Oliver Greenfield's banishment from civilised society, however much it
may have gratified the virtuous young gentlemen of the Fifth, was
regarded by a small section of fellows in the Sixth with unmitigated
disgust. These fellows were the leading spirits of the Saint Dominic
Football Club, which was just about to open proceedings for the season.
To them the loss of the best half-back in the school was a desperate
calamity.
They raged and raved over the matter with all the fury of disappointed
enthusiasts. _They_ didn't care a bit, it almost seemed, whether the
fellow was a cheat or not. All they knew was, he was the quickest
half-back and the safest drop-kick the school had, and here was the
match with Landfield coming on, and, lo and behold! their man was in
Coventry, forsooth, and not to be had out for love or money. Thus
baulked, the Sixth Form athletes could afford to wax very virtuous and
philanthropic on the subject of Coventry generally.
"The Doctor ought to put a stop to it," said Stansfield, who this year
occupied the proud position of captain of the fifteen.
"Why, we've not got a single man worth twopence behind the scrimmage!"
This was gratifying for Loman, one of the council of war, who usually
played quarter or half-back in the matches.
"I don't see why we shouldn't get him to play if he _is_ at Coventry,"
said Callonby; "_we_ didn't send him there."
"All very well," said the captain; "if we got him we should lose
Ricketts, and Bullinger, and Tom Senior, and Braddy, which would come to
about the same thing."
"And I shouldn't play either," said Loman, "if Greenfield played."
Stansfield shrugged his shoulders and looked vicious.
"All child's play!" said he. "They think it's very grand and a fine
spectacle and all that. But they ought to have more consideration for
the credit of the school."
"It's not much to the credit of the school," said Loman, "to have a
fellow like him in the fifteen."
"It's less credit to have a pack of louts who tumble head over heels
every time they try to pick up a ball, and funk a charge twice out of
every thrice!" retorted Stansfield, who was one of the peppery order.
"Greenfield's worth any half-dozen of you, I tell you."
"Better get him to play Landfield by himself," growled Loman, who
generally got the worst of it in discussions like this.
"It's a plaguey nuisance, that's what it is," said Stansfield; "we are
sure to get licked. Who's to play half-back instead of him, I'd like to
know?"
"Forrester, in the Fourth, plays a very good half-back," said Callonby;
"he's tremendously quick on his feet."
"Yes, but he can't kick. I've a good mind to put Wraysford in the
place. And yet he's such a rattling steady `back' I don't like to move
him."
"Wraysford told me yesterday," said Wren, "he wasn't going to play."
"What!" exclaimed Stansfield, starting up as if he had been shot.
"Wraysford not going to play!"
"So he said," replied Wren.
"Oh, this is a drop too much! Why ever not?"
"I don't know. He's been awfully down in the mouth lately; whether it
is about the Nightingale, or--"
The captain gave a howl of rage.
"I wish that miserable brute of a Nightingale had been scragged, that I
do! Everything's stopped for the Nightingale! Who cares a button about
the thing, I'd like to know? Wraysford can get dozens more of them
after the football season's over. Why, the Doctor gave out another
scholarship to be gone in for directly after Christmas, only to-day.
Can't he go in for that?"
"So he will, I expect," said Wren; "but I don't fancy he'll play, all
the same, on Saturday."
Stansfield groaned. "There go my two best men," he said; "we may as
well shut up shop and go in for croquet."
A powerful deputation waited on Wraysford that same evening to try to
prevail upon him to play in the fifteen. They had hard work to do it.
He said he was out of form, and didn't feel in the humour, and was
certain they could get on well enough without him.
"Oh, no, we can't," said Stansfield. "I say, Wraysford," he added,
bluntly, "I expect it's this Nightingale affair's at the bottom of all
this nonsense. Can't you possibly patch it up, at any rate till after
Saturday? I'd give my head to get you and Greenfield in the team."
"Do play, Wraysford," put in Callonby. "Don't let the school be beaten
just because you've got a row on with another fellow."
"It's not that at all," said Wraysford, feeling and looking very
uncomfortable. "It's nothing to do with that. It's just that I'm not
in the humour. I'd really rather not."
"Oh, look here," cried Stansfield; "that won't wash. Come to oblige me,
there's a good fellow."
In the end Wraysford gave in, and the captain went off half consoled to
complete his preparations, and inveigh in his odd moments against all
Nightingales and Coventrys, and examinations, and all such enemies and
stumbling-blocks to the glorious old English sport of football.
