The Freshman (Holman)/Chapter 17
Whee-e-e-e, wham;
Chop suey, chop suey;
Tate! Tate! Tate!
The shrill war cry, flung into the autumn air by thirty thousand loyal Tate throats, thundered across the gridiron streaked by the afternoon shadows.
But this time the cry did not ring out just in the imagination of a college-struck country youth posturing in front of his bedroom mirror.
It was the day of days! When every heart in Tate stood still and all the world watched football history in the making.
The tocsin surged like a barrage of artillery before the first wave of attack goes over the top. It surged from a solid, brightly hued mass of humanity banked fifty tiers high in the Tate Stadium. Excited youths, pretty girls, sedate matrons ready to turn their heads away in horror at injuries down on that lime-marked field, white-haired old grads, sports and actors from Broadway, gamblers and the great non-collegiate but sport-loving mass of the American people. And, over in the opposite stand, where were encamped the hosts of Union State, a similar assemblage. High on the topmost tier of seats on the Tate side of the field, in the exact center, telegraph instruments clicked and blase newspaper reporters bent over copy paper, ready to fling the results of each move on the field to the four corners of the earth. And, near them, a radio microphone and its gemi were already telling thousands about the crucial doings in Tate Stadium that crisp November afternoon.
Following the Tate cheer, a great silence reigned in the amphitheater.
In the center of the field a thin dime spun flashingly into the sun and dropped to the turf.
"Tails," Chester Trask had said quietly as the coin was in mid-course.
A little man in white shirt and trim knickerbockers stooped over the dime, flipped it into his palm and said, "Tails she is."
"We'll defend the south goal," said Captain Trask. The referee pocketed his money and tossed the new brown football under his arm to Trask, who in turn tossed it to his substitute, Childers, and ran off the field.
Captain McCoy, of Union State, trotted back briskly to his men. "Line up, fellows. We receive," he cried to them.
Big Childers hovered over the ball carefully on his own forty-yard line while the Tate men ranged in a single line on either side of him. Having teed the ball to his satisfaction, Childers stepped back. The Tate players, prancing to keep warm and to allay their nervousness, settled down and crouched in their positions.
"All ready, Union State?" called the referee in a silence that would have made a cap pistol sound like Big Bertha.
McCoy, the Union State center, flung up his hand in affirmation.
"All ready, Tate?"
Childers signaled his O. K.
A whistle shrilled. Mike Cavendish, on the bench near Harold Lamb, exhaled voluminously. His annual big moment had arrived.
Childers swung toward the ball, increased his stride, hit it strong and true with his big boot. The Tatians were down the field under the kick like a pack of hounds. Tobey, the Union State halfback, and a fast, rugged runner, too, took the ball on the fly. His interference formed quickly. Broad blue chests ranged thick and fast in front of him. The first Tate tacklers were bowled over. Tobey, running with a peculiar bent-over hitching stride that was desperately hard to fathom, streaked up the field. Then, just in time to save Mike Cavendish from apoplexy, Velie, the Tate left end, cut back of the interference and nailed the runner. Tobey had carried the ball back thirty-five yards and the Union State stand was a riot of enthusiasm.
On the bench, Tate's "Big Four" backfield, whom Cavendish always kept out of the first quarter, were hovering around their coach. "Watch this man Tobey," Cavendish said hoarsely. "He's a devil in an open field. Trask, he's your man when you get in there. Don't let him get started. Hey—hey!" Cavendish had stopped his bench coaching abruptly as catastrophe greeted Tate on the field.
Union State had formed quickly. With the Tate line off balance, the ball had been snapped on a direct pass to Wing, the fullback. He held it back of him, seemingly to throw a forward pass, and the confused Tatians instinctively waited for the toss. But even as Wing posed with the ball, the fleet Tobey, coming like a blue tornado, snatched it out of his hand and whirled around left end. Tate was caught napping. There were a few futile stabs at Tobey, but in a second he was out in a clear field, except for Tichenor, the quarterback, forty yards beyond the line of scrimmage. The Union State stands were on their feet yelling, screaming. A touchdown on the first play of the game? Verily the gods were good.
