Rockford

“ Henry gladly yielded assent and in a few moments they entered Jack's room and had received his somewhat noisy welcome. Berry also was there, and Pond and his brother came a little later, and in the presence of such friends Ward's gloomy thoughts soon vanished.
"And how are all the good people at Rockford?" said Jack eagerly. "That's the best town I ever was in in my life. I don't see why they need any churches or preachers there for my part; a fellow has to make a desperate effort if he wants to do anything bad there." ”

“ When I began playing ball at Rockford I was just at that age when, in my estimation, I knew a heap more than did the old man, and that idea had not been entirely knocked out of my head when I arrived in Philadelphia. The outdoor life that I had led when a youngster, the constant exercise that I had indulged in, together with the self-evident truth that the Lord had blessed me with a constitution that a young bull might envy, had all conspired to make me a young giant in strength, and as a result I was as full of animal spirits as is an unbroken thoroughbred colt, and as impatient of restraint. ”

“ At Rockford, Illinois, a manufacturing and commercial center, is a very exclusive college for young ladies, with a wonderful board of trustees, including a great agricultural implement manufacturer, another large manufacturer, and the widow of a third; the attorney for the town’s principal industrial enterprise, also a large stockholder in the concern; the town’s principal merchant, its principal lumber and fuel dealer, and the editor of its interlocking newspaper; a bank president, a steel manufacturer, a judge, and an ex-governor of the state of Illinois, a notorious corporation tool. ”

“ Smart did strike out, but Fairhaven was one run ahead when Rockford went to bat for the last time.
Merriwell trusted fully to the tramp’s skill as a back-stop, and his speed and curves actually dazzled the batters. He retired them in one-two-three order, and Brick McLane fell off the bleachers as the third man struck out and he realized Fairhaven had taken the game.
“Pretty well done, wasn’t it, Dick?” said Hoboson, as he cast aside his battered old hat and seemed instantly to fling off a false wig at the same time. “Glad to get rid of those things. They are beastly hot.” ”

“ A WORTHY PAIR. “That’s right,” nodded Uriah Blackington. “If this thing gets out, you’ll be driven out of Rockford, Fernald. There’s only one thing for you to do.”
“I hope you’re not chump enough,” said Fernald, “to think I meant it when I offered to throw the final games this season. I did that in order to lead this fellow into the bargain with me about the game to-morrow.”
“I wouldn’t believe you under oath!” retorted Blackington. “You’re a thoroughly untrustworthy scoundrel! As president of this league, I demand your instant resignation from the position you hold.” ”

“ Norman left me the next morning at Davis Junction to go home to Rockford, and I came on to Chicago, arriving Friday, August 19.
Whether this is the end of the trip or not, I cannot say, but my impression is that as soon as I can get the business attended to, I will return to Kearney and take up the trail where I left off, and finish it if I have to go alone. In the meantime the horses are having a much needed rest and the prairie schooner is left at anchor without a soul on board. Let us hope her journey is not over. ”

“ Then he had gone away, and, Captain Naylor, on police inspection, had seen the disorder, and reported Dick.
"Do you wish to accuse any one?" went on Major Rockford.
Dick thought rapidly. To tell the true circumstances, and show Glen's note, would mean that the facts of the spread would come out. Glen and his chums would be punished, and Dick might be censured. It would be better to accept the blame for having his room in disorder, rather than incur the displeasure of his comrades by being the means of informing on Glen. ”

“ Gardner snapped his bat round quickly and met the ball full and fair, sending it whistling over the head of the second baseman and bringing the island crowd up with a shout. It was a clean hit for Fairhaven’s centre fielder.
“That’s the way to soak ’em, dern their picters!” squealed Obediah Tubbs, as he danced with elephantine grace down the coaching line back of first.
“This is a regular three-ring circus!” cried a Rockford man sneeringly. “There goes the clown! Say, fatty, do you know how a fool looks?” ”

“ From the very outset of the contest the Nationals played the finest game of their tour, not only in pitching and batting, but especially in fielding, while the Excelsiors, after the first innings, which ended seven to nothing against them, "went up in the air," as the saying is, and came out of the fight the most demoralized set of ball players ever seen in Chicago. To be beaten at all was bad enough, but to be whipped by a score of 49 to 4 by a nine their Rockford rivals had beaten the day before, was galling in the extreme. ”

