"I"m with you!" said Lucky Lee, and he increased the stake again. His eyes were glistening.
For several minutes they kept on increasing the amount in the centre of the table, one thoughtfully, the other excitedly. The older players now left off making patronizing remarks, and became interested. Finally Young said, "No, I won"t make it any higher. What have you got?"
Lee slapped down his cards. His voice trembled a little as he asked, confidently, "Can you beat that?"
"Yep," said Young, and he coolly laid down his victorious hand. The others all looked at it. "It"s about time I was winning," he said, calmly enough; but his heart was thumping.
"Why didn"t you keep on raising him?" asked Powelton, sneeringly.
"I wish I had," thought Young, as he gathered in what meant a large winning for one swoop. Lee was laughing loudly to show he did not care.
He was excited, and would have gone on betting for a long time, Young thought.
That was the turning-point. Had Young lost, he might have stopped; but to stop now would look mean, he reflected.
"The luck has turned," he whispered to himself. "I"ll play a few more hands." And when the game broke up at dawn, he had lost his winnings, and more.
That night he tossed in his bed, and said: "I must stop; that"s all there is about it; I _must_ stop."
The next time they met to play, Young said, "Go ahead without me; I don"t feel like it to-night."
"The Deacon hasn"t any sporting blood. He"s afraid of his own pupil,"
Powelton said, and the others laughed. Lucky laughed, too; he was the pupil. Young played.
That night Young won handily. He felt especially pleased to win that night. He thought, "I"ll stop the minute I have won back what I lost."
But he did not win back what he had lost, and so played on the next night, and on the next. And so it went until he was brought to a stop with a jerk.
It came near the end of the term and of the year, shortly before the final examinations. The crowd had been playing nearly every night, and of late, somehow, Young had been losing nearly every time he played; but he said: "I can"t afford to stop now. Surely this bad luck can"t continue. I must win! I will win next time!" He could not stop. It is called "gambler"s fever."
He could not sleep; he was neglecting his studies. He had used up all his allowance of "absences." He did not mind that, but he had within these few weeks lost--he would not allow himself to reckon how much! He had borrowed from the fellows, and he had been steadily drawing from the bank the precious money for which he had worked so hard, and which meant so much more to him than money meant to boys with monthly allowances from home. One morning he made out another check to his own order. "This is positively the last time," he said to himself. He had said that before, but this time it was true.
That night he began to lose with the first hand. He laughed, he played recklessly, he lost. He went home, and found a letter in his pocket while undressing which he had forgotten to open, in hurrying to the game. This letter said, "We beg leave to call your attention to the fact that your account seems to be overdrawn to the amount of seventy-five cents." It was from the Princeton Bank.
This meant that William Young owned not a cent in the world, and was a debtor even to the bank besides owing various sums to his companions. He was bankrupt. It was pretty bad. But that was not the worst of it. That was not the reason he stood by the table letting his lamp smoke while he kept staring at the letter in his hand.
He had kept with his personal account the fund of his cla.s.s, and every cent of it was gone with the rest. He had held it in trust as treasurer.
It had amounted to something over one hundred dollars.
But he had drawn it out unconsciously? No; he knew he had used all his own money long ago.
But surely he had meant to return what he had borrowed from the cla.s.s fund? Oh, yes; but this kind of "borrowing" is called embezzlement--an ugly word. It really means theft and breach of trust combined.
Young could not take it all in at first. For awhile he stood there, saying to himself, "Isn"t it funny this letter was in my pocket all the evening while I was playing--isn"t it funny?"
Then he looked up, sniffed, and said, "That lamp is smoking." He turned it down, and stared at the flame for nearly a minute. Then suddenly he blew it out, and was alone in the darkness.
Oh, yes, it was all true. There was no way of getting out of it. He realized it all now vividly. He, William Young, a member of the church, son of honest old Farmer Young, was a gambler and--yes, he might just as well call it by its right name--a thief!
He was the one of whom the others at home used to stand in awe because he was going East for a higher education. He was the one for whom the minister predicted such great things. He was the one who had his tuition remitted in consideration of "high moral character." He was the one whose letters from college were read aloud at the sewing society by a proud little mother, who thought he was the best son in the world.
