The next evening, which was Tuesday evening, while the societies were hilariously enjoying their annual calcium-light procession, Donald Pike took a car and hastened to the home of the Honorable Fairfax Lee. He had tarried in the campus long enough to be sure that Winnie Lee was again enjoying the processional festivities from one of the dormitory windows.
"n.o.body will know whether I am in that procession or not," he muttered, as he started toward Lee"s. "And if they do know, what is the difference? I"m under no obligation to be there, and I can say that I had a headache, or anything else I want to, if I choose to take the trouble to account for my absence."
To Pike"s great satisfaction, he found Fairfax Lee at home; and when he told the servant that he had an important communication to make, he was invited into the waiting-room, and finally was ushered into the presence of Mr. Lee.
The facing of Mr. Lee in this manner, even though he could claim disinterested motives, rather phased even the blunted spirit of Donald Pike. If he had dared to, he would have committed his story to writing, and so brought it to Lee"s attention. But things that are written often have an unpleasant way of reappearing, to the discomfiture and undoing of the writer, and Pike"s caution warned him against such risks. Words merely spoken, he a.s.sured himself, can be denied, if that becomes afterward necessary. Written words, undestroyed, cannot be so easily escaped.
"Anything I can do for you?" Mr. Lee queried, when Pike hesitated. "You have a communication, I believe?"
Donald pulled himself together, and the opening sentences of what he intended to say came back to him. He had thought these out with care, and they seemed very fine and even humanitarian.
"I want you to know at the outset, Mr. Lee, that in coming to you with the information I bear I am wholly disinterested. But the truth is due you. No one else seems to have had the courage to tell you, and I shall."
Fairfax Lee began to look interested.
"You are very kind," he said, "and I thank you in advance for your favor."
This was so auspicious a beginning that Pike"s courage rose.
"I want to have a frank talk with you about a certain young Yale man--Mr. Buck Badger. You must have noticed that he is very devoted in his attentions to your daughter?"
There was no reply to this, though Pike halted, in the expectation that there would be one.
"I am well acquainted with Badger. In fact, until very recently, he was my roommate, and we were good friends. Perhaps when I tell you that he is not a fit man to a.s.sociate with your daughter, you may think I am led by the fact that Badger and I are not now the friends we were once. But it is not so. We are not friends simply because his baseness became so apparent to me that I could no longer a.s.sociate with him.
"I have thought this thing over for a good while, Mr. Lee, and as an honorable man, I did not think I ought to remain silent and see things go on as they are. You love your daughter, Mr. Lee?"
This last was rather an effective shot, for Fairfax Lee loved Winnie devotedly.
"All this is very unpleasant, Mr. Pike, but I am ready to hear what you have to say. I am free to confess that you rather surprise me."
"Your daughter is an admirable young lady, Mr. Lee. And though I cannot say that she and I are more than the merest acquaintances, I thought it a shame that matters should go on as they are without a word from me to you, to let you see what your daughter is walking into. Or what she would walk into, if she should ever be so unfortunate as to marry Buck Badger!"
Donald Pike had at last contrived to get into his tones and manner a sympathetic element that, while it was veriest hypocricy, was very effective.
"My daughter is not married to Mr. Badger yet!" said Lee, somewhat bluntly, a frown on his usually pleasant face, for his position was far from agreeable.
"And I hope she may never be."
"You fail to specify," Lee reminded. "You make only vague charges."
"There are many things," said Pike, coming to the point now with great boldness, "but I shall name only one. Buck Badger is a drunkard."
Fairfax Lee seemed astonished, and the frown on his face deepened.
"He is the worst type of drunkard. Not a man who drinks steadily, but one of those who indulge now and then in crazy, drunken debauches. For weeks, even months, he may not touch a drop of liquor. Then he will go on a spree. You can verify this, I am sure, by inquiries carefully made among the students. More than once he has been known to be on a drunk.
He was drunk when he went aboard the excursion steamer, _Crested Foam_, when she was burned in the bay."
"What?"
"It is true, Mr. Lee, every word of it. Your daughter and a good many others think he was drugged by the boat-keeper, Barney Lynn, and lured on the steamer for the purpose of robbery. But when he met Lynn he was already raving blind drunk, and Lynn merely took advantage of his helpless condition. You can know that this is true if you will call or send a man to the saloon of Joe Connelly. He went to Connelly"s that night--or rather, the evening before--filled himself up on the vilest decoctions, and went out from there as drunk as a fool. He has been there before many times. Connelly knows him well."
All this was so circ.u.mstantial that Fairfax Lee was alarmed and moved.
He knew that Connelly"s was one of the worst dens of the city, and he felt sure that unless there was something in the story Pike would not give names in this way. He resolved to learn the whole truth about the matter.
"If what you say is true, Buck Badger is not fit to a.s.sociate with any girl," he a.s.serted.
"Especially not with a girl as innocent and unsuspecting as your daughter, Mr. Lee. I have seen that for a good while, and it has been a fight with my conscience to keep from coming here with this story. I couldn"t delay it longer. I trust you see that I can have no hope of gain, and nothing but right motives in bringing you this story--which you will find fully substantiated by a course of inquiry."
Fairfax Lee was flushed and silent.
"All of Badger"s friends, or most of them, I am sure, know that he was drunk, and not drugged, when he went aboard the _Crested Foam_. Some of them might admit this knowledge."
"You are a soph.o.m.ore?"
"Yes."
"And Mr. Badger is?"
"Yes, sir."
"And you were recently his friend and roommate?"
"Yes."
"I have your card, which I will put by for reference. I presume, if I call on you, you will be willing to repeat anywhere what you have said to me here?"
This was unexpected, and Pike hesitated.
"I don"t care to get myself into trouble with Badger. He is of the bulldog, pugilistic type, and the first thing he would do would be to a.s.sault me like the bully he is. I have given you the warning. You can get all the proof you want. Probably you would never have heard of this until too late, if I had not voluntarily brought you the story."
"You are right," Lee admitted. "Perhaps that would be asking too much."
"I have struck the blow, Badger," Donald Pike muttered, as he left the handsome home of the Lees. "You will find it more of a knock-down, I fancy, than if I had hit you between the eyes with my fist. n.o.body ever walks roughshod over Don Pike and gets off without suffering for it. You will hear something drop pretty soon."
And so, chuckling, he took his way to the street-car line, and returned to the campus and the Yale jollification.
The Kansan had accompanied Winnie Lee home that evening, as usual. The hour was late, and he did not enter the house, but kissed her good-night at the gate.
"Good-night and pleasant dreams, sweetheart!" he said as he turned to go.
His heart was light, for he and Winnie had enjoyed a long and loving talk on the way home, and throughout the evening there had been no untoward incident to mar his pleasure. He had noticed Donald Pike"s absence, and had been glad of it, but he merely supposed Pike kept away because of the row of the previous evening. If there are such things as premonitions of coming trouble, certainly they did not distress Badger that night. Winnie was also in a happy frame of mind as she tripped lightly up the steps and entered the house.
Inza and Elsie had returned some time before. As she had expected, they had retired to their rooms. She was surprised, however, to find her father waiting for her in the sitting-room, which was brightly lighted.
As she came into the room, she saw something ominous in his face. She thought she was to be lectured for remaining out so late.
"Sit down, Winnie," he said. "I want to have a talk with you."
His voice was even more ominous than his face. She came and sat down by his side, when she had removed her hat. He put his hand on her head and drew her toward him.