; is it?"
"No, but you might find some way of doing it if you said something,instead of acting like Sphinxes," snapped Tom.
"I wonder if that chair can be fixed?" broke in Phil, anxious to turnthe subject, for matters were being strained to the breaking point. "Yousure did come down with an awful crash, Tom. Poor old chair! I'm glad itwasn't one of our good ones."
"Good ones!" cried Tom, who had bid in the steamer affair at theauction, much against the wishes of his chums. "Say, this has thoseother ancient arks beaten a mile," and stooping over he began trying tosolve the twisted puzzle of the arms, legs and foot-rest that seemed tohave gotten into an inextricable tangle.
"Oh, I give it up!" he cried, after several unsuccessful efforts. "We'lllet one of the janitors play doctor," and he laughed.
"That sounds better!" exclaimed Phil.
"It would sound better if we had won to-day," went on Tom. "Why in thename of the binomial theorem couldn't we?"
"The answer is easy," spoke Frank. "They've had more practice than wehave, they pull better, they have more power; three things that theyexcel us in. What's the result? Power, practice and skill added togetherequal a win."
"But isn't there any way we can get those three things?" demanded Tomfretfully.
"Next year, maybe," assented Phil.
"We've got to get 'em this year!" cried Tom, smiting his open palm withhis clenched fist. "I won't admit we can't get 'em. We've got to beatBoxer Hall and Fairview, and we've got to get in condition in the nexttwo weeks! Do you fellows hear? We've got to double up on our work!We--we----"
"Hear! Hear!" broke in the voice of Bricktop Molloy, as he entered theroom at that moment. "What's all the row about? Tommy, me lad, you'regetting to be a regular orator, so ye are!"