WITH THE AWKWARD SQUAD
"Sure! That's all right," said Joe Dobbins. "If I want to dig I can trot
over to the library or somewhere. Seven to nine, you said?"
"Yes, but it won't be for very long, I guess: maybe only a couple of
weeks. Merriman seemed an awfully clever sort of a chap."
"Must be if he can teach Latin! I never did see the good of that stuff,
anyway." Joe fluttered the pages of the book he had been studying.
After a moment he said: "Say, Foster, you're a sort of sartorial
authority--how's that for language, eh?--and you know what's what in the
line of clothes, I guess. Now I wish you'd tell me honestly if there's
anything wrong with the things I wear. They look all right to me, but I
notice two or three of the fellows sort of piping 'em off like they were
wondering about 'em. What's wrong with the duds?" And Joe glanced over
the grey suit, with the large green and blue threads running through it,
that he was wearing.
"Why, they----" But Myron paused. Three days before he would not have
hesitated to render a frank opinion of the clothes; would have welcomed
the opportunity, in fact: but this afternoon he found that he didn't
want to hurt Joe's feelings.
"Spit it out, kiddo--I mean Foster! Let's know the worst."
"Well, I suppose they're good material and well made, Dobbins, but the
fact is they--they're different, if you see what I mean."
"I don't. What _do_ you mean, just? Style all wrong by Fifth Avenue
standards?"
"By any standard," replied Myron firmly. "They look ready-made."
"But, gee, they _are_ ready-made! I never had a suit made to order in my
life. Why should I? I'm not hump-backed or--or got one leg longer than
the other!"
"Some ready-made clothes don't look it, though," explained Myron. "Yours
do. Did you get them in Portland?"
"Sure. We've got some dandy stores in Portland."
"Did that suit come from the best one?" asked Myron drily.
"N-no, it didn't, to tell the hideous truth." Joe chuckled. "You see,
the old man has a friend who runs a store and we've both got sort of
used to dealing with this guy. He's a pretty square sort, too; a Canuck.
Peter Lafavour's his name. But I guess maybe Peter doesn't know so much
about style as he makes out to, eh? I always sort of liked these duds,
though: they're sort of--er--snappy, eh?"
Myron smiled. "They're too snappy, Dobbins. That's one out with them.
Then they don't fit anywhere. And they look cheap and badly cut."
"Aside from that they're all right, though?" asked Joe hopefully.
"Perhaps, although gentlemen aren't wearing pockets put on at an angle
or cuffs on the sleeves."
"And Peter swore that this suit was right as rain!" sighed Joe. "Ain't
he the swine? How about my other one?"
"Well, it's better cut and hasn't so many queer folderols," answered
Myron, "but it looks a good deal like a grain-sack when you get it on,
old man."
"What do you know about that!" Joe shook his head dismally, but Myron
caught the irrepressible twinkle in his room-mate's eyes. "Guess I'll
have to dig down in the old sock and buy me a new outfit," he continued.
"I suppose those tony-looking duds you wear were made to order, eh?
Think your tailor could make me a suit if I wrote and told him what size
collar I wear?"
"I'm afraid not, but I saw a tailor shop in the village here today that
looked pretty good. Why not try there?"
"Blamed if I don't, kid--Foster! I don't suppose you'd want to go along
with me and see that I get what's right? I'd hate to find I had too many
buttons on my vest--I mean waistcoat--when the things were done!"
"I don't mind," answered Myron after an imperceptible moment of
hesitation, "although you really won't need me if the chap knows his
business. No first-class tailor will turn you out anything that isn't
correct."
"Yeah, but--well, I'd feel easier in my mind if I had you along. Maybe
tomorrow, eh? Somehow these duds I've got on don't make such a hit
with me as they did! Coming over to the gym? It's mighty near time for
practice."
"In a minute," answered Myron carelessly. "You run along." Then he
reflected that if he was to go with Joe to the tailor's the next day he
might just as well start in now and get used to being seen with him.
