OFF TO THE STRUGGLE.
It was the morning of the day before Thanksgiving, and gloom brooded
heavily at Yale. The report of Merriwell’s injury had gone abroad, and
the odds being offered that Harvard would defeat Yale were amazing.
But what was still worse, there seemed no Yale money afloat. The
backers of the blue did not have courage to accept odds of three or
four to one. Never in the history of the college had there been such
an absolute lack of confidence. Of course, there were plenty of men
who pretended to believe that Yale would win, but they did not seem
sincere, and they were not taking any chances.
Lorrimer declared that the eleven was the best Yale had put onto the
field in ten years. But the astonishing record of the eternally
triumphant Harvard team stared them in the face, and they knew to a
man that they were going against the hardest proposition they had ever
tackled.
Hodge had not held a secure position on the team, and, on account of
his free talk after Merriwell’s injury, he had been dropped back with
the substitutes. It is a wonder he was not told his services could be
dispensed with entirely. Frank knew the men were preparing to take the
train for Boston. He had expected to be with them, and he had pictured
in his mind the rollicking Thanksgiving he would have. Now he was
thinking it would be the most dismal for years.
There were steps outside, and then Steve Lorrimer came hurriedly in,
his face flushed and his eyes downcast.
“How do you do, Mr. Lorrimer?” said Merry pleasantly. “I hope you’ll
excuse me for not rising.”
Lorrimer closed the door carefully.
“Merriwell,” he said, “I’ve come to beg your pardon.”
“What?” cried Frank, astounded.
“Yea,” said Lorrimer, “I want to beg your pardon for dropping you the
way I did. I want to tell you something, too. I never meant to drop
you entirely; I did that to teach you a lesson. It was my intention to
take you back onto the eleven for the game to-morrow.”
“Well,” said Frank, with a faint smile, “as it has happened, your
intentions cannot be carried out.”
“Will you accept my apology?” asked Lorrimer. “I’ll make it public if
you like.”
“It is not necessary,” said Frank. “I accept it.”
“I’ve tried to work the men just right so that they would be in
condition, without overworking them,” Lorrimer went on. “I have held
the coachers in check. I believe the men are all right physically; but
they are all wrong mentally.”
“How is that?”
“They lack courage.”
“That’s bad.”
“Bad! It’s going to defeat us!”
Merriwell looked anxious.
“I’m afraid you are right,” he said, “unless you can screw their
courage up. A team should not be too confident when it goes into a
game, but an absolute lack of confidence means ruin in a game like
this. It’s a shame. What’s the matter?”
“You!”
“I?”
“Yes.”
“How?”
“The team needs you to brace it up and give it courage. I never
realized before how much it depended on you.”
“Well, Lorrimer, I am awful sorry I can’t brace it up.”
“Can’t you?”
“Why, no! How can I?”
“Can’t you go to Boston with us?”
“The doctor――――”
“I know, but victory for Yale may depend on it. If you could go with
the men――if you could appear on the field in a uniform, I believe we’d
have an even chance for victory.”
“Do you?”
“Sure thing.”
Frank sat bolt upright now, his eyes gleaming and a flush in his
cheeks.
“Lorrimer,” he said, “I’ll go!”
The manager felt like uttering a shout, but he did not. Instead, he
held out his hand, which Frank took, saying:
“Wiggle it carefully, old man.”
“There’s a chance for us, Merriwell!” cried Steve. “The sight of you
will put spirit into the men. You will give them heart, and that is
what they need.”
Frank got up.
“I’ll be ready as soon as I can get into my clothes,” he said. “Will
you see that I have a cab to take me to the station?”
“You bet I will!”
“All right. You can depend on me, Lorrimer. If I knew I could help the
team win this game, I’d go to Boston if I had to be carried there on a
stretcher!”
Lorrimer hurried down-stairs, and within thirty minutes it seemed that
the whole college knew Merriwell was going to Boston with the eleven.
It created a perfect tumult of excitement. Men who, an hour before,
had declared they were not going to see the game made a scramble to
get ready and catch the train. Of a sudden it seemed that the aspect
of things had brightened in a most wonderful manner.
“What is he going to do?”
That was the question hundreds asked.
“Is he going to play?”
Scores asked that question.
The time approached for Merry to start for the train. He came down
from his room, escorted by his most intimate friends. Browning was
helping him downstairs. They saw a crowd was waiting outside.
“Let me alone, Bruce!” cried Frank, who had tried to discourage the
giant from offering assistance. “This is what I’m on my feet for. Give
me a chance to make my bluff.”