Tichenor warily swung over to meet the flying enemy. Pale, grim, teeth clenched. Tobey shot straight toward him, a blue streak of lightning, as if to bore through Tichenor. Then, in the last few yards between them the Union State star swerved sharply to the left. But Tichenor was not fooled. He swerved too. He dived, under the deadly straight-arm, cleanly at the elusive knees of Tobey and felled him to the earth.
"Thank God," breathed Mike Cavendish, who had sat open-mouthed. Then he was full of ire. "The dumbheads!" he cried. "Fooled by a trick play that's got whiskers on it. It's a crime."
But his anger changed to concern as he saw the Tate team, puffing and humiliated, standing over a fallen man. Tobey's plunging knees had struck Tichenor's bad shoulder. Childers pulled the substitute quarterback to his feet and Tichenor wanted to trot back to his position. But Childers, acting captain, was shaking his head, pointing to the game signal-caller's unmistakably displaced shoulder and looking over to Cavendish to indicate that Tichenor must come out.
"Well, if that ain't a tough break," sighed Mike. He looked at the "Big Four" and waved his hand. "Go on in, you fellows, and see if you can't break up this Donnybrook Fair!" Mike was sending his prides into the conflict after only one play in the game had been completed. Union State took it as an omen.
The Tate second-string backfield came trotting out, except for Tichenor and his human crutch, Childers, who walked slowly. Hughie Mulligan quickly felt Tichenor's shoulder. He shook his head. "He's through," he said to Cavendish. "He ought to go down to the infirmary right away and get that set."
"Go ahead," said the coach gloomily. He was watching Wing, of Union State, hit the center of the Tate line for five yards.
"Look at that line of theirs," Mike groaned to nobody in particular. "They make our lads look like lightweights. Where do they dig up that material? Oh, we've got our work cut out for us to-day all right, all right."
Gales, the Union State left halfback, followed with a plunge off left tackle. His lineman opened a gap as big as a barn door through Woolsey, the opposing Tate man. Velie, Woolsey's supporting end, was taken neatly out of the play. But Gales got only two yards beyond the line of scrimmage. Chester Trask, catapulting into the breach,
_7.png)
killed his advance before it had hardly started. But time out was called. Woolsey and Velie, two of Tate's cripples of the past two weeks' were both hurt. Woolsey so badly that he had to be removed from the game.
"What have those bozos got?—brass knuckles and two-inch spikes? Or have I put a lot of glass men out there, hey?" complained Cavendish as he sent in a substitute for Woolsey.
Union State was stopped only temporarily* On the next play Tobey made it first down around Velie's end. It was easy to be seen that the Tate end was not himself. He was limping badly and seemingly in pain. His old injury had returned to plague him. With Tobey running wild, Cavendish could not afford to take chances. He called Velie out of the game.
The Union State procession continued straight toward the Tate goal line. Short jabs at the line, each time with a small gain. Five- and ten-yard runs around end by the slippery Tobey. The visitors' heavy linemen were simply too bulky for the lighter Tatians. Moreover, Union State was playing as roughly as the law allowed and, when they could get away with it, rougher. The referee warned them about piling on when the ball was down, about illegal use of knees, about cutting down men from behind who were out of the play. He checked their advance by penalizing them twenty yards for holding after a Tate guard had nearly pulled Trask's arm out of its socket.
But the Union State advance was inexorably resumed. The Tate linemen responded to Trask's slaps on the backs and entreaties. They sweated, tugged, dived into the play, grabbed and accepted the terrible battering they got without a murmur. The opposition was simply too much for them. Only the heroic work of the "Big Four," supporting them, saved Tate from a rout.
At their own fifteen yard line, Tate put on a last stand and held the Blue for three downs, to the wild delight of the home rooters. But a new menace loomed immediately. Swanson, Union State's right tackle and the year's best drop kicker, fell back for a try at goal. It looked to be an easy kick for this expert. Only twenty-five yards to the goal posts!
"Block that kick! Block that kick!" shrilled the entreaty from the Tate stands.
The ball was passed. A surge of bodies. Straight and true came the pigskin to big Swanson, who dropped it to the ground and booted it cleanly. Cavendish and the rest of the Tate bench held their breaths. The ball sailed close to the left goal post. But the referee, standing alertly behind the line, was signaling—no goal!
