RODNEY HESITATES
The St. Matthew’s game was played in a drizzle of rain on a field
already slippery and sodden. St. Matthew’s sent a husky bunch of some
twenty odd players, who, stripping off their blue and white sweaters,
romped on to the field for their warming up. Beside them Maple Hill’s
warriors looked frail and delicate. Tad, who with Pete Greenough had
good-naturedly escorted the twins to the game, confided to Matty that
for his part he didn’t see any use in playing the game, that it could
be settled on the gymnasium scales.
“I think,” returned Matty loyally, “that our boys are very much nicer
looking. Don’t you, May?”
“Ever so much,” replied her sister unhesitatingly.
“Looks don’t count though,” said Pete.
“No, if they did we’d have them licked to a finish right now. Why,
Kitty alone would settle ’em. We’d just march Kitty out into the middle
of the field and the enemy would fade away!”
St. Matthew’s was a new opponent on the schedule, and Maple Hill knew
very little of her ability. But it wasn’t long before it became evident
that the Blue-and-White would take a lot of beating. Wet grounds
militated sorely against the home team, for quick starting was out of
the question, and by the time the Maple Hill attack reached the line it
was still going so slowly, had so little punch to it, that it usually
crumpled up against the St. Matthew’s defense like a paper kite against
a stone wall. On the other hand, the heavier and slower opponents
managed to keep their feet well, and crashed into the Green-and-Gray
for short gains. The first period ended without a score and without
either team having got near enough to its opponent’s goal to attempt
one. Each seemed to be trying the other out, and each stuck pretty
closely to line plunging, punting only when forced to.
But in the second period Maple Hill altered her game. On attack the
wide formation was used, and for a time Tyson and Gordon were fortunate
in slicing off good gains. Stacey Trowbridge brought the spectators to
their feet once by getting away with the ball for a wide end run that
might have netted a touchdown had he been able to keep his feet, and
did gain nearly thirty yards. When he was picked out of a mud puddle
with the pigskin still firmly clasped to his breast the teams lined up
on the St. Matthew’s twenty-eight yards. A forward pass failed to work,
Gordon made four through center, Kitty, who had been put in a moment
before, opening a fine wide hole for him, and with six to go Tracey
tried a drop kick for goal on third down. But the ball went low, was
partly blocked and recovered by the visitors. After that it was all
St. Matthew’s until the middle of the field had been passed. Here the
Green-and-Gray braced, and St. Matthew’s kicked. Gordon returned the
punt immediately and gained ten yards on the exchange. St. Matthew’s
tried a forward pass and netted twelve yards, failed on two plunges
at the left of the line, made three through Pounder and from kick
formation sent her fullback on an end run. This ended disastrously,
however, for Peterson brought the big blue-stockinged warrior to earth
for a five yard loss, and the pigskin again changed hands. From then
until the end of the half the ball progressed back and forth in the
middle of the field with little advantage to either side.
In the intermission Maple Hill, clad in raincoats and slickers,
got together and tried a few songs and did some cheering, the rain
drizzling down upon them steadily and depressingly. The twins, snuggled
under a huge umbrella, were much pleased when Rodney, trailing a wet
and bedraggled blanket behind him, climbed the stand to them.
“It’s a perfectly grand game!” declared Matty. “I’ve been so excited I
couldn’t sit still! Isn’t Kitty lovely, Rodney?”
“Old Kitty is playing a great little game,” Rodney agreed warmly.
“I heard Cotting say that he was putting it all over that big St.
Matthew’s guard.”
“Are we going to win?” asked May.
“I don’t know.” Rodney shook his head. “They’re a lot heavier than we
are. We can’t do much with their line. And it’s hard to make any trick
plays work, the ground’s so slippery. I guess we’ll be satisfied enough
to keep them from scoring.”
“Are you going to play?” Matty asked.
“Me? Oh, I don’t think so. Maybe I’ll get in for a few minutes at the
last. Cotting will probably try to save the first string fellows as
much as he can for next Saturday. Isn’t it a brute of a day?”
“We like it,” said Matty. “Don’t we, May?”
“We always like rain,” May agreed. “Mama says we make her think of a
pair of water spaniels. Just as soon as ever it begins to rain Matty
and I grab our raincoats and get out of doors. We like snow, too, don’t
we, Matty?”
Matty nodded. “I wish you might have seen the snowman we made last
winter, Rodney. It was twice as high as I am, and we put a pipe in his
mouth and an old hat on his head and called him ‘Chawles,’ for Mr.
Cooper.”
“And when we were laughing about it, Mrs. Westcott heard us from her
window and called up mama on the telephone and told her that we were
insulting Mr. Cooper!”
“And then,” added Matty complacently, “we changed him to a woman and
called her Mrs. Westcott.”
“The boys said it looked just like her,” murmured May reminiscently.
Tad and Pete, who had gone to join the cheerers below, returned to
their seats, and presently Rodney returned to the substitutes’ bench
just as the teams trotted back on the field, the water spouting under
their feet.
