Two days later the tennis tournament started. In order to swell the number of entries, Sam had allowed Steve to persuade him to be his partner in the doubles. Sam had never played tennis but three or four times in his life, but Steve got him out of bed at half-past five on two mornings and tried to teach him the game. The attempt was not greatly successful, however, and Steve and Sam, giving fifteen, were speedily eliminated from the contest. Even Steve’s excellent playing couldn’t quite make up for Sam’s earnest but futile efforts. The boys who watched the two councillors play against George Porter and Ned Welch had difficulty in keeping from laughing at Sam’s wild attempts and awkward blunders. Finally, discovering that Sam, too, thought he was funny, they had their laughs and Sam didn’t mind at all. Millson Charrit, the Indians’ clever shortstop, captured first place in the singles, and Porter and Welch finally won the doubles championship, but not until Joe Groom and Tom Crossbush, giving half-fifteen, had run the last set to 8-all.
Then came the Annual Field Day, with nine events, including a mile and seven-eighths cross-country run. There was broad- and high-jumping, pole-vaulting, sprinting, shot-putting, discus-throwing, and low-hurdling. There were no remarkable records established, although Gerald Jones did better the camp record for the pole-vault. Perhaps the surprise of the afternoon occurred when Billy White, thirteen years old, romped in twenty yards ahead of his nearest competitor in the cross-country run. For that Billy got his name burned on a nice clean pine panel and hung in the “Trophy Room,” by which name a certain section of wall in The Wigwam was known. To be sure, Billy had not bettered the existing record, but he had come within a few strides of equalling it, and, in view of his age, his performance was considered worthy of perpetuation in the annals of camp athletics.
Meanwhile the Indians continued to pin defeats on their baseball rivals, although their games with the Mascots were never certain victories until the last man was out. The Mascots gave Mr. Gifford’s team several warm brushes, and occasionally won a contest, but three times out of five George Porter’s pitching decided the day. The Brownies, ever hopeful, went down to defeat regularly and cheerfully. That is not quite true, though, for the Brownies did win two games that summer, beating both the Mascots and the Indians.