And the first quarter was over.
The cheer leaders, as if sprung from catapults, jumped into action. Shrill challenges were flung back and forth across the field from the rival camps. Down there on the grass the players of the two teams soused their hot, smeared faces into water buckets and then clustered around their respective leaders.
"Not so good, eh, Mike?" "Cupid" Williams, blessed with a bench pass, came up to the coach and said.
"I'll be lucky to have enough men to finish the game with," groaned Mike.
"Well, Crawford's holding up all right. That's something to be thankful for," said Williams.
"He ain't had nothing to do yet," gloomed Mike. "Wait till he gets scrimmaging with that glass ankle of his."
For the good of Old Tate, Harold Lamb, tense and listening, hoped that Crawford's "glass ankle" would hold out. Tichenor was gone, and the Freshman realized the gap between Crawford and quarterbacks such as Hollister, sitting there beside him looking already scared to death, and himself. Harold honestly wished Crawford would stick it out the whole game.
The familiar whistle blew again and play was resumed. Tate now defended the north goal, with a little wind at their backs. Trask, standing on his own twenty-yard line, booted a beautiful spiral fifty yards down the field. But half of the value of the long kick was nullified, for Tobey ran the punt back twenty-five yards. Then the Union State march started anew. The Tate linemen were tired. Crew and Waterman, the guards, who had been standing a terrific amount of leg-twisting and other illegalities from their brutal opponents and were outweighed by them fifteen pounds to a man, staggered around almost groggy. Only the double duty stood by big Mershon, the Tate center, an iron man, kept the center of the Tate line from becoming a sieve.
Union State battered their way to Tate's twenty-yard line, but were held for two downs. Then the vistor's quarterback, sensing that the half was nearly over, called upon Swanson again. This time the star drop kicker made good, sending a beautiful effort straight between the goal posts. Concentrated hysteria attacked the Union State stands. Tate was silent. The figure "3" went up opposite the visitors' column on the automatic scoreboard. Before the teams could line up again, the whistle blew to denote the end of the first half. Tate had had possession of the ball exactly three times. They had rushed it exactly thrice, gaining six yards. Then they had each time been forced to punt, being too far in their own territory to risk further offensive.
No wonder the Union State hosts were jubilant as they sang their songs and stood up to stretch and visited between the halves. The Tate songs were just as loud, but they lacked that spirit of defiance. The Union State Band paraded on the field and formed a "T" in front of the Tate stands. The Tate Band returned the compliment with a slightly ragged "U. S." for the visitors. All the traditional between-the-halves ceremonies were carried out.
Meanwhile, in the Tate field house, Mike Cavendish was exhorting his young and failing charges. Mike professed to believe that beating Union State was a cinch, that the Tate eleven had been lying down on the job and ought to be ashamed of itself. The beleaguered Tate linemen, nursing bruised thighs, black eyes and cut faces, stretched out panting on benches and took Mike's tonguelashing.
"What of it if they're heavier than you are?" roared Mike. "Beef don't count. It's nerve. And you fellows aren't showing the nerve. Trask is the only one that's playing the game. You block that big bloke Wing. You can nail this Tobey. But you let 'em suck you in, fool you. You act like schoolboys playing your first game." And so on to the extent of ten minutes.
Harold, listening to every word, was filled with a mad longing to get out there and show them what Cavendish meant. His fists clenched. If Cavendish would only let him in there—he'd stop Wing; he'd nail Tobey; he'd get hold of that ball and then rush the feet of¥ those big Blue giants! He trotted out with the team and took his place on the bench beside Hollister.
The teams lined up again. This time Union State, fresh and inspired by their score, kicked off to Tate. McCoy sent a long, lazy spiral into the hands of Crawford. The latter, catching it with that easy grace for which he was famous, was off fleet as a deer. But the huge Union State advance guard tore through the Tate interference as if it were paper. Two husky Blue shirts hit Crawford at the same time. He went down like a shot. Out of the sharp contact three bodies hitting at full force came a queer little click. Cavendish groaned aloud. Rightly. For, though Crawford had clung to the ball, his weak ankle had not survived the rough handling of his tacklers. When the Union Staters rose, Crawford was stretched at full length on the ground, one leg twisted under him. He tried to stand, slumped down again with a little cry of pain.
