Monty had a good voice, and lots of it, a true baritone. And he proved within a few moments that he could, to use his own phrase, “pound the tombstones.” He could read easy notes, but his playing was usually by ear, and he was not tied down by any particular method, style or rules. Fingering may not have been one of Monty’s strong points, but he had a good sense of harmony and rhythm and plenty of strength! His first offering, however, afforded him small opportunity to prove his skill as an accompanist, for the song required little assistance from the instrument. Nor, for that matter, did it call for remarkable vocal effort. It wasn’t a particularly cheerful song, and the fact that Monty sang it in a drawling wail made it no livelier.
There was, evidently, another verse, but Jimmy interposed. “For the love of lemons, Monty!” he begged. “Don’t you know anything cheerful?”
Monty grinned, nodded and struck the keys a resounding bang, straightened back and started off blithely:
Monty said there were eighteen verses in all, but he compromised with Leon and Jimmy on eight. By that time Monty’s audience had increased vastly. The doorways were thronged, while a few of Jimmy’s friends had joined him at the piano. Monty dashed into a rollicking cowboy ditty called, “When Rob Got Throwed”:
Applause followed the final verse, and for the first time Monty became aware of the size of his audience. “Hello,” he said to the room in general. “Want to sing something? What do they know, Jimmy? How about ‘Sam Bas’? or ‘The Shivaree’? or ‘Black Jack Davey’? Well, what do you know?”
But it appeared that the audience preferred to hear more from Monty, and Monty good-naturedly responded. The game tables were now abandoned and the doorways were empty, and half a hundred inhabitants of Lothrop had closed in around the piano or found points of vantage near by. The big tables, one at each end of the room, were crowded, and swinging feet kept time to the refrains. Monty had to ransack his memory for songs. Now and then the listeners showed a disposition to take part by humming a chorus, but it wasn’t until the soloist had got halfway through “Cantankerous Charlie” that he had the audience with him. They liked that song, for there was a fine swing to the refrain:
After that the concert was no longer a one-man affair. One singer after another was pushed forward, held a brief conference with Monty and launched into song. After the first verse was sung Monty was right with him. When in doubt he “faked,” but he never went far wrong. They sang all the popular songs of the moment, and many old favorites. Once, Mr. Rumford appeared unnoticed at the door—his rooms were at the end of the corridor—and looked and listened doubtfully. But the hour was still early, and save that the noise was possibly a bit excessive, the performance was violating no rule, and the assistant principal went softly away again.
At last, Monty pleaded weariness, and a senior named Forbes took his place at the keyboard, and they began on the school songs: “Here We Go,” “The Scarlet and Gray,” “The Days to Memory Dear,” and many others. Monty sifted his way through the crowd. He had had enough, and was ready for bed. He tried to find Leon, but that youth was swallowed up in the throng. Fellows near by were observing him curiously, but approvingly, as he loitered across to the fireplace. At the piano Forbes was making the strings hum under the strains of “Here We Go!” and half a hundred throats—more, perhaps, since youths returning from the village or other dormitories had joined the throng—were chanting the chorus. Monty yawned. After all, singing had not altogether quieted his craving for exciting deeds, but nothing more promised. Unobtrusively, he left the room by the nearer door, and climbed the stairs to Number 14 to recover his hat. As he went, the swelling refrain followed him:
The words, if not the sound, failed him as he pushed open the door of Number 14. He considered awaiting Leon’s and Jimmy’s return, and decided against it. Leon would probably go back to Trow without coming back upstairs. Monty yawned again, picked up his hat, set it askew on his head, and started out. But the sight of the key reposing trustfully on the inside of the door gave him an idea. He chuckled as he withdrew it, closed the door, inserted the key on the outside, turned it, and pulled it out. He tried the portal and dropped the key in his pocket. Up and down the corridor other doors stood invitingly open, some wide, some barely ajar. A few were closed. Monty’s idea grew to splendid proportions. He crossed the corridor to the nearest open portal and knocked. There was no answer. As he had expected none, he was not disappointed. Reaching around, he took the key of Number 13 from the inside, transferred it to the outside, and closed and locked the door. The key, with its little brass disk bearing the number, joined its fellow in Monty’s pocket. He listened, a smile of dreamy delight on his face. They were still at it downstairs. It would be a shame not to make a thorough job of it, not to take advantage of such good fortune!
For the next few minutes he was busy. He didn’t hurry, and there was nothing crafty in his movements. Quite boldly he walked to a door and knocked. Only once did he meet a response. Then he asked for Jimmy, was told to try Number 14, apologized and withdrew. At the end of five minutes twelve doors were firmly locked and twelve keys jingled merrily in Monty’s pocket. Whereupon, crooning softly and happily, he descended the stairway at the south end of the building, and, carefully avoiding the common room, let himself out into the night.