"Guess I'm ready, though," he corrected. "Come on."
The distance from Sohmer to the gym was only a matter of yards, and it
wasn't until the two reached the entrance of the latter building that
they encountered any one. Then, or so Myron imagined, the three fellows
who followed them through the big oak door looked curiously from Joe's
astounding attire to his own perfectly correct grey flannels. He was
glad when the twilight of the corridor was reached, and all the way
down the stairs to the locker-room below he was careful to avoid all
suggestions of intimacy with Joe.
Football was still in the first rather chaotic phase. An unusually large
number of candidates had reported this fall, and, while in theory it
was a fine thing to have so much material to select from, in reality it
increased the work to be done tremendously. On the second day of school
one hundred and twelve boys of all sizes and ages and all degrees of
inexperience were on hand, and coach, captain and trainer viewed the
gathering helplessly. Today a handful of the original number had dropped
out of their own accord, but there were still nearly a hundred left, and
when Myron, having changed to his togs, followed the dribble of late
arrivals to the field he wondered what on earth would be done with them
all. Perhaps Coach Driscoll was wondering the same thing, for there
was a perplexed frown on his face as he talked with Billy Goode and
contemplatively trickled a football from one hand to the other.
Myron rather liked the looks of Mr. Driscoll. So far he had not even
spoken to the coach and doubted if the latter so much as knew of his
existence, but there was something in the coach's face and voice and
quick, decisive movements that told Myron that he knew his business.
"Tod" Driscoll was about thirty, perhaps a year or two more, and had
coached at Parkinson for several seasons. He was a Parkinson graduate,
but his football reputation had been made at Yale. He was immensely
popular with the students, although he made no effort to gain popularity
and was the strictest kind of a disciplinarian. Today, while Myron,
pausing at the edge of the crowded gridiron a few yards distant, viewed
him and speculated about him, the coach showed rather less decision than
usual, for twice he gave instructions, once to Billy and once to the
manager, and each time changed his mind.
"We've got to find more instructors," Myron heard him say a trifle
impatiently. "How about you, Ken? Know enough football to take a bunch
of those beginners over to the second team gridiron?"
"I'm afraid not, Coach," answered Kenneth Farnsworth.
"You don't need to know much. What do you say, Billy? Who is there? I've
got most of the veterans at work already, and there isn't one of them
that shouldn't be learning instead of teaching."
Myron didn't hear the trainer's reply, for at that moment a well-built,
light-haired, somewhat harassed youth of apparently nineteen strode
up to the group. "Look here, Coach," he began before he was well
within talking distance, "what about the backs? We've got to have some
get-together work before Saturday's game, haven't we? Cater says you've
got him in charge of a kindergarten class, Brown's sewed up the same
way, Garrison hasn't shown up----"
"I know, Cap. But what are we going to do with this raft of talent?
Some one's got to take hold of them, and I can't take more than twenty.
Cummins is about ready to go on strike----"
"It _is_ a mess, isn't it?" Captain Mellen turned and viewed the scene
puzzledly. "The worst of it is that there probably aren't a dozen in the
whole lot worth troubling with."
"True, but we've got to find the dozen," answered Mr. Driscoll.
"We can't afford to miss any bets this year, Cap. We'll call the
first-choice backs together at four. That'll give us half an hour for
kindergarten stuff. But I want a couple more fellows to take hold. Who
are they?"
"Search me! Why not double them up, sir?"
"They've been doubled up--or pretty nearly. Cummins has about thirty to
look after and Cater twenty-four or five. That's too many. Sixteen's
enough for a squad. How about Garrison?"
"He isn't here. I don't know what----"
"He's cut," interposed Farnsworth. "Got a conference at four."
"Conference! Gee, why couldn't he have that some other time?" asked Jud
Mellen.
"Time to start, sir," said Farnsworth, looking at his watch.
