The Plastic Age - Percy Marks (i have read the book .TXT) 📗

Don’t worry, either; I won’t disgrace the fraternity by making Phi Bete,” he concluded sarcastically.

“Oh, calm down, Hugh, and forget what I said,” Tucker pleaded, thoroughly sorry that he had started the argument. “You go ahead and do what you think right and we’ll stand by you.” He stood up and put his hand on Hugh’s shoulder. “No hard feelings, are there, old man?”

Kindness always melted Hugh; no matter how angry he was, he could not resist it. “No,” he said softly; “no hard feelings. I’m sorry I lost my temper.”

Tucker patted his shoulder. “Oh, that’s all right. I guess I kinda lost mine, too. You’ll be around to the meeting tomorrow night, won’t you? Better come. Paying fines don’t get you anywhere.”

“Sure, I’ll come.”

He went but took no part in the discussion, nor did he frequent the fraternity house any more than he had previously. More and more he realized that he had “gone with the wrong crowd,” and more and more he thought of what Graham had said to him in his freshman year about how a man was in hell if he joined the wrong fraternity. “I was the wise bird,” he told himself caustically; “I was the guy who knew all about it. Graham saw what would happen, and I didn’t have sense enough to take his advice. Hell, I never even thought about what he told me. I knew that I would be in heaven if Nu Delta gave me a bid. Heaven! Well, I’m glad that they were too high-hat for Norry Parker and that he went with the right bunch.”

Norville Parker was Hugh’s Catholic friend, and the more he saw of the freshman the better he liked him. Parker had received several bids from fraternities, and he followed the advice Hugh had given him. “If Delta Sigma Delta bids you, go there,” Hugh had said positively. “They’re the bunch you belong with. Apparently the Kappa Zetes are going to bid you, too. You go Delta Sig if you get the chance.” Hugh envied Parker the really beautiful fraternity life he was leading. “Why in God’s name,” he demanded of himself regularly, “didn’t I have sense enough to take Graham’s advice?”

When spring came, the two boys took long walks into the country, both of them loving the new beauty of the spring and happy in perfect companionship. Hugh missed Carl badly, and he wanted to ask Parker to room with him the remainder of the term. He felt, however, that the fraternity would object, and he wanted no further trouble with Nu Delta. As a matter of fact, the fraternity would have said nothing, but Hugh had become hypersensitive and expected his “brothers” to find fault with his every move. He had no intention of deserting Parker, but he could not help feeling that rooming with him would be a gratuitous insult to the fraternity.

Parker⁠—everyone called him Norry⁠—was a slender, delicate lad with dreamy gray eyes and silky brown hair that, unless he brushed it back severely, fell in soft curls on his extraordinarily white forehead. Except for a slightly aquiline nose and a firm jaw, he was almost effeminate in appearance, his mouth was so sensitive, his hands so white and slender, his manner so gentle. He had a slow, winning smile, a quiet, low voice. He was a dreamer and a mystic, a youth who could see fairies dancing in the shadows; and he told Hugh what he saw.

“I see things,” he said to Hugh one moonlight night as they strolled through the woods; “I see things, lovely little creatures flitting around among the trees: I mean I see them when I’m alone. I like to lie on my back in the meadows and look at the clouds and imagine myself sitting on a big fellow and sailing and sailing away to heaven. It’s wonderful. I feel that way when I play my fiddle.” He played the violin beautifully and had promptly been made soloist for the Musical Clubs. “I⁠—I can’t explain. Sometimes when I finish playing, I find my eyes full of tears. I feel as if I had been to some wonderful place, and I don’t want to come back.”

“I guess I’m not like other fellows. I cry over poetry, not because it makes me sad. It’s not that. It’s just so beautiful. Why, when I first read Shelley’s ‘Cloud’ I was almost sick I was so happy. I could hardly stand it. And when I hear beautiful music I cry, too. Why, when I listen to Kreisler, I sometimes want to beg him to stop; it hurts and makes me so happy that⁠—that I just can’t stand it,” he finished lamely.

“I know,” Hugh said. “I know how it is. I feel that way sometimes, too, but not as much as you, I guess. I don’t cry. I never really cry, but I want to once in a while. I⁠—I write poetry sometimes,” he confessed awkwardly, “but I guess it’s not very good. Jimmie Henley says it isn’t so bad for a sophomore, but I’m afraid that he’s just stringing me along, trying to encourage me, you know. But there are times when I’ve said a little bit right, just a little bit, but I’ve known that it was right⁠—and then I feel the way you do.”

“I’ve written lots of poetry,” Norry said simply, “but it’s no good; it’s never any good.” He paused between two big trees and pointed upward. “Look, look up there. See those black branches and that patch of sky between them and those stars. I want to picture that⁠—and I can’t; and I want to picture the trees the way they look now so fluffy with tiny new leaves, but I miss it a million miles.⁠ ⁠… But I can get it in music,” he added more brightly. “Grieg says it. Music is the most wonderful thing in the world. I wish I could be a great violinist. I can’t, though. I’m not a genius, and