Harold had turned to Dave Hollister at the beginning of that memorable second half and remarked cheerfully, "There's only two of us left here, Dave, old boy! We'll get into this game yet."
Now, with Crawford injured, Harold's words seemed almost prophetic.
As the Tate players crowded around the recumbent Crawford, Hugh Mulligan ran out on the field with his medicine kit Cavendish, securing the permission of the referee, followed him into the arena.
Harold, looking anxiously out upon the field, suddenly saw Trask waving to him. Springing up, wild with excitement, the Freshman yet took time to say consolingly to Dave Hollister, "Hard luck, Dave, they're sending me in ahead of you!"
He sprinted out toward the opposing teams, fastening his headguard around his chin as he ran. They were sending him in for Crawford! His big chance had come!
But Trask met him outside of the group kneeling around Crawford. "Take off your sweater and give it to Miller!" snapped the captain.
Then Harold, having a hard time to keep the bitter tears of disappointment from rushing to his eyes, saw that Miller, the substitute tackle, had had three-quarters of his sweater torn off in the mêlée that had laid Crawford low. Harold, obeying without a word, peeled off his sweater and handed it to the half-clad player. Then he trotted slowly back to the bench.
They carried Crawford in on the stretcher that seemed to be working overtime for Tate that day.
"There's only ten minutes to go. I won't quit now. I tell you I won't!" Harold could hear the half-delirious, blanketed figure of the star quarterback half sobbing ten feet from the bench. "Mike, I can stay in. I can stand. Just give me a minute." But his mouth was twisted with pain and his ankle hung limply. Harold, relieving Trask of his part of the burden of carrying the quarterback, saw tears streaming down Crawford's dirty face. Cavendish gloomily ordered Mulligan to have his star transported down to the college infirmary.
Harold, resuming his seat on the bench, tried not to look conscious as Cavendish sadly surveyed the rest of his quarterback material. The rough Union Staters were making big inroads into the ranks of the Tate substitutes. Cavendish gave a quick glance at Hollister, the third-string quarter. The latter's face was pale and tense. He was locking and unlocking his hands, crossing and uncrossing his legs. Sweat stood out on his pale forehead. Hollister was a Senior who had been trying for four years to make the Tate team. He was a good mechanical quarterback but lacked the spark that makes a good field general. Four years Hollister had worked for this moment. For his letter. And now moment and letter had come! And he was scared to death. He was so nervous that he could not have told one his own name if asked quickly.
Up in the Tate stand, Sheldon was saying gleefully to his chum, Garrity, "Look at 'Speedy' on the bench. He still thinks he has a chance to get in the game."
Cavendish stared at Hollister and the coach's heart sank. The lad was almost sick with fright. Could he trust this trembling funker out there running the Tate team? Well, what better could he do? He surely couldn't send in this fool Lamb, the joke of the squad.
"Hollister! Take Crawford's place," snapped Mike. "And, for the love of Mike, buck up, man. Your chance has come. Go out there and run those blue-bellies ragged!"
Hollister could hardly get his headguard over his head for trembling. But he reported to the referee, a whistle blew, the new quarterback crouched behind Mershon and the game was on again. Hollister sent Trask against the Union State center and the captain made six yards. Blythe hit right tackle and lost three precious yards of Trask's gain. Trask hit the same spot and made them back again. Hollister started calling signals and Trask interrupted him. The captain ran over to his quarterback.
"The fool doesn't know enough to call for a punt," ranted Mike.
The signal was changed and Trask punted. The old story of the first half was repeated. Tate was continually on the defensive. Back, back they were pushed. Three times they stopped the Union State advance within ten yards of a touchdown, thanks to demoniacal tackling by Trask, Blythe and Houghton, the Red and White backfield men. Union State did not once punt, confident that they could get their yardage by rushing. Tate, in possession of the ball, seemed sluggish on their feet. The linemen failed to open gaps. Trask and Blythe plunged into stone walls. Houghton, running the ends, saw his interference dumped and himself nailed by tvvo and three Blue tacklers at once. Union State had it over Tate like a blanket and only luck and frenzied last-minute stands on the part of their opponents were preventing the visitors from running up a score.
