The Plastic Age Percy Marks (read full novel txt) 📖

small features made him an excellent possibility for a woman’s part. But he was not a good actor, and he knew it. His attempts at acting in a high-school play had resulted in a flat failure, and he had no intention of publicly making a fool of himself again. Besides, he did not like the idea of appearing on the stage as a girl; the mere idea was offensive to him. Therefore, when the Society offered him a part he declined it.

Bob Tucker took him severely to task. “What do you mean, Hugh,” he demanded, “by turning down the Dramat? Here you’ve got a chance for a lead, and you turn up your nose at it as if you were God Almighty. It seems to me that you are getting gosh-awful high-hat lately. You run around with a bunch of thoroughly wet ones; you never come to fraternity meetings if you can help it; you aren’t half training down at the track; and now you give the Dramat the air just as if an activity or two wasn’t anything in your young life.”

“The Dramat isn’t anything to me,” Hugh replied, trying to keep his temper. Tucker’s arrogance always made him angry. “I can’t act worth a damn. Never could. I tried once in a play at home and made a poor fish of myself, and you can bet your bottom dollar that I’m not going to again.”

“Bunk!” Tucker ejaculated contemptuously. “Hooey! Anybody can act good enough for the Dramat. I tell you right now that you’re turning the fraternity down; you’re playing us dirt. What have you done in college? Not a goddamn thing except make the Glee Club. I don’t care about track. I suppose you did your best last year, though I know damn well that you aren’t doing it this year. What would become of the fraternity if all of us parked ourselves on our tails and gave the activities the air the way you do? You’re throwing us down, and we don’t like it.”

“Well, I’m not going out for the Dramat,” Hugh mumbled sullenly; “you can just bet on that. I’ll admit that I haven’t trained the way I ought to, but I have made the Glee Club, and I have promised to join the Banjo Club, and I am still on the track squad, and that’s more than half the fellows in this fraternity can say. Most of ’em don’t do anything but go on parties and raise hell generally. How come you’re picking on me? Why don’t you ride some of them for a while? I don’t see where they’re so hot.”

“Never mind the other fellows.” Tucker’s black eyes flashed angrily. He was one of the “hell-raisers” himself, good looking; always beautifully dressed, and proud of the fact that he was “rated the smoothest man on the campus.” His “smoothness” had made him prominent in activities⁠—that and his estimate of himself. He took it for granted that he would be prominent, and the students accepted him at his own valuation; and powerful Nu Delta had been behind him, always able to swing votes when votes were needed.

“Never mind the other fellows,” he repeated. “They’re none of your party. You’ve got talents, and you’re not making use of them. You could be as popular as the devil if you wanted to, but you go chasing around with kikes and micks.”

Hugh was very angry and a little absurd in his youthful pomposity. “I suppose you refer to Parker and Einstein⁠—my one mick friend, although he isn’t Irish, and my, one Jewish friend. Well, I shall stick to them and see just as much of them as I like. I’ve told you that before, and you might as well get me straight right now: I’m going to run with whoever I want. The fraternity cannot dictate to me about my friends. You told me you didn’t want Parker and Einstein around the house. I don’t bring them around. I don’t see as how you’ve got a right to ask anything more.”

“I don’t suppose you realize that everything you do reflects on the fraternity,” Tucker retorted, slightly pompous himself.

“I suppose it does, but I can’t see that I have done anything that is going to ruin the name of Nu Delta. I don’t get potted regularly or chase around with filthy bags or flunk my courses or crib my way through; and I could mention some men in this house who do all those things.” Hugh was thoroughly angry and no longer in possession of his best judgment. “If you don’t like the way I act, you can have my pin any time you say.” He stood up, his blue eyes almost black with rage, his cheeks flushed, his mouth a thin white line.

Tucker realized that he had gone too far. “Oh, don’t get sore, Hugh,” he said soothingly. “I didn’t mean it the way you are taking it. Of course, we don’t want you to turn in your pin. We all like you. We just want you to come around more and be one of the fellows, more of a regular guy. We feel that you can bring a lot of honor to the fraternity if you want to, and we’ve been kinda sore because you’ve been giving activities the go-by.”

“How about my studies?” Hugh retorted. “I suppose you want me to give them the air. Well, I did the first term, and I made a record that I was ashamed of. I promised my folks that I’d do better; and I’m going to. I give an hour or two a day to track and several hours a week to the Glee Club, and now I’m going to have to give several more to the Banjo Club. That’s all I can give at present, and that’s all I’m going to give. I know perfectly well that some fellows can go out for a bunch of activities and make Phi Bete, too; but they’re sharks and I’m not.