“ A fellow who can't stand a little hazing is no good."
"That's so. Guess I'll go. I don't mind it if it isn't too rough. I wouldn't mind being hazed myself. It would give me a chance to make a rough house for Dutton and his cronies."
"Come on then. Let's go to the gym. I heard that they're going to haze a bunch of 'em there."
"What about Major Rockford?"
"Well, I guess he and the colonel know about it, but they won't interfere unless it gets too strenuous."
Dick and Paul found a large crowd of the older cadets already gathered in the gymnasium. ”

“ This practice could be called using the federal law for extortion - - but we call it stealing.
However, by this means, BATF creates a statistical criminal, adding an arrest and the confiscation of perhaps 100 firearms to their office reports. As some of you may have noted in the dialog of the "Rockford Files" which ran last Friday night on NBC television, never has any law enforcement agency been so noticeably preoccupied with statistics as BATF.
The price to the citizen is enormous, of course. ”

“ US Route 20 Relocation APPROVED Beginning at the junction of present US 20 and new high type facility about 2 miles east of Belvidere, thence west on new facility about 3 miles to junction with State Route 5, thence continue west on SR 5 to an interchange north and west of Cherry Valley, thence south west on new facility via Perryville, thence west on new location about 7 miles, thence northwest and west to junction with present US 20 west of Rockford. ”

“ Sir Edward, her brother ... Sir Edward, in truth, is a poor fool, my lord—And Mr. Ratcliffe, her cousin, who rides with them, him I mightily mistrust. You have given me your blood, father—will you blame me now because it will not run obediently when I think of danger to my lady?”
[174]
“Nay, if thy body kept pace with thy spirit,” mocked Rockhurst, “what a beard wouldst soon have, my callow son!” Yet, though he mocked, anger had fled from his glance to be replaced by fatherly pride.
The tears rose to Harry’s eyes. The young can endure severity better than irony. ”

“ A subtle change swept over Rockhurst’s countenance. The air of grave severity, the shadow of regretful tenderness, passed from him, to be replaced by the mocking glance, the expression at [53] once reckless and cynical which, before the world’s eyes, characterised the man who had won for himself—among a company of reprobates—that second if scarcely more appropriate nickname of his, “Rakehell Rockhurst.”
“Nay, but you’re a promising lad!” said he, gibing. “And you’ll make your way, my son, I doubt me not. Time advances, old types die out, and manners change. ”

“ Rockhurst’s skill, guided by luck, had inflicted, at the first pass, one of those disabling wounds that [25] cause pangs singularly disproportionate to their seriousness. He sheathed his rapier with much deliberation, picked up his cloak and flung it around him as it were a royal mantle, smoothed out the feather in his hat,—not improved in any way by its buckler service,—and set it back on his head at the right jaunty cock. He was about to pass the Capitan with a taunting buenas noches, when some impulse of careless good nature bade him change his mind. ”

“ Tell him I am dull, que je m’ennuie, Vidame, et qu’il vienne s’ennuyer avec moi, for I am persuaded he is as dull as I am. ’Tis the fate of good wit in a weary world. How now—not gone?”
“Sire,” said the lad, in a toneless voice, “Lord Rockhurst is at Whitehall. I saw him at his writing [230] but just now, as I passed the Window of his apartment.”
“All the better fortune! Haste, then,” said the King. “But hark ye, Little Satan: Rockhurst alone! God forbid there should be a flounce near our presence to-night! Bid the Lord Constable come and crack a bottle with us as in the old days of Flanders.” ”

“ Almost as far as the eye could reach, the land and all that stood on it—timber, meadow, homestead, hamlet—belonged to Rockhurst, fit appanage to those massy castle walls that rose clear-cut against the blue air, in all the majesty of ancient power. And as he gazed, Lionel Ratcliffe’s heart grew sombre even as his glance. A keen-faced man, old-looking for his thirty years, somewhat below the middle height, with marked features, cold blue eyes and thin lips that betrayed the working of an intellect as sharp as the steel that hung by his side. ”