"That dummy Hollister," lamented Cavendish, pacing like a caged tiger in front of the bench. "Why does he keep sending plays at the center? I told him to open up the play. Start his forward passing. He's hopeless."
Mike's ire at the Senior, who had been calling his signals in a small choking voice noticed even in the Tate stands and had as yet failed to inject himself into a single play offensive or defensive, mounted to red-hot heights at the beginning of the fourth quarter, when the unfortunate quarterback fumbled a punt and let a blue sweater recover the ball. Tate held again, and again Union State punted. A groan went up from the excited Tate stands as Hollister fumbled again. He was simply too nervous even to distinguish the ball clearly in the air.
A Union State player, unable to check himself even after the quarterback lost the ball, bumped into Hollister and knocked him down. For a moment the Senior lay prostrate. Harold Lamb at once jumped up from the bench and rushed over to Coach Cavendish. The coach would have to send him in now!
Harold pushed close to the coach and looked at him eager, expectantly.
Cavendish shoved him away impatiently. "Why, we've just been kidding you. You're only the water boy," he snarled.
In his excitement Harold took little notice of this insult. He was looking out upon the field now and he saw Hollister assisted to his feet. The quarterback, apparently sound, trotted back to his position. Harold gloomily resumed his seat on the bench.
McCoy sent another arching punt into the air and Hollister, wabbling uncertainly under it, barely touched it with his finger tips. Tobey, coming like a whirlwind, brushed the quarterback aside as if he were a feather, and fell on the ball.
And this time, having received the huge knee of the giant Swanson squarely in his stomach, Hollister was obviously out for good. Cavendish watched anxiously. Trask raised the quarterback to his feet, but Hollister slumped down again. Trask looked expectantly over to the bench.
And then Harold could stand it no longer. He rushed wildly up to the gloomy Cavendish. The Freshman's eyes were strangely alight.
"You listen now!" cried the Freshman. "I wasn't kidding! I've been working—and fighting—just for this chance—and you've got to give it to me."
The referee came walking over from the field toward Cavendish and added to the coach's dilemma by saying crisply, "You've had enough time out. Send in your substitute."
Harold renewed his attack. "Let me in!" he pleaded. "I can hold that ball. I can nail Tobey. I'll forward pass. I'll try the trick stuff. We can lick them yet! Let me in!"
The referee broke in again. "You have one minute to send in a substitute or else forfeit the game," he warned.
Cavendish looked around helplessly. Would he have to put the water boy in to run the team! He looked out on the field toward Trask. It was a cinch Trask wanted Lamb there. Well, there was nothing else to do!
He turned to Harold and bellowed, "Go in there then, you madman. And may the saints forgive me!"
Harold was off like a shot. He slapped the referee resoundingly on the back as the Union State quarterback was calling signals. The referee's whistle shrilled.
"Speedy" Lamb was in the game at last—fighting for Old Tate!
The Freshman turned to his teammates. He swept the battered and tired Tate line with fierce eyes. He yelled, "Come on, you old women! Afraid of mussing your hair? Come on, fight! Fight!" He danced behind them, slapping the guards and tackles on the back. He bawled at the backfield men, "Come on, you half men! Snap into it! Smash these blue-bellies. Kill 'em!" His teammates looked at him sadly, indulgently. They were beginning to admit they were beaten. They had about given up.
Then Harold trotted back to the position back of the line just vacated by Hollister.
Houghton was playing to his right, also lurking for the forthcoming punt. But everybody knew the punt would never go to Houghton. Swanson would try out this thin, childlike-looking new quarterback, hoping to find him as butter-fingered as the last one. The ball spiraled back from the center. Swanson caught it. But, instead of punting, the big tackle attempted to double-cross his opponents by rushing around right end. He cleared the line of scrimmage and started for the open field. But Houghton and Harold, rushing over to stop him, tackled him at once. Swanson was cut down as if an avalanche had struck him. Harold landed under the husky Swede. Players of both teams flung themselves upon the heap.
