“Is he the captain?” asked Ira.
“Coach. Ever played it?”
“Football? No.” Ira shook his head. “I never thought I’d care to. I saw a game once at Lewiston.”
“Where’s that?”
“Maine. I live in Cheney Falls.”
“No one can blame you. How’s the grub?”
“Fine, thanks. Who is Goodloe?”
“Gene Goodloe? Track Team captain. Know him?”
“Not very well. I – I sort of met him awhile back.”
“You’ll like him, I guess. Most of us do. He’s a corking runner. Good fellow to know, Rowland. Better cultivate him. Meet all the fellows you can, old man. The more the merrier. You can’t know too many at school, especially if you’re a new boy. I had a perfectly miserable time of it here my first year. I was horribly shy, you see. Yes, I got over it!” He laughed as he caught Ira’s quick glance of surprise. “Had to. I used to get red clear around to the back of my face if anyone spoke to me. The second year I realised that it wouldn’t do and I made up my mind to get cured. How do you think I did it? I got up one morning and went out and spoke to every fellow I met, whether I’d ever seen him before or not. It nearly killed me at first and I got all sorts of snubs and funny looks, but it cured me. Now I – I’d slap Jud himself on the back if it would do me any good.”
“Jud?” asked Ira.
“Otherwise Doctor Judson Lane, principal of this here school. All through? Going to have desert? No? Come along then. There’s your check. Might as well pay it if you’ve got the money. They have a nasty way of going out on the street after you and bringing you back if you get absent-minded.”
They slid off their stools and made their way to the cashier’s desk, Johnston hailing many acquaintances on the way and once pausing in response to the invitation of one. Ira had an uncomfortable suspicion that he was the subject of the short, whispered dialogue that ensued. “It’s probably these clothes,” he thought. “They are different from other fellows’. I’ll have to get some new ones, I guess.”
Outside, Johnston chatted merrily as he conducted his companion around the corner of Main Street and finally brought up before a three-story house set close to the sidewalk. It showed evidences of past grandeur, but the buff paint was peeling away from the narrow porch and stores had been built close to it on either side. The first floor was occupied by a tailor’s establishment on the right and by the agency of a spring-water company on the left. Johnston gaily pointed out the convenience of having your trousers pressed on the premises as they waited in the hallway. Presently, in response to the tinkling of a faraway bell, footsteps creaked on the stairs and a tall and angular woman came into sight.
“Good afternoon and everything,” greeted Johnston. “You don’t remember me, Mrs. Magoon, but we were very dear friends once. I used to come here to call on Dan Phillips a couple of years ago.”
“I remember you very well,” was the reply in a dry voice. “You’re the young man that broke the newel post one time when you was sliding down the – ”
“My fault! I see you do remember me, after all. I feared you didn’t. Now – ”
“It wasn’t ever paid for, either, although you said time and again – ”
“You’re perfectly right, ma’am. It just somehow slipped my memory. I’m glad you mentioned it. Everybody ought to pay his just debts, I should think. I’ve brought you a lodger, Mrs. Magoon. This is Mr. Rowland, Mr. Thomas Chesterfield Rowland, of Cheerup Falls, Maine, a very personal friend of mine. He was about to take a room over on Linden Street, but I prevailed on him to come to you. I told him that you had just the room for him. You have, haven’t you?” Johnston beamed ingratiatingly.
“Well, I dunno,” said Mrs. Magoon, folding her hands in a blue checked apron and looking doubtfully from one boy to the other. “Everything’s pretty well taken now. There was a young man in here not ten minutes ago to look at the only room I’ve got left. I dunno will he be back, though. He said he would, but they always say that. If you’d care to look at it, sir – ”
“He would,” declared Johnston. “He would indeed. After you, Rowland. One flight and turn to your left.”
“Two flights and turn to your right, if you please,” corrected the landlady. “All the second floor rooms are taken.” She toiled upstairs at their heels and directed the way to a large, scantily furnished room at the back of the house. “It’s a nice, cheerful room,” she said pantingly. “Two good windows and a fine view. There’s a washstand goes in here yet.”
The fine view consisted of several backyards, the roof of a shed and a high board fence in the immediate foreground, but beyond the fence lay the trim, green lawn of a residence on Washington Avenue, while, by stretching his neck a little, Ira could see a few gravestones in the cemetery around the corner of the next-door building. Just now the foliage hid the school, but Mrs. Magoon predicted that in the Winter he would have a fine view of it. There were two big windows on the back of the room, a sizable closet, a fireplace with a dingy, white-marble mantel and a rusted grate and a few oddments of furniture all much the worse for wear. Ira tested the bed and shuddered inwardly. It was like a board. There was a green plush rocking-chair, a battered walnut table with an ink-stained top, a bureau of similar material and condition, two straight-backed chairs and an ornate black walnut bookcase with one glass door missing. A faded, brown ingrain carpet covered the centre of the floor, the wide expanse of boards surrounding it having at some far distant time been painted slate-grey.
Johnston expatiated warmly, even with enthusiasm, on the room’s attractions. “How’s that for a fireplace, old man?” he asked. “It’s real, mind you. No stage fireplace, with a red lantern in it, but the genuine thing. Lots of room here, too. Must be twenty feet each way, eh? Of course, you’ll need a few more things. A window seat would help. And another easy-chair, maybe. Then, with the family portraits on the walls and a fire crackling cheerily – what ho! ‘Blow, wintry winds! What care we?’ Or words to that general effect. You say there’s a washstand, too, Mrs. Magoon? Fine! Imagine a washstand over there in the corner, Rowland. Sort of – sort of finishes it off, eh? Useful little affairs, washstands. No home should be – How about the bathroom, Mrs. Magoon? Adjacent or thereabouts, I presume?”
“One flight below, sir. It’s a very nice bathroom, with an enamelled tub, sir. If you’d care to look at it – ”
“By all means, ma’am, as we descend. You said the rent was – ”
“Four a week, sir.”
“Oh, no, indeed! For the school year, Mrs. Magoon.”
“I said four a week, sir.”
“And I said – Oh, I see! Four dollars a week! You will have your joke, eh? The lady has a sense of humour, Rowland. You can’t deny it.”
“It doesn’t seem to me that it’s worth that much,” said Ira dubiously.
“Bless us, no!” said Johnston. “That was only her joke. Now, Mrs. Magoon, seriously, what do you ask by the month for this palatial apartment?”
“It’s four dollars a week, young man, whether you pay weekly or monthly; although I have to insist on the bills not running no longer than a month.”
“No one can blame you. But you’ll find my friend here very prompt, ma’am, in such matters. I have never known him to let a bill run longer than a month. You might almost call him finicky in money matters. Considering that, now, suppose we say three dollars a week, with – ” he shot a questioning glance at Ira – “two weeks paid in advance?”
“I couldn’t do it, sir,” replied the landlady firmly, arms akimbo. “Three-seventy-five is my lowest figure, and nothing you could say