Monty jingled the keys in his pocket in soft accompaniment to his triumphant song as he walked toward the corner of the building. But having reached the corner, he paused in the shadow there. The question confronting him was what to do with the keys. They were no use to him, were heavy in his pocket, and made a noise as he walked. There ought to be, he reflected, an appropriate place to deposit them. But he didn’t see one that he favored until his gaze fell on the lighted and open window of a room close at hand. It was the corner room in the building, and, as he determined when he had softly pushed his way through the branches of the shrubs between walk and building, was evidently a study.
It was more elaborately furnished than other studies Monty had seen, and the pictures on the walls were rather more “classy.” A light on a big mahogany writing table was turned low under its green shade. Best of all, the apartment was deserted. By standing close to it, and rising on his tiptoes he could stretch his hand through the window and reach the top of a small cabinet which stood against the wall at the right. The top of the cabinet was already occupied by various small articles, but they could be pushed aside. Monty listened and looked. No one was in sight, and, save for the subdued din of the singers in the common room, all was silent. In a moment the booty was disposed of. One key fell to the floor with an alarming rattle, but nothing happened in consequence. Monty withdrew noiselessly, got cautiously back to the path, and proceeded on his way home across the campus. He met no one, and a few minutes later climbed the stairs of Morris and entered his room looking as innocent as a cherub.
At the washstand, Alvin Standart was sopping a sponge against his nose and sniffling weirdly. Monty gazed delightedly.
“Hello,” he said. “Who gave it to you?”
“Nobody,” replied Alvin, sniffling between syllables. “It’s just a nose-bleed. I have them sometimes.”
“Oh,” murmured Monty, disappointedly. “What for?”
“What for?” echoed Alvin in disgust. “Because I can’t help it, you fresh chump.”
Monty pondered that, looking on interestedly while Alvin continued his efforts to stop the hemorrhage. Finally, “Look here,” he said, “isn’t there something you do for it? Seems to me I’ve heard of something. Let’s see. I know! You put a lump of ice on the back of the neck or against the spine. That’s it. And if you haven’t any ice you use something cold, like a—paper-knife.”
“Haven’t any ice,” grumbled Alvin.
“Wait a bit. A knife will do, or—here’s the very thing!” Monty’s inquiring hands had encountered a key in his pocket, and he drew it forth triumphantly. “Here you are. Hold that against the back of your neck, like that.”
“Ouch! It’s cold!”
“Sure! It ought to be. Got it? All you’ve got to do is to hold it there until your nose stops bleeding.”
“Well—well, suppose it doesn’t? Think I’m going to stand here all night holding this thing?”
“Search me,” answered Monty cheerfully. “You don’t expect me to do it, do you? Couldn’t you sit down and hold it?”
“No, because I’ve used up all the handkerchiefs I’ve got and— Oh, gee!”
“What’s the matter?” inquired Monty, looking up from his work of removing his shoes.
“It’s gone.”
“The nose-bleed? Good!”
“No, you fool, the key! It dropped down my back.” Alvin squirmed uncomfortably.
“You should have held on to it. You see, the well-known law of gravity——”
Alvin sniffed. “You and your silly old key,” he growled.
“Well, you ought to be glad it wasn’t a lump of ice,” responded Monty soothingly. “There’s a bright side to every cloud, Standart.” Monty dropped his shoes and began undressing. Alvin viewed him aggrievedly from the washstand.
“I don’t believe you ever heard of stopping nose-bleed with a key,” he said, suspiciously. “I never did.”
“That’s mighty poor reasoning, partner. About how long will you be camping around that basin?”
“I—I guess I’m through with it now,” answered Alvin. “I think it’s stopped.” He sniffed experimentally, blew his nose gently, and said, “Humph!” in a surprised tone.
“There you are! Next time, hombre, you’ll believe in my remedies, eh? Would you very much mind removing the basin to the bathroom, and obliterating the evidences of carnage? Give it a good cleaning while you’re at it.”
When Alvin returned he set about disrobing, and in the course of the operation the key which had slipped down his back fell with a tinkle to the floor. Alvin picked it up, and observed it curiously. “Say, where’d you get this?” he asked.
“Get what? Oh, that key? I don’t know. Let’s see it.”
“It’s a dormitory key,” said Alvin. “It says ‘8’ on it.”
“Oh, I—happened on it. Toss it over. I dare say some chap dropped it.” Monty put it in his trousers pocket, with a fine show of ease, but as he went back to bed, and settled down for slumber he wondered how he had missed it when he had emptied his pockets of the others, and blamed himself severely for his carelessness.