It was evident soon after the third period began that Coach Cotting had
decided to play a defensive game and take as few risks of injury to his
players as possible. Gordon punted as soon as the ball went into Maple
Hill’s possession, and after that Stacey invariably called for a kick
on second or third down. The punting game was not ill advised, either,
for with a wet ball and a slippery field fumbles by the opposing backs
might well be looked for. They came, too, but good luck attended St.
Matthew’s that day and her fumbles were always recovered before the
Maple Hill ends could get to the ball. Toward the last of the third
period the Green-and-Gray partisans were treated to an anxious
three minutes. Using a shift formation that was hard to meet, St.
Matthew’s took the ball from her own forty-five yard line by successive
rushes down to Maple Hill’s twenty-seven. There, with the stands
imploring Maple Hill to, “Hold them!” and Watson begging the team to
get together, a fumble by the St. Matthew’s quarter lost two yards,
although the ball was recovered by a back, and another try netted but
a fraction of a yard, Kitty and Pounder refusing to be budged and the
entire Green-and-Gray backfield, solving the play, piling in behind
them. There was a conference then by the St. Matthew’s quarter and the
captain, and after one or two false starts the right tackle was sent
back to try a place kick at goal. Maple Hill, however, broke through
desperately and the ball bounded away from some charging defender, and,
although a St. Matthew’s player fell upon it some ten yards up the
field, it went to Maple Hill a moment later when Peterson intercepted
a forward pass. A plunge at left tackle gained two yards, and Gordon
punted and Maple Hill’s goal was once more out of danger. The period
ended after the visitors had gained a first down with the ball near
the middle of the field in St. Matthew’s territory.
It had been a gruelling game, and more than one of Coach Cotting’s
players showed the pace. With the big game only seven days distant
it would not do to overtax his best men, and so during the short
intermission the Maple Hill lineup was considerably changed. Of the
forwards only Pounder, Kittson, and Peterson remained when the fourth
period began, while, with the exception of Gordon, an entirely new
backfield was presented. St. Matthew’s went desperately to work for a
score, and her heavy charges at the Green-and-Gray line soon began to
tell. The right side of it was weak, and most of the gains were made
there. St. Matthew’s went down to her opponent’s thirty-four yards
without losing the ball. Then there was a slip up on signals, and Kitty
wormed through and fell on the pigskin. In Maple Hill’s first play,
a double pass behind the line, Anson, who had substituted Fuller,
wrenched his knee when tackled, and when, a moment later, he tried to
run up the field under Gordon’s long punt and had to subside in a pool
of water, Cotting called him out and sent in Rodney. There remained
only some six minutes of playing time. St. Matthew’s, who had made
several changes in her line already, now put in a new backfield entire,
perhaps concluding that her chance of winning had gone by and that the
best to be had was a no score tie.
She started back with the ball, but much of her aggressiveness had
departed, and the new backfield was slow and uncertain. In spite of
that, however, she managed to keep the ball until she had gained two
first downs. Then she was set back for holding and presently punted.
The kick was poor, and Gordon, playing back, raced in with upraised
hand and made a fair catch on the forty-four yards. The Maple Hill
supporters arose and loudly demanded a touchdown and for a minute
or two it looked as though their demand might be satisfied, for two
gains outside of tackles brought a first down with the pigskin on the
thirty-two yard line. Gordon gained three straight through center,
Rodney made two on a skin tackle plunge at the left, and Gordon again
took the ball, but was stopped for no gain. It was then fourth down
with five to go, and after a conference Gordon fell back to kicking
position. But the signals told a different story and Rodney sprinted
across the field, Peterson close behind him.
“Forward pass!” cried the opposing quarter. “Look out!”
Peterson, slackening his pace, turned for the throw. Rodney met the
first of the enemy and sent him staggering aside. The ball came arching
across the field. But Gordon had thrown too far and Rodney saw that the
flying oval would pass over Peterson’s head. He stepped back, dodging a
blue stockinged enemy, heard Peterson’s warning cry as his upstretched
hands failed to grasp the ball, and got it himself, head high. In front
of him at the instant stretched an open path to the goal line. From the
stands came frenzied cries of delight, from the enemy hoarse shouts of
warning. Had Rodney started on the instant and made straight for the
goal line he would have scored, and Maple Hill would have won another
hard fought battle. But for just the instant that it took to turn the
opponent’s confusion into action Rodney hesitated. The ball should
have been Peterson’s, he realized, and by some chance it had come to
him. For an infinitesimal instant of time that thought crowded back
all others. Then he saw what was to be done and bounded off, throwing
aside a pair of clutching arms. But the hesitation cost him success.
The stretch of sod that had been empty a second before was now guarded,
and eager hands reached for him. Peterson did his best, but the enemy
was too many and Rodney was pulled to earth on the twelve yard line,
ignominiously defeated by his own inaction, by the lack of that one
factor that Terry Doyle called football instinct and Coach Cotting
termed football sense.
The game ended 0 to 0 and the teams cheered each other dispiritedly,
each feeling, doubtless, that by rights the contest should have been
its own. Not a soul spoke to Rodney of his failure. In fact, it seemed
to him that every fellow looked more kindly upon him than usual. But
he knew what had happened, knew that by just a fraction of a moment he
had lost the game for his team, and between the sounding of the final
whistle and the reaching of the gymnasium door he came to a decision.
He would resign from the team.