So he walked out at the head of the party, straight as an Indian,
stepping off with a brisk pace, apparently as well as ever. His
appearance created unbounded astonishment, for it had been believed
that he was entirely “done up.”
“What’s the matter with him, anyhow?”
“He’s a healthy-looking sick man!”
“He’s as well as ever!”
“Somebody has been playing a slick game!”
These were the exclamations. One fellow cried:
“Fellows, the cat is out! Merriwell wasn’t hurt at all! The whole
business was a fake to fool Harvard! He’s fooled her, too, and Yale
will win to-day!”
Frank laughed outright. Everything was moving finely.
“Talk about your clever tricks!” shouted a voice. “This beats ’em all!
Hurrah for Frank Merriwell!”
They cheered, and Frank walked steadily through their midst to the
cab, which he entered, his grip and overcoat being tossed in after
him. Diamond, Browning, and Rattleton followed, and the cab rolled
away.
“If we can keep it up,” said Frank, “we may change the complexion of
things.”
All Boston seemed football crazy, for the time, at least. Blue and
crimson were the colors everywhere. At noon people began turning
toward Soldiers’ Field, that colossal rectangle where the battle was
to take place. The work of the ticket-takers began as the spectators
came dribbling in. It was a tiny rivulet at first, then a brook, then
a stream, then a river, then a rushing, roaring flood.
Inside the seats of the stadium gradually became covered with all
sorts of wraps and all colors of ribbons. There were pretty girls in
crimson sweaters, and just as pretty ones wearing Yale blue. There
were men with flags and with their colors pinned to their coats. By
one-thirty it seemed that the great stand was filled, but there was
not the slightest decrease in the steady flow of people rolling inward
from the four corners of the field.
The college men poured in and gathered in compact masses, Yale on the
east and Harvard on the west. They were exuberant and overflowing with
life, and they were armed with megaphones.
It was near two o’clock, when, of a sudden, the Harvard men sent up a
long, roaring yell, that sounded like the call of a lion to battle. In
an instant, from the opposite side of the arena, the Yale bloodhounds
began to bay. The dull tramping of the oncoming host could be heard no
longer. In the midst of the uproar came the lilt of far-away songs.
The pulsing beat of a drum was borne to the ear. The megaphones blared
and roared and lapsed to silence at times. In those brief intervals
the strong wind could be heard playing amid the sea of waving pennons
with a sound like the humming bow-strings on a battle-field of old.
The blood throbbed and leaped in the veins, and the excitement and
expectancy of the hour was intoxicating.
In front of this vast and heaving concourse was the level field of
battle, marked with white lines, like the ribs of a skeleton.
It was exactly five minutes past two when the roaring suddenly broke
forth with fury it had not hitherto attained, and onto the field
suddenly came the gladiators who were to struggle for the supremacy.
Shaggy and lion-maned, they were armored and prepared for the terrible
battle that was impending. And all eyes were turned upon them, while
the college men stood up and waved their colors and roared and roared
again. That great mass of human beings broke out into a flutter of
crimson and blue color. Amid those men who came out thus upon the
field was one for whom the eyes of two-thirds of the college men and
football cranks within that enclosure searched. The cheering lulled,
and a Yale man shrieked:
“There he is! There’s Frank Merriwell!”
What a sound followed, coming from the throats of that gathering of
Yale students. It was a note of greeting, exultation, and joy! The man
on whom it seemed that their hopes centered had trotted onto the field
with the others. There was no longer a doubt but it was a trick, all
this business of Merriwell having been severely injured. The
preliminary practise began. Men fell to chasing the ball about and
falling on it. There was some signal-practise, and then:
“The game is going to begin!”
The two captains were seen to walk aside from the others, together
with the referee, who took a coin from his pocket and spun it in the
air. The toss fell to Yale. Birch did not hesitate. He gave Harvard
the ball and took advantage of the wind. Then the battle lines were
formed in the center, and the substitutes came down along the ropes.
Frank Merriwell was with the substitutes. Hundreds of Yale men were
puzzled by this. They had expected to see him go onto the field, and
now, for the first time, they began to get an inkling of the real
truth――they began to suspect that he was not in condition to play.
“What’s the matter with Merriwell?”
“Why doesn’t he go on?”
“What are they doing with him, anyhow?”
“If he can play, they ought to play him!”
“There is something wrong about this.”
Amid the uproar could be heard these remarks coming from Yale men.
“Hollender is going to kick off!”
