Chapter IX: A Cloud with a Silver Lining

As had been the case that morning, Harriet, Jane, Hazel and Tommy were found at work, the former two at the net, the latter two some little distance away, tossing balls back and forth with their racquets. The Meadow-Brook Girls had made up their minds to learn the game, and, still further, to learn to play an expert game. Once having made up their minds to a certain course of action they would forge ahead, undaunted by any obstacles that might be placed in their way. Bright eyes and glowing faces encouraged even the morose Captain Baker. He went so far as to smile his approval.

“We will get down to business again,” he said. “Harriet and Jane will please take their places, Harriet to serve, Jane to be the striker-out. Play!”

Jane began by losing her racquet, which fell near the serving line in Harriet’s court. That was the beginning of the match, drawing suppressed groans from the boys and laughter from the girls.

Margery watched the practice indifferently. She declined even to practice. Tommy declared that Buster was too fat to play tennis anyway, and that it was fortunate for her companions that she knew it. The game was resumed and played out, Jane winning. There had not been a moment of encouragement in it to the observers on the boys’ side. Even Miss Elting had frequently shaken her head, evidencing her hopelessness of the girls ever accomplishing anything at the game.

Hazel and Tommy played next. The little lisping girl took a keener interest in her tennis practice than they had ever known her to do in anything else.

“Tommy is going to be an expert player one of these days,” declared Harriet. “Which, however, is more than can be said of some of her companions. How do you think we are getting along, George?”

“I couldn’t say so soon,” answered George evasively.

“Now, now, George. You know you told the boys to-day that we were hopeless,” returned Harriet laughingly.

George flushed to the roots of his hair.

“Somebody told you,” flared Captain George.

“Yes,” she answered nodding, her eyes snapping mischievously.

“I know. Sam told you. I’ll whale you for that when we get back to camp, Sam,” threatened George.

“No, Sam did not tell me. You told me yourself, Captain,” chuckled Harriet. “You told me first by coloring when I accused you of it, then you admitted it by word of mouth. You see, I know you.” Harriet laughed merrily, George’s companions joining in the laugh good-naturedly.

“She’s too sharp for you, Captain,” shouted Dill.

“Even if I can’t play tennis,” answered Harriet. “But I’m going to play tennis and I’m going to play it well. One of these days I shall beat you, George, but I shall not forget that it was you who taught me. Don’t you think I shall make a player? Answer me frankly. No evasion, sir.”

“Well, I—I—I can’t say just——”

“Tell the truth.”

“No, I don’t. There, I’ve said it. You made me do it, so don’t blame me for saying so. I don’t believe there is the least little bit of use in our going on with this. You might learn to play the game, but you never, never will be expert enough to go into a match game,” he declared with emphasis.

“Aren’t you an encouraging boy, though?” jeered Jane. “So glad you told us.”

“Am I to understand that you are no longer our instructor, George? If so, we had better get some one else. I am quite certain that Sam would be glad to teach us the game. Wouldn’t you, Sam?” asked Harriet mischievously.

“Well, seeing that my nose is out of commission, I guess I’d have to wear a mask. If I had a mask and a coat of armor, I might be willing to take a chance at teaching you. I guess the Pickle had better do it, though. We can take turns at it and as fast as one gets knocked out another can take his place and go on with the game.”

“Oh, you fellows make me weary,” cried George, springing up. “I’ll teach you, Harriet. I said I would, and I will. I guess, if you have the pluck to stand up and keep batting away at the balls without losing your nerve, I ought to be willing to do my part, even if the tournament is out of the question. We will go on with the practice.”

Tommy smiled wisely at Jane, and the latter chuckled under her breath. The practice was resumed, this time with renewed vigor. Some slight improvement was noted, though the great difficulty seemed to be in getting the girls to place the ball accurately. They seemed to be unable to hit the ball so that it would fall in any certain designated spot. Their strokes, too, were uneven. The ball was just as likely to fall spinning on the volleyer’s side of the net as into the court of her opponent.

The technical name for this is “a fault,” and means a score for the faulter’s opponent. There were many such, the faults being about even, however, with little or no advantage for either side. It was discouraging work, discouraging for George Baker and discouraging for the girls, though they did not show by their expression that they were other than happy and contented with their work. George found himself wondering again if they really knew how badly they played. He decided that they could not know, or, with all their pluck, they would give it up.

“The gloom on our side of the camp is so thick you can cut it with a bread-knife,” thought Sam after watching the game for the better part of an hour. “What spectacles they are making of themselves, and—hooray! Good play. What’s the matter, Harriet? Did you forget yourself?”

She had made a really brilliant play. To their amazement, others equally as brilliant followed it. Then all at once there came a slump. Harriet Burrell played worse than ever. It had come to the point where she could not even hit a ball, much less deliver it properly.

“If there were a lake handy, I’d jump into it and drown myself,” George confided to Billy.

“Go jump in the spring. A good ducking will do you good. Your face is as red as a lobster. You couldn’t be any hotter if you had been playing a championship game yourself.”

“A championship game!” groaned Baker. “Don’t mention it!”

“Do you know anything?” demanded Sam, coming up at that juncture.

George shook his head.

“No, I’m a driveling idiot. I always knew something was wrong with me, but until this thing came up I never knew exactly what that something was. Now I do.”

“Glad you’ve got a clear understanding of yourself,” answered Sam. “It will be the best thing ever for what ails you. But you were mighty slow in getting wise to yourself. Even Tommy could tell you. She could tell you what you have done in this matter, too.”

“Eh? What I have done?”

“Yes.”

“Well, what have I done, that you haven’t done?” demanded George.

“You’ve bitten off more than you can chew,” answered Sam, with a series of cautious nods, being wary of the bandages across his injured nose. “That’s what you’ve done.”

“I have,” agreed George. “So have you, so have all the fellows. We are all in it up to our chins. What have you in the back of your head besides what you’ve just said?”

“That we ought to have a crack player to teach those girls.”

“Sam,” said Baker gravely, and with great impressiveness, “the champion player of the world couldn’t put any ginger or skill into the playing of those young women, all of which isn’t saying a word against them, for I admire them more than any lot of girls I ever knew, and so do we all. Besides, there isn’t any champion on tap, so we must grub along with Captain George Baker. Hello, there comes Fred Avery.”

The latter put down his bundles, wiped the perspiration from his forehead, then, walking over, tossed the morning paper to George. Baker, hot and perspiring, sat down with his back against a granite boulder and glanced idly through the pages of the newspaper. All at once he sprang to his feet and, waving the newspaper frantically above his head, began to dance about and yell as if he had suddenly gone crazy.

“Catch him! Catch him!” howled Sam. “Somebody catch him! He has hydrophobia!”

“I’ve got it, I’ve got it!” yelled George. “I’ve _got it_! Saved, saved! Whoop! Yeow! Oh, I was never so glad in my life. Yell, you Indians, yell!”