"
Then, crushed and disconsolate, the football squad filed silently from the
room, to break the glad news to Coach Corridan, and to spread the joyous
tidings to old Bannister. When they had gone, T. Haviland Hicks, Jr.,
staring at the figurative black cloud that lowered over his Alma Mater,
strove to find its silver lining, and at last he partially succeeded.
"Anyway," said Hicks, with a lugubrious effort to grin, "Thor's
announcement shocked the squad so much that I was not forced to explain my
Billion-Dollar Mystery!"
CHAPTER V
HICKS MAKES A DECISION
"In the famous words of Mr. Somebody-Or-Other," quoth T. Haviland Hicks,
Jr., "something has
got to be did, and immediately to once!"
Big Butch Brewster nodded assent. So did Head Coach Patrick Henry Corridan,
Beef McNaughton, Team Manager Socks Fitzpatrick, Monty Merriweather, Dad
Pendleton, President of the Athletic Association, and Deacon Radford,
quarter-back, also Shad Fishpaw, who, being Freshman Class-Chairman,
maintained a discreet silence. Instead of the usual sky-larking, care-free
crowd that infested the cozy quarters of the happy-go-lucky Hicks, every
collegian present, except the ever-cheerful youth, seemed to have lost his
best friend and his last dollar at one fell swoop!
"Oh, yes, something has got to be did!" fleered Beef McNaughton, the
davenport creaking under the combined tonnage of himself and Butch
Brewster, "But who will do it? Where's all that Oh-just-leave-it-to-Hicks
stuff you have pulled for the past three years, you pestiferous insect?
Bah! You did a lot; you dragged a Prodigious Prodigy to old Bannister,
enshrouded him in darkest mystery, and now, when he pushed the 'Varsity off
the field and promised to corral the Championship, single-handed, he puts
his foot down, and says, 'No--I will not play football!' Get busy, Little
Mr.
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