Football -- Juvenile fiction; Schools -- Juvenile fiction
The driver, following custom, pulled up with disconcerting suddenness
at the entrance of Academy Building, swung off his seat, threw open
the door on Leonard’s side and wrested the battered suit-case from
between the latter’s legs. Then he as swiftly transferred Leonard’s
half-dollar from the boy’s fingers to his pocket and grabbed for the
distinguished kit-bag beyond. Leonard, unceremoniously thrust into
a noonday world dappled with the shadows of lazily swaying branches
and quite unfamiliar, took up his bag and instinctively ascended
the steps. There were other youths about him, coming down, going up
or just loitering, but none heeded him. Before he reached the wide,
open doorway he paused and looked back. Straight away and at a slight
descent traveled a wide graveled path between spreading trees, its far
end a hot blur of sunlight. At either side of the main path stretched
green sward, tree dotted, to the southern and northern boundaries of
the campus. Here and there a group of early arrivals were seated or
stretched in the shade of the trees, coolly colorful blots against the
dark green of the shadowed turf. Two other paths started off below him,
diverging, one toward a handsome building which Leonard surmised to be
Memorial Hall, holding the library and auditorium, the other toward the
residence of the Principal, Doctor Maitland McPherson, or, in school
language, “Mac.” Each of these structures stood close to the confines
of the campus; the other buildings were stretched right and left,
toeing the transverse drive with military precision; Haylow and Lykes,
dormitories, on the south flank; Academy Building in the center: Upton
and Borden, dormitories, too, completing the rank. Somewhere to the
rear, as Leonard recalled, must be the gymnasium and the place where
they fed you; Lawrence Hall, wasn’t it? Well, this looked much more
like what he had expected, and he certainly approved of it.
He went on into the restful gloom of the corridor, his eyes for the
moment unequal to the sudden change. Then he found the Office and took
his place in the line before the counter. He had to wait while three
others were disposed of, and then, just as his own turn came, he heard
at the doorway the pleasant, leisurely voice of his late companion in
the cab. There was another boy with him, a tall, nice-appearing chap,
who was saying as they entered: “You’re in Upton, with a fellow named
Reilly, who plays half for us. It’s a good room, Renneker, and you’ll
like Red, I’m sure.”
“Thanks.” The other’s voice was noncommittal.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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