Roger soon proved that he could—indeed, the problem presented no difficulties except such as Dunn’s stupidity had raised or his cunning invented. Having thus paved the way for his main business, Dunn leaned against the door-post, and, holding a finger between the leaves of his Virgil to strengthen the impression that he was stopping casually on the way back to his interrupted work, began to talk.
Roger gave a good-natured little laugh. “No, I didn’t, and I didn’t expect to.”
“Four votes out of fourteen—that’s not very near.”
“I don’t mean that. You know what I mean.”
“The day before the election it was all settled that you were to get it. I heard so from McDowell and Bumpus and two or three others. Then something happened, and the vote went the other way.”
“What happened?” Roger was listening eagerly.
“Talbot went against you and bulldozed ’em into electing Horr. You know he’s always got to have his way.”
Roger smiled bravely. “He probably thought Horr would make a better captain.”
“I don’t know what he thought. I know what he did. He pretends to be a friend of yours, too.”
“The way he treated you didn’t look much like it. Good night.”
Dunn returned to his room fairly well satisfied with himself; he had given Hardie something to think of that would take down his insufferable conceit, a conceit which Dunn was convinced must be the worse since it was masked by such a quiet exterior.
In fact, if thinking was all Roger was expected to do, Dunn’s mission of malice was wholly successful. Roger did think, lying awake an hour after he went to bed, and fighting vainly against an insistent mental activity that would not be cajoled by firm resolutions or new arrangements of pillow; but the direction which his thoughts took was different from what Jason had anticipated. A week before, he would have ridiculed the idea of his being made captain; his ambition did not fly so high. Now, when the opportunity had come and gone, when the honor which, it seemed, had been almost within his reach, was bestowed upon another, he understood how much he should have prized it. Why had Talbot interfered against him? Surely not from ill-will, for the record of the season proved him as stanch a friend as an insignificant new boy ever acquired; nor from personal liking for Horr—they belonged to wholly different sets in school. It must be, then, that Pete regarded him as incompetent for the position. Moreover, if Pete thought so, it was probably true; he was just a meek, harmless, flabby sort of fellow who happened to be able to play a fair game at end, but wasn’t fit for leadership! Dunn’s shot had wounded, but not in the spot at which it was aimed. Hardie’s self-esteem was hurt, not his trust in Pete.