Ann Arbor Tales Part 38

"No," his mother replied. "She be home maype a hour; maype two hour."

Each seemed conscious of the infinite labor of the conversation.

"Well," John said after half an hour, "I guess I'd better be going."

"So soon!" his mother exclaimed. "Vy not in de morning? We go to church, you ant me."

He shook his head, sadly.

"No," he said. "I must go back to-night. The train leaves before long."

"All right," she muttered.

At the gate in the low fence he turned. His mother's figure was silhouetted against the light of the room at the end of the hall.

"Good-bye," he said, "and tell Pauline to take care."

"Goot-pye," she called to him softly.

She turned back into the house at once and he heard the door shut.

Pa.s.sing beneath an electric light he examined his watch. The train was due to leave in an hour. He decided to walk to the station. The cold felt good on his face.

He straightened his shoulders and walked with long, even strides, looking neither to right nor left.

He found Janet waiting in the shadow of the baggage-room doorway. The station was thronged with a shouting, jostling crowd. Taking her arm, he guided her through the gate and a.s.sisted her to the platform of the last coach.

"You hold the seat, will you?" he asked. "I want to smoke. We broke training to-night, you know."

She nodded, smiling.

And until the porter's call he paced up and down the long train shed. As the train pulled out he swung himself to the platform of the rear coach and entered.

V

A throng of several hundred awaited the arrival of the train at midnight in the railway yards. At the first shriek of the whistle away beyond the bend of the river the cheering commenced. It gathered force sufficiently to smother completely the pounding of the great engine as it thundered past the trim little station and came to a grinding stop.

In the crowd that packed the platform the old men were as eager as the lads; and there were not a few such old men with white in their hair and lined faces, that the lights of the station made radiant. Professors were there, eagerly jostling, squirming, edging in the crowd, holding their own in the tight-squeezed ma.s.s with elbows every whit as pointed as the elbows of the youngsters that the youngsters thrust into _their_ sides.

The crowd discovered at once that the team was in the second coach and before a man of the eleven had reached the platform the car was surrounded.

Late as was the hour, speeches were demanded, nor was a path opened through the throng until the demand had been acceded to. A circle formed around the band and its bra.s.sy noise blared out upon the night until every townsman within range of the farthest-carrying horn flung up his window and poked a head wonderingly into the outer darkness.

As the crowd surged down the platform to the front of the train, Adams, taking advantage of the clear way at the rear, a.s.sisted Janet to the ground and un.o.bserved they pa.s.sed out into the street through the tall turnstile in the shadow of the baggage-room.

She breathed deeply of the cool night air and he felt the pressure of her hand upon his arm as her steps quickened to his.

In the crowded train she had refrained from all attempts to learn the reason for his silence. Only now and then, as in answer to some question that she asked him, had he spoken in the hour and a half required to cover the forty miles between Detroit and Ann Arbor.

But now in the silence of the darkened street she took courage. At the top of the steep hill, as they pa.s.sed beneath a sputtering electric lamp, she looked up at him and asked:

"What is it, John--tell me--what is it?"

She hung upon his reply eagerly, a little frightened, though she realized, in seeking to a.n.a.lyze her foreboding that she could not tell herself why she should.

"There's a great deal, Janet," he replied calmly. She perceived an unfamiliar note in his voice, a note that seemed to her to sound a sort of resignation.

"But _what_---- Can't you tell me? Has anything happened?"

For a moment he did not answer, but then he said: "Yes, dear; several things have happened--several things----"

"What?" she asked, almost in a whisper, and he felt her hand's pressure upon his arm again.

He continued, ruminatively, quite as though she had not spoken: "Several things, that make other things clearer to me now--much clearer."

She had never heard him speak like this before. Perhaps it was a matter intimately personal with him, too intimately personal even for her to share his knowledge, his consideration of it. She almost regretted having asked him. Why had she not prattled on about the game, the splendid victory, his own skill? But when next he spoke she understood she had done no wrong.

"I must tell you about those things, Janet; I must tell you now--to-night--I have meant to before."

Her hand upon his arm tightened its grasp.

"John, what _is_ it? _What_ has happened?" Now she made no effort to conceal the fright that sounded in her voice.

He patted her hand, white on his black sleeve, and laughed lightly--forcedly, she thought.

"There, don't be afraid," he said, "I haven't committed any crime."

She laughed then herself, and said, "You _did_ frighten me, though."

They had come to the library. As they pa.s.sed, the deep throated bell in the tower rang out twice upon the stillness--tang--tung.

Fifteen minutes past one, Janet calculated.

They took the diagonal walk to the crossing of South and East University Avenues. Her room was in the second house from the corner, on the former street.

He seemed of a sudden to perceive where they were, for, looking about him, he said: "Janet, it is something I must tell you for your own sake. And when I'm through, you can say to me what you think; it won't hurt."

A step and they were at her home.

"Can't you sit here on the porch a few minutes?" he asked; "I shan't keep you long."

With sudden anger she replied:--

"John, if you don't speak out at once what you have to say, I shall go in immediately. You've said again and again that there is something you must tell me; why don't you? Couldn't you see; can't you see now that I haven't begged you to tell because it seems to pain you."

"It does," he exclaimed, "you can't know how it pains me." He looked down at her where she sat on the step and into her uplifted face.

"What is it?" she asked calmly, now.