Darkness closed abruptly around Harold. When it cleared again, he found himself being carried off the field on that fatal stretcher! He had been knocked clean out. But he was all right now. A little groggy, but all right. To the amazement of the stretcher-bearers, he jumped to the ground and ran back to his position.
On the next play the redoubtable Tobey dropped back. Tate expected the fleet halfback to try one of his famous sweeping end runs. But Union State was full of tricks. Tobey, faking a run, suddenly stopped behind the line and hurled a long, swift forward pass straight ahead of him to a State lineman running free and very swiftly. Unfortunately for State, the pass was a little high, and too swift to handle. The ball struck the State receiver in the head, bounded high in the air and landed in the arms of Harold Lamb, who, bewildered, was rushing about blindly.
Harold took the ball and ran with it. Tackled savagely and downed, he had the satisfaction of rising and hearing a Tate player exult, "Atta boy, 'Speedy'—a twenty-yard gain." And Tate had possession of the precious pigskin at last!
So excited was Harold that he started to stoop behind the Union State center instead of his own and big Mershon had to pull him back into his own territory. Cavendish, seeing this piece of dumbness, which seemed to confirm his low opinion of the joke Freshman's ability, danced with rage and ended by putting his foot squarely in the water bucket and upsetting it.
Harold stooped behind Mershon and barked a signal. He had been a little afraid for his voice. Afraid it would divulge how nervous he really was underneath his bravado. But it came out strong and clear and gave him courage. He was slightly crazy, this fighting Freshman. But his head was clear. Having flung out his signal, Harold jumped aside. The ball was snapped back direct to Trask. The entire Tate backfield with the exception of Trask jumped across the line and tore down the field. But Union State was ready for them. Every Tate man was seemingly covered. Trask, eager to forward-pass, was foiled. As a tackier dived at him, Chester spotted Harold gyrating about wildly just over the line of scrimmage. The captain desperately hurled the ball toward the Freshman. More by good luck than good management, Harold saw it coming, raised his hands, juggled the ball, held it. Instantly Tobey tackled him fiercely. Harold struggled, loathe to believe he had been downed.
The referee blew his whistle and still "Speedy" tried to nudge himself forward, digging his cleats into the turf and pushing with all his might. The referee blew again—more loudly. Still Harold paid no heed.
A red-faced and very angry referee came rushing up and seized the Freshman by the shoulder. The official jerked the ball out of Harold's hands.
With blazing eyes the referee cried angrily, "When you hear this whistle—put the ball down!"
A few more futile stabs at the Union State stonewall line and Harold, esteeming discretion for the moment the better part of valor, summoned Trask for a punt. The captain responded nobly by booming out a long sixty-yard spiral. Wing, State halfback, received it and was downed instantly.
The Union State supporters in the grandstand were shouting with joy and confidence. They had the ball back and the game was nearly over. Tate's rooters were wrapped in gloom.
State lined up. The weary Tate players crouched down to meet the onslaught of their opponents. Deciding to take no chances of fumbling so near his own goal line and knowing there were only a few minutes to play, the State quarterback summoned Swanson, the punter, back of the line.
"They may kick. I better play back—hey?" Harold yelled to Trask.
The captain nodded.
The ball was snapped back straight and true to Swanson. The Swede caught it, swung his big leg and crashed out a high booming punt.
At this providential moment a hawker, standing in an aisle in the Tate stands, let loose of his wares in his excitement. And his wares were toy balloons. They floated out upon the field high in the air. In the direct line of Swanson's punt. Harold, dancing under the ball, eyes in the air, suddenly saw six balls when there should have been but one. He blinked, faltered, lunged. The ball, eluding his eyes and his grasp completely, came swooping down and struck him squarely in the head. It bounded to one side and rolled along the ground. Harold, dazed for an instant, was after it like a shot. He scooped it up and tore down the field. Ahead of him was a clear passage! He had gone twenty yards when a whistle blew. It sounded like the referee's whistle—only many times louder. Through Harold's excited and bewildered consciousness flashed the memory of the referee's words, "When I blow this whistle, put the ball down!" and the memory of the official's red, angry face. Promptly Harold stopped his run and threw the ball disgustedly to the ground. He thought he probably had run out of bounds or that some player had violated the rules, resulting in the stoppage of the play.
