T. Haviland Hicks Senior | Page 2

was strangely familiar. Back at
Bannister College, where he remembered he had gone in the dim and
dusty past, he had often heard that same fog-horn voice, roaring songs
of a less blood-curdling character, and accompanied by that same banjo
twanging, which tortured the campus, and bothered would-be studious
youths!
"I'm not in a moving-picture show," Butch informed himself, as he
donned khaki trousers, football sweater, and heavy shoes. "I'm not on a
Western ranch, either. I'm in the sleep-shack of Camp Bannister, the
football training-camp of the Bannister College squad! Those fellows
in the bunks are not cowboys, Indians, and bandits--they are my
teammates! I did dream stuff that would shame a Wild West scenario,
but I understand it all now--my dreams were influenced by T. Haviland
Hicks, Jr.!"
At that dramatic moment, to substantiate his statement, the raucous
voice, accompanied by resounding chords strummed on a banjo,
sounded again. The vocal and instrumental chaos was frequently
punctured by revolver reports, as the torturesome Caruso outside
roared:
"Oh, Chuckwalla Bill thought life was sweet-- Till he met up with
Sure-shot Pete; A hotter shootin' match Last Chance never saw-- But
Sure-shot Pete was some quicker on the draw!"

The pachydermic Butch, fully dressed--and awake, raging in his wrath
like an active volcano, glanced at his watch, and discovered that it was
exactly five A.M.! Intensely pacified by this knowledge, he lumbered
toward the bunkhouse door and flung it open, determined to crush the
pestersome youth who thus unfeelingly disturbed the quietude of Camp
Bannister at such an unearthly hour! However, his grim purpose was
temporarily thwarted--before him spread a beautiful panorama, a vast
canvas painted in rich hues and colors, that indescribably charming
masterpiece of nature, entitled dawn.
Butch, gazing from the bunkhouse doorway toward the pebbly shore of
the placid lake stretching out for two miles before him, beheld Old Sol,
blood-red, peeping above the wooded hills on the far-off, opposite
strand of Lake Conowingo; the luminous orb laid a flaming pathway
across the shimmering waters, and golden bars of light, like gleaming
fingers outstretched, fell athwart the tall pines that towered on the high
bluff back of the camp. The glorious sunshine, succeeding a flood of
rosy color, inundated the scene; it bathed in a gorgeous radiance the
early autumn woods, it illumined the bunkhouse, and another rude
shanty known to the squad as the grub-shack, it poured down on old
Hinky-Dink, the ancient negro cookee, setting the breakfast tables just
outside the canvas cook-tent.
"Deed, cross mah heart, Mistah Butch," grinned old Hinky-Dink,
seeing, as a motion picture director would express it, "Wrath registered
on the countenance" of Butch Brewster, "Ah done tole dat young Hicks
dat a bird what cain't sing an' will sing mus' be made not to sing! Ah
done info'med him dat yo'-all was layin' fo' him, cause he done bus' up
yo' sleep!"
A jay bird, a flashing bit of vivid blue, shot from a tall pine, jeering
shrilly at Butch; out on the lake, a trout leaped above the water for an
infinitesimal second, its shining scales gleaming in the sunshine. From
the cook-tent, where old Hinky-Dink grumbled at the frying pan, the
appetizing odor of frying fish assailed the football captain, softening
his wrath.
High above the shanties, on a tall flagpole made from a straight young

pine, floated a big gold and green banner, its bright colors gleaming in
the sunshine; it bore the words:
CAMP BANNISTER TRAINING CAMP THE FOOTBALL SQUAD
BANNISTER COLLEGE
Head Coach Corridan, smashing the precedent that had made former
Gold and Green squads have their training camp at Bannister College,
had brought the Varsity and second-string stars to this camp on the
shore of Lake Conowingo, in the Pennsylvania mountains. For two
weeks, one of which had passed, they were to train at Camp Bannister,
until college officially opened; swimming, hunting, cross-country runs,
and a healthful outdoor existence would give the athletes superb
condition, and daily scrimmages on the level field back of the bluff
rounded out an eleven that promised to be the strongest in Bannister
history.
As big, good-natured Butch Brewster stood in the bunkhouse doorway,
his wrath at the pestiferous Hicks forgotten, in his rapture at the
glorious dawn, he saw something that showed why his dreams had been
of the wild West! The expression of indignation, however, yielded to
one of humorous affection, as he gazed toward the shore.
"I can't be angry with Hicks!" breathed Butch, beholding a spectacle
more impressive than dawn. "So, the irrepressible wretch has Coach
Corridan's revolvers, used in starting our training sprints, and a lot of
blank cartridges! He is giving an imitation of a Western bad man. No
wonder I dreamed of Indians, cowboys, and hold-ups; I'll have revenge
on the heartless villain, routing