There was a hush. The Harvard full-back stepped off from the ball
lying on the turf and sized it up. He balanced himself carefully,
while the rest of the twenty-one young panthers waited with every
nerve and muscle taut. Then, with a rapid forward movement, Hollender
swung his foot against the ball, and away it sailed over the Yale
forwards like a flying bird.
There was a rumbling rush of feet on the hard turf. Under the ball
stood Richmond, on Yale’s twenty-five yard line. He caught it fairly,
but barely had he done so when he was slapped to the ground, and two
tons of Harvard beef piled upon him. The game was fairly on, and all
present, players and spectators, felt that it was to be the greatest
game in history to date.
Harvard, with all the experience of the past year and the record of
wonderful work thus far this season, was confident that she would give
Yale the worst trouncing she had ever received. On the other hand,
Yale was desperate and determined to win back her lost laurels. It was
amazing how those men had been cheered and encouraged by Frank
Merriwell. He had put stiffening into the back-bones of all of them,
and he had made them feel that the game belonged to them by decrees of
fate if they were willing to work for it.
There was an untangling, and then the human tigers stood there glaring
into each other’s eyes.
Yale’s first play was to give the ball to Badger for a plunge against
Harvard’s right wing. The stocky Western man made a gallant attempt,
but the gain was slight, for the Harvard end closed in about him and
swamped him. Ready, quivering, alert, the Harvard men were on their
mettle at the outset, and it was plain that Yale was up against a hard
proposition.
Birch decided to try a kick from close behind the line, but one of the
rushers was called out, as if he was to run with the ball. He kicked,
but it seemed that his toe hardly touched the pigskin when those
Harvard wildcats were upon him. A big Harvard athlete partly blocked
the ball, and Jack Ready, who was well in the play, succeeded in
recovering it for Yale at the Harvard fifty-yard line. Neither
Badger’s plunge nor the attempted kick had proved a success, and the
Harvard rooters were whooping their joy.
But Yale was undaunted, and again a kick was tried from behind the
line. Again the man was beaten down, but this time the Harvard
gladiators were too late, and the ball sailed through the air, came to
earth, and rolled out of bounds at Harvard’s fifteen-yard line. But
Harvard got possession of the leather, and there she lined up for her
first assault on the Yale line.
Across the field rolled a great chorus of voices singing a song to
inspire the defenders of the crimson. There was scarcely a moment of
delay, and then a Harvard man was sent against Yale’s left wing, which
was regarded as weak. But Jack Ready was there, and he distinguished
himself by bringing the man with the ball to the ground without a foot
of gain.
It was beginning to look brighter for Yale.
“Frank Merriwell did it!” screamed Diamond in the ear of Bruce
Browning. “He put the needed courage into the men. We’re going to win
this game!”
Browning nodded. His confidence had been restored and he was feeling
better.
“It would have been a cinch if Merriwell had played,” he shouted back.
But their enthusiasm and confidence received a setback when a Harvard
man was sent against the right wing of the Yale line, and, aided by
splendid interference, cut his way through and took the ball up the
field fifteen yards. It was Badger who tackled and brought the runner
to earth, the interference being unable to stop the rush of the
determined Westerner.
Immediately following this a round-the-end play was tried, but it
resulted in no gain for Harvard. The left wing was bucked again, but
the needed five yards were not obtained on the second down.
“We’ll hold ’em!” cried Diamond.
Browning nodded.
And then, by a new and surprising play, Harvard seemed to try to send
the ball round the end, but shifted with the suddenness of a flash of
lightning and hurled herself in one compact mass against Yale’s
center. It was a surprise. Yale seemed split and overwhelmed in a
twinkling. The man with the ball came through, his interferers
protecting him finely. Down the field he sped toward the Yale goal,
and the great throng of Harvard students rose up and thundered like
the bursting of a mighty storm in the tropics.
Behind the Harvard runner came defenders of the blue. The men before
him were swept aside by the interference. It looked like a great,
sensational run for a touch-down. Yale spectators were gasping for
breath, while the Harvard crowd roared its applause and delight. Bruce
Browning was speechless; Jack Diamond was shivering as if struck by a
chill; Harry Rattleton was white as chalk. They realized that a run
through Yale’s center at this early stage of the game might totally
demoralize the Yale eleven. And the run was being made!
If Frank Merriwell were in the game! That was the thought of many of
Merry’s particular friends and admirers. But he was not in the game,
and his best friends knew he was in no condition to go into it.
