They had found each other as rushees at a luncheon for freshmen in the Delta Omega house, and decided on the spot to room together. Young Masterson, however eager to emancipate himself from the restraints of a rather severely disciplined household, was something of an idealist, and opened up a new world to Bobby who, listening at first because he liked Tom, and later because he liked what Tom said, learned from his youthful tutor a love for the classics which, in the original, he had despised.
But Masterson, not having been brought up on cocktails, was not much advantaged by the tardy instruction he received in exchange for his Greek and Roman mythology. Once he started—no matter what the hour, place, or circumstance—Tom could be depended upon to continue drinking until he was unconscious. Bobby, approximately sober, would get him home, somehow, and put him to bed with all the solicitude of a mother. Apparently it never occurred to him that he was jeopardizing his chum’s future.
“Poor old Tommy!” he would say, unlacing his shoes. “I’m afraid you’ll just never learn to drink like a gentleman!”
Nor was the Merrick influence much of a blessing upon the Delta Omega house into which he and Tom moved as sophomores. Had he been less lovable, he might have been less dangerous. His charming irresistibility was fatal to the good resolutions of many a chap who honestly wanted to stay sober and do his work. Even the seniors—by custom disdainful of juvenile society—once they were in debt to him for lavish hospitality which was at first reluctantly accepted, found themselves careening over the road in Bobby’s big touring-car, late Friday afternoons, en route to his grandfather’s home on Lake Saginack.
And the indulgent old man, believing they would all have a better time if they had the house to themselves—and eager to be out of the racket—would be driven in to the city to find sanctuary at the Columbia Club. The neighbourhood used to protest, but old Nicholas always reminded them—when they complained of drunken demons, for whose conduct he was presumably responsible, driving recklessly with open mufflers and raucous sirens, at all hours of the night—that boys would be boys. When they smashed something, he paid for it.
Not infrequently Bobby’s weekend guests went back to Ann Arbor on Monday morning without a nickel; wearing their very socks by permission of their host, who owned them after an all-day poker game on Sunday. How often they promised themselves, “Never again!” but it was hard to stand out against Bobby’s insidious smile. Moreover, the food and service at old Nicholas’ country palace was a tempting diversion from the near-starvation of fraternity fare and the discomforts of a crowded house where nothing ever received anxious thought and respect but the impending payments on the mortgage.
For some time, Bobby had been conscious of a dull rumble of conversation, just beyond the screen. It began to annoy him. Some stupid ass was airing his home-brewed philosophy.
“All this here talk about Providence … Providence; bah—I say! … Take this very case, for instance! … Here is a noted man who has made himself so useful that people came to him for thousands of miles for help that nobody could give them but him! … Look at me, for instance! …”
Bobby scowled, and muttered, “Yeah! … Look at you! … It’s bad enough to have to listen to you!”
“Look at me! I came here clear from Ioway; and lucky enough I got here when I did … Last operation he ever performed, they tell me! … And they might have saved his life too if that pulmotor thing, or whatever it was, hadn’t been in use on that drunken young What’s-his-name with the rich granddaddy! What right had he to be alive, anyhow … now I ask you?”
It may have been Bobby’s sudden pallor that attracted the attention of the nurse who sat at the little desk by the door. She quickly crossed the room and asked if there was anything he wanted. Bobby swallowed with a dry throat, attempted a grateful smile, and replied weakly, “Perhaps I should go back … feel better in bed … not very strong yet. Tell them, will you?”
His exit from the solarium was effected with such promptness that the patients observed it. Who was this youngster? Questions were asked and answered. The man who had discoursed of the unseemly ways of Providence was deeply contrite … Wished he’d known, he said.
Bobby’s nurse stepped out into the corridor, after putting him to bed, and an intern passing by remarked, “So he knows all about it.”
“Well, he had to find out sometime, didn’t he?”
“Yes—but he’s a pretty good scout … And it was a rotten way to dish it up to him!”
“You should worry,” snapped Miss Bates.
For hours, Bobby Merrick lay with his eyes closed, motionless, but not asleep. At first, he was hotly indignant. What right had these saps from Ioway, or wherever, to pass judgment on what kind of people had a right to live? How could anybody be so small-minded as to hold it against him that his life had been saved, even if it could be shown that Doctor Hudson might have been rescued if the oxygen machine had been available? It wasn’t his fault. He hadn’t borrowed the damned thing! He hadn’t asked to have his life saved at that price, or at all!
And then his resentment over this monstrous injustice gave way to steady thinking. Perhaps, after all, he was under a certain obligation to this dead man. Very good; he would show his appreciation of what it had cost to save his life. He fell to wondering whether Doctor Hudson had left his young wife and Joyce properly provided for. Joyce was extravagant. He knew what it must require to keep her going. He had had her in tow, occasionally, himself.
“See if Mrs. Ashford is free to come here