"All right, let's get at it. But I wish I could think--Who's that fellow
there, Mellen?" Mr. Driscoll dropped his voice. Mellen turned and looked
at Myron and shook his head.
"I don't know him, Coach. Who is he, Ken?"
"I think"--Farnsworth turned the pages of his book until he had found
the F's--"I think his name is Forrest. No, Foster. High school fellow.
Two years playing. Passed a corking physical exam."
"Foster!"
Myron, who had been aware that he was under discussion, joined the
group. "Yes, sir?" he asked.
"Think you could take about twenty fellows over to the next field and
show them how to handle the ball? You know the sort of stuff, don't you?
Passing, falling, starting and so on. Want to try it?"
"Yes, sir, I can do it all right."
"Good! We've got such a mob here today that we're short-handed. Stick to
me a minute and I'll round you up a bunch."
"You can't call him exactly modest, can you?" asked the manager of Billy
Goode when the others had walked away. "'I can do it all right,' says
he."
"How do you know he can't?" asked Billy. "And if he can there ain't any
harm in his saying so, is there? Say, if I was starting my life over
again, my friend, I'd say yes to everything like that any one asked me.
I missed a lot of good chances by being too modest."
"And truthful?" laughed Kenneth.
"Let it go at modest," said Billy smiling.
Myron received eighteen boys as his portion and led them across to the
second team gridiron and set to work. Four other awkward squads adorned
the field, the nearer one being under the care of Charles Cummins. Myron
smiled secretly when he saw the surprised stare with which Cummins
regarded him. When their glances met Cummins nodded shortly. To put
his class through the third lesson was no trick for Myron, but it was
dreary and tiresome work. It seemed to him that Coach Driscoll must have
deliberately apportioned to him the stupidest boys on the field, for of
all the awkward squads Myron had ever had anything to do with his was
the awkwardest. But some few presently began to respond to treatment
and by the time they were jumping out of the line and digging knees
and elbows and shoulders into the turf in the effort to land on the
trickling pigskin he felt that he hadn't done so badly with them. He
didn't say much to them, for his own experience had shown him that too
much instruction and criticism only confused the pupil, and neither did
he try to impress them with their stupidity. As a result, most of them
eventually forgot to be self-conscious and tried to follow instructions.
Watching, Myron heard a voice at his elbow and looked around into the
face of Cummins, who, giving his own charges a moment of rest, had
walked across unnoticed.
"How do _you_ like it?" Cummins inquired shortly.
"There are other things I'd rather be doing," replied Myron. He didn't
feel particularly friendly toward this chap who had badgered him so a
day or two before, and his tone showed it. A smile flickered around the
corners of Cummins' mouth.
"Main thing," he said gravely, "is to be patient with them. I find that
pays best."
Myron turned and looked at him wonderingly. "That sounds well," he
replied sarcastically. Cummins grinned.
"Got it in for me, haven't you?" he said. "Don't blame you--er--Whatever
Your Name Is. I was never cut out for a teacher. Besides, I want to get
to work myself. What's your line? Tackle?"
"I don't know. Whatever I get, I suppose. Try that again, you chap. Get
started quicker. I played half-back last year."
"Guard's my game. Well, I guess I'd better go back and hound those
fellows some more. See you again, Foster, if I live."
Myron wondered why Cummins had pretended not to recall his name at
first. "Just to be as disagreeable as possible, I guess," he concluded.
Cummins' hectoring voice floated across the field just then: "All right,
my hearties! Line up again and, for the love of limes, look intelligent
if you can't act so!"
Ten minutes later the awkward squads were called to the bench and Myron
went to work on Squad D or E, he didn't know which it was, and trotted
around the field behind a shrill-voiced quarterback, practising a
handful of elementary plays that he already knew by heart. He wondered
how long it would be before some one in authority discovered that they
were wasting the time of a first-class half-back!