The ball was in Yale’s territory, and it was being carried straight
and sure for her goal-line. Two men were after the runner. They were
closing in from opposite sides. One was Buck Badger and the other was
Richmond, Yale’s quarter-back.
“Badger will do it! Badger will stop him!”
Somebody cried out the words. Then they saw Badger blocked off and
baffled by Harvard interference.
Yale’s thirty-yard line was reached.
Five yards farther on the interferer who was giving his attention to
Richmond stumbled a moment. Before he could recover, the active little
Yale quarter-back went past him and flung himself like a wildcat at
the Harvard man with the ball. The tackle was accurate and well made.
The man with the ball went down, and Harvard had not scored, although
a most brilliant play had been made――a play that would be talked about
for weeks to come.
Then it was the turn for the Yale crowd to yell, and they nearly split
their throats. There was a pile-up and an entanglement. The Harvard
man was hurt. He tried to get up and stay in the game, but when he
stood straight on his feet he reeled and fell into the arms of his
friends. Then they carried him from the field, covered with glory, but
done for, and another man took his place.
Harvard was on her mettle now. She had broken through Yale’s center,
and the feat of the brave fellow just carried from the field was
something to put iron into the blood of his companions.
The moment the game was on again Harvard drove hard at Yale’s center,
without resorting to strategy. It seemed that this repetition of her
recent move was unexpected, and it succeeded, for the ball was taken
to Yale’s fifteen-yard line.
The goal was near, and Harvard was working for her life. In past years
she had produced great defensive teams, but it was plain that her team
could take the offensive this year. Yale was desperate. The advance
must be checked right here. Hard-faced and desperate, the defenders of
the blue lined up. Twice Harvard flung herself against the line, and
twice she failed to gain an inch.
“Hold them, boys――hold them!” muttered Jack Diamond, as if his words
could reach the ears of those dirt-covered gladiators on the gridiron.
Then a pass was tried by Harvard, and right there she fumbled. It was
Jack Ready who fell on the ball, and Yale breathed once more. Now the
lost ground must be recovered. Yale tried to send a man round
Harvard’s right end, but no gain was made. Then Derford, Yale’s left
end, was literally hurled out of a formation play for a gain of four
yards, and that was some encouragement.
Right there three downs followed, and, as a last resort, a desperate
one, Birch kicked. The wind helped him, and he got the ball off in
splendid shape before a hand touched him. Hollender received the ball
and sent it back on the instant. This was a mistake, for Harvard lost
ground, having the wind against her, and the Yale crowd breathed a
trifle easier. But the fight was entirely in Yale territory now, and
Yale could not get the ball past center. Twice she came near
succeeding, only to slip up when success seemed within her grasp.
Harvard was cheering her men on.
The half was drawing to a close, and neither side had scored. Harvard
did not propose to lose her advantage. The captain called on his men
to rally, and they answered. Having the ball in their possession, they
began a series of terrific hammering at the Yale line. To the despair
of the Yale rooters the defenders of the blue seemed weakening.
Harvard made steady gains, and the ball was pushed to Yale’s
thirty-yard line once more, where there was another fearful scrimmage,
and when it was over Buck Badger was carried from the field with a
wrenched knee.
“That settles it!” groaned Browning. “I’ve never liked that fellow,
but he’s been our mainstay to-day. We’re in the soup!”
“I am afraid so,” said Diamond huskily. “Oh, if Frank Merriwell could
take his place!”
A freshman by the name of Deland came out from the reserves and took
Badger’s place. The game went on, with Harvard hammering her way
forward sure as fate. Yale’s twenty-yard line was reached. Then the
crimson beat out three yards, a yard, four yards, two yards, and the
ball was “down” ten yards from Yale’s goal-line.
“For the love of Heaven, hold it there two minutes!” prayed Jack
Diamond, looking at his watch.
Harvard had found she could gain by driving with all her might into
Yale’s line. It was brutal sort of work, but it counted, and those
Cambridge men were there to win if it cost blood and limbs. Yale was
making a “last-ditch stand.” There did not seem to be a man on the
team who was not willing to shed any amount of gore if he could aid in
the checking of those human battering-rams.
Slam! Harvard drove into Yale’s right end, and the “down” had not
gained a foot. Bang! Harvard rammed Yale’s center, and four yards were
made.
Then there was a quick change of men, and two substitutes appeared in
Yale’s line. They were fresh, and they held Harvard in her next center
attack.
“It’ll be all over in a moment!” groaned Browning. “Harvard will put
the ball over the line on her next attempt!”
Then the referee’s whistle blew, and Yale was saved for the time, as
the first half was ended.