Why hadn"t he stayed at home and remained an honest man, working hard in the bank or as a plain farmer, like good little Charlie? Oh, how did he ever sink so low? If he only had a chance to do it all over again--if he could only wake up and find it all a dream--if he could only wipe it all out of existence, how joyous and sunny would be life and duty and hard work again!
But it wasn"t a dream! It was all very real, indeed. None of it could be wiped out. It was all there and staring him in the face, real, horribly real. And that was not all; matters could not remain only as bad as _this_. He was an out-and-out embezzler, liable to be found out and exposed as such at any moment--and then what?
Leave college with a disgraced name--but that would not be all. The news would go home; it would get there before he did. Everyone in the county would hear it, and talk about him. Some of them would laugh and sneer, and say, "Too bad!" and really be secretly glad.
Perhaps the authorities would send and--it made him weak and sick to think of it--have him arrested--by an officer of the law--and put in jail. This would kill his honest, old gray-bearded father. And as for his mother--but that hurt too much! He shut his eyes; he simply would not let himself think of that.
But what could he do? Time was flying. Just now he had heard Old North strike four in the dark, silent distance--good Old North, on whose steps he had hoped to sing as a Senior some day. Every moment brought him nearer to ruin. Something must be done.
He took hold of his head to quiet its buzzing. "It will do no good to think about it any more," he said aloud. "Act, act, act--you must!"
First, he spent a few bitter moments on his knees by the bed It is no one"s concern what he said to G.o.d. Then he arose, quite calmly struck a match, and with an almost steady hand lighted the lamp. Then very deliberately, in a matter-of-fact way, he drew up the rocking-chair so that the light would come over his left shoulder. He dragged over another chair to put his feet upon. He sat down. He did a little figuring at first on the envelope in his hand. Then he opened his trigonometry and studied furiously until chapel-time. There was, you see, good stuff in Will Young yet.
It would do no good to tell himself any longer how low he had fallen; but it would do a great deal of good to win the Freshman First Honor prize; and he had no time to lose.
To win was not a mere ambition now--it was a grim necessity. It was the one way of keeping from being disgraced in the eyes of the world as deeply as he was in his own and G.o.d"s.
The prize would not come until commencement. Before that time the cla.s.s might vote to use its money. They might instruct their "honorable treasurer" to expend the funds on decorations and a bra.s.s band, as was sometimes done at the close of examinations to celebrate their Soph.o.m.orehood; and what would he do then! He decided that he must not let himself think about that now. It made his heart stop so short it fairly hurt; besides, it interrupted his work.
He had figured it all out in his neat businesslike hand on the envelope.
On one side, under a.s.sets, he wrote, "Freshman prize, if won, $200;" on the other side the following list:
The Princeton Bank overdraw $0.75 Henry Powelton, borrowed 10.00 Carey H. Lee, borrowed 25.00 William Sinclair Drew 23.35 The cla.s.s of Ninety-blank debt 117.20 ------- Total $176.30
Two hundred dollars would "square" him, and just leave enough to buy a ticket back to the old farm--that is, if he wanted to go there.
CHAPTER XIII
THE LAST CHANCE
Many times that huge, dark thing in the background of his thoughts jumped into the foreground and interrupted his work; but he accomplished a good deal. He felt a glow of hope. It was only ten days to the examinations, but it had only been during the past month of madness that he had neglected his studies. He could soon make that up.
Just as he started for chapel, he suddenly began to wonder if he had been mistaken about that prize. Wasn"t it only $100 after all? He took down a catalogue and looked it up. He was right, the prize was $200.
"A prize of $200, part of the income of the J. S. K. fund;" but what was this?--"To be paid in quarterly instalments during the following year"!
He had never noticed that before. For a moment it made him feel sick at the stomach. Then he decided that it was not so bad after all, for if he only won the prize he could borrow money on the certificate of it that would be presented the winner at commencement.
For the first day or two the club guyed him for turning poler, and they thought his serious and grave demeanor was very funny when he declined to join with them in their pursuits. At first he paid no attention to their jeers; he had no time. Then came the day he got angry and said.
"It makes no difference to me what you fellows think. I"ve quit my foolishness for good, and that"s all there is to it. Now let me alone."
He struck the table a heavy blow, and looked as if he meant everything he said; and no one felt inclined to guy him again. He looked like the old Deacon who had done up Ballard.
"The Deacon must have an attack of R. E. Morse," Billy Drew said, as he left the room.