As he hurled the ball to the turf, half of the pursuing Tate and Union State players flung themselves at it. Trask, at the bottom of the heap, had the precious pigskin safely snuggled to his breast.
As Harold, knocked down in the rush, arose, the whole Tate team started raving at him. Chester Trask was hurling maledictions upon the Freshman's head. Then Harold realized his terrible mistake.
The whistle that had caused him to throw down the ball had not been blown by the referee! It had come from a locomotive drilling freight cars in the yards over beyond the stadium!
Harold flushed, lowered his head, longed to drop down through the ground. Then, recovering, he trotted back to the ball.
"It's all right, fellows. We'll get 'em yet!" he shouted as nonchalantly as possible.
"One minute left to play and you threw away our only chance!" Blythe, the Tate halfback, grumbled. Others were even more violent and outspoken against him.
Disregarding their hostility and eager to redeem himself, Harold crouched behind Mershon, the center, as the teams lined up and thought swiftly. He had time for about one more play. And the Union State goal was forty yards away. Should he try the play Cavendish had sprung on them the last week of practice? The play the coach had said was a fifty-to-one shot, not to be tried unless everything else had failed? Well, the time looked ripe.
Harold yelled the next signal. He trotted back and lay prone on the ground. Chester Trask grimly stationed himself ten yards beyond his quarterback. The place-kick formation. A place-kick from the center of the field! It could be done, but the effort would have to be a mighty one. "Block that kick!" yelled the Union State stands. "Block that kick!" warned Captain McCoy.
The ball spiraled to the recumbent Lamb. He set its nose on the ground as the Union State line surged forward. But Trask's toe never hit that ball. Even as the captain swung toward it, Harold sprang to his feet with the ball and slipped like greased lightning around the right end. For an instant the Union Staters were outwitted. They tackled Trask. They looked in the air for the ball. Then they set out in full cry after Harold.
Blythe and Houghton were ranged beside him for interference. The former quickly sacrificed himself to take out a Union State tackier. Harold flew over the white lines. He could see Houghton out of the corner of his eye. He could hear the pounding footsteps of the enemy coming ever closer behind him. Twenty, thirty yards he reeled off, and then the Union State quarterback was in front of him, waiting calculatingly.
"Left!" panted Houghton. And Harold swung obediently. The Union State quarter swung with them. He came at Harold head down, launched into the air. But he never met the man with the ball. Houghton dived in between and sent him sprawling.
Harold was alone in that last fateful twenty yards. He tried to increase his speed, but his legs would not work harder for him. As he crossed the last chalk-mark before the goal line he knew that he would be caught. Three steps further and Tobey, coming with the speed of a deer, dived at him. Harold was swooped down, struggled a foot or two, stopped and thrust the ball as far as possible ahead of him. Four or five Union Staters leaped upon his prostrate form at once.
Then the players of both teams seemed to be piling upon him under the shadow of the goal posts.
Mike Cavendish, who had passed through a lifetime in that mad twenty seconds, hid his red face in his gnarled hands and begged a hoarse Hughie Mulligan, "Is the ball over? I can't look. I'm scared to death. Is it over the line?"
Hughie could not yet say for sure. And neither could the jubilant Tate stands. The referee plunged to the bottom of the heap, scattering Blue-clad and Red and White-clad warriors alike. He tore loose the desperately clinging Tobey. He lifted the exhausted Harold off the ball. He observed ball and last white line. Then he jumped to his feet and swung an arm aloft to the scoreboard.
The ball was over!
A wonderful "6" leaped beside the word "Tate" up there on the huge black scoreboard.
The Tate cheering section became a raving madhouse. Hughie Mulligan danced around Cavendish and hugged him. The Tate substitutes did a war dance. The Tate players on the field whirled, turned cartwheels and flung headgear into the air. Then concentrated on pounding the back of Harold Lamb.
The referee brought the ball out so that Tate could try for their extra point. The teams lined up, Tate joyous. Union State glum. But the goal was never kicked. As the ball was snapped back, the whistle shrilled.
The game was over!