“ Major Jimmy Bass would exclaim; "don't we all know Little Compton like a book? And ain't he got a right to wear his own duds?"
Rockville, like every other railroad town in the South at that period, had become the site of a Confederate hospital; and sometimes the hangers-on and convalescents paid brief visits of inspection to the neighboring villages. On one occasion a little squad of them made their appearance on the streets of Hillsborough, and made a good-natured attempt to fraternize with [91] the honest citizens who gathered daily at Perdue's Corner. ”

“ Jack still held his place in the conning tower, but he could do nothing to guide the craft, and it would have been folly to attempt it, so fearful was the force of the wind.
"Which way are we headed?" asked Mark, making his way back to the tower where Jack was.
"Almost due west," was the reply. "About two points to the south, too."
"Then we are being driven away from the north pole," said Mark.
"We're as helpless as kittens tied up in a sack," said Andy. "If only I could do something I'd feel better. But I've got to sit here and take what comes." ”

“ We don't want any tramps here!"
"Come on, Mark," said the heavier of the two boys; "if our room is better than our company, they can have the room. I hope you'll get richer boarders than we are," the youth went on, turning to the constable. "We are going to shake the dust of Freeport from our feet. I think they ought to call this town Closedport instead of Freeport!"
"None of yer sass, now!" warned the constable, tapping his badge again.
"Jest you move on out of town!"
"I think we had better go," murmured the other boy, who was thin and small. "Don't make any trouble, Jack." ”

“ Pulling his full underlip between finger and thumb, Charles stared alternately out of the window at the picture of grey river, vanishing skiff, and brooding sky, and at Enguerrand’s delicate white face. Beneath the boy’s tensely still attitude it was easy to divine quiver of nerves, fierce eagerness.
“Why, now,” said the King at last, somewhat maliciously, “we are not too proud to be taught by our subject. Our Lord Constable and ourself had, as I said, a wager who should capture the linnet’s next song. My Lord Rockhurst is an old soldier: he trusts no one. ”

“ Your dearest rights are menaced! The woods of Rockville, your ancient, rightful, and enchanting resort, are to be closed to you. Castleburghians, the eyes of the world are upon you. ‘Awake! arise! or be for ever fallen!’ England expects every man to do his duty! And [Pg 24] your duty is to resist and defy the grasping soil-lords, to seize on your ancient patrimony!”
“Patrimony! Ancient and rightful resort of Rockville!” Sir Roger was astounded at the audacity of this upstart plebeian race. What! they actually claimed Rockville, the heritage of a hundred successive Rockvilles, as their own. ”

“ Whilst you play with bolts and delay your lord with fond embrace, we, on our side, vanish by the garden whence we came. Aye, and let out the señor, for ’tis still I who have the key.—Go, dear madam; leave the rest to us.”
“Alack, alack!” she moaned, “this supper table, laid for two, will yet betray me!”
“Say you so!” exclaimed Rockhurst, his wits leaping to the humorous opportunity. “Nay, then shall the supper vanish, too! Your Flemish household still sleeps heavily; our chances are good. ”

“ Rockhurst’s countenance at sight of Master Smelter, with the black fists, as the proposed evening comrade!... He could see the dilation of the nostrils, the haughty lips, barely apart upon a smile. What a tale would not Rockhurst’s tongue make of it for royal ears!—As for the inn, were he to find there some chance gentlefolk, how could he hope to induce them to come forth again on such a night, when, in truth, no coach was like to find a passage through the snow? ”

“ Rockhurst was the first to hear the cry. In a trice he was back in the Peacock Walk, kneeling by the bench. Hare was at his heels, gabbling his tale. Half his words went unheeded, but some found their mark in the father’s heart:—
“And Lionel says: ‘Rakehell Rockhurst’ (he, he!) . ‘A devil with the women!’ says he. And Harry hits him across the mouth. ‘Liar!’ says Harry. ”

“ Harry, this whole long year I have looked for her, night and day. There is not a corner of the town we have not scoured, old Chitterley and myself. Aye, that was the mystery you fretted not to share!”
[364]
Harry looked at his father speechlessly, with fierce dry eyes.
“Alas!” Rockhurst went on stonily, “she must even be dead, stricken by the contagion—fallen at the street corner perchance, swept into the common pit as so many others! And yet, if she were not dead—There is not a burning house I pass but I fear she may be in the flames. Food is as ashes, drink as gall upon my tongue. ”