Loman looked forward to the coming match with quite good spirits.
Indeed, it was a long time since he had felt or appeared so
light-hearted.
That very day he had received a most unexpected present in the shape of
a five-pound note from an aunt, which sum he had promptly and virtuously
put into an envelope and sent down to Mr Cripps in further liquidation
of his "little bill." Was ever such luck? And next week the usual
remittance from home would be due; there would be another three or four
pounds paid off. Loman felt quite touched at the thought of his own
honesty and solvency. If only everybody in the world paid their debts
as he did, what a happy state of things it would be for the country!
So, as I said, Loman looked forward to the football match in quite good
spirits, just as a man who has been working hard and anxiously for
eleven long months looks forward to his well-earned summer holiday.
Things were looking up with him, and no mistake.
And then, just like his luck, the Doctor had that same day made the
announcement, already referred to, of another scholarship to be competed
for directly after Christmas. It was for Sixth form boys under
seventeen, and he meant to go in for it! True, this scholarship was
only for twenty pounds for a single year, but that was something. As
far as he could see, Wraysford, who would get his move up at Christmas,
would be the only man in against him, if he did go in, and he fancied he
could beat Wraysford. For in the Nightingale exam he had not really
tried his best, but this time he would and astonish everybody.
Greenfield would scarcely go in for this exam, even if he got his move
up; it was safe to conclude his recent exploit would suffice him in the
way of exams, for some time to come.
And then, what could be more opportune than its coming off just after
Christmas, at the precise time when Cripps would be looking for a final
settlement of his account, or whatever little of it remained still to
pay! Oh, dear! oh, dear! What a thing it is to be straight and honest!
Everything prospers with a man when he goes in for being honest! Why,
Loman was positively being bathed in luck at the present time!
The Saturday came at last. Stansfield had drilled his men as well as he
could during the interval, and devoutly hoped that he had got a
respectable team to cope with the Landfield fellows. If he could only
have been sure of his half-back he would have been quite happy; and
never a practice passed without his growling louder than ever at the
disgraceful custom of sending useful behind-scrimmage men to Coventry.
At the last moment he decided to give the responsible post to Loman,
rather than move forward Wraysford from his position at "back"; and
Loman's usual place at quarter-back was filled up by young Forrester of
the Fourth, greatly to that young gentleman's trepidation and to the
exultation of the Fourth Senior as a body, who felt terrifically puffed
up to have one of their men actually in the first fifteen.
Some of my readers may perhaps know from actual experience what are the
numerous and serious anxieties which always beset the captain of the
football fifteen. If the fellow is worth his salt he knows to a nicety
where he is strong and where he is weak; he knows, if the wind blows one
way, which is the best quarter-back to put on the left and which on the
right. He knows which of his "bulldogs" he can safely put into the
middle of the scrimmage, and which are most useful in the second tier.
He knows when to call "Kick!" to a man and when to call "Run!" and no
man knows better when to throw the ball far out from touch, or when to
nurse it along close to the line. It is all very well for outsiders to
talk of football everlastingly as a _game_. My dear, good people,
football is a science if ever there was a science; the more you know of
it the more you will find that out.
This piece of lecturing is thrown in here for the purpose of observing
that Stansfield was a model football captain. However worried and
worrying and crabby he was in his ordinary clothes, in his football togs
and on the field of battle he was the coolest, quickest, readiest, and
cunningest general you could desire. He said no more than he could
help, and never scolded his men while play was going on, and, best of
all, worked like a horse himself in the thick of the fight, and looked
to every one else to do the same.
Yet on this Saturday all the captain's prowess and generalship could not
win the match for Saint Dominic's against Landfield.
The match began evenly, and for the first half of the time the game was
one long succession of scrimmages in the middle of the ground, from
which the ball hardly ever escaped, and when it did, escaped only to be
driven back next moment into the "mush."
"It'll do at this rate!" thinks Stansfield to himself. "As long as they
keep it among the forwards we shan't hurt."
Alas! one might almost have declared some tell-tale evil spirit had
heard the boast and carried it to the ear of the enemy, for next moment
half-time was called, the sides changed over, and with them the
Landfielders completely reversed their tactics.
The game was no longer locked up in a scrimmage in the middle of the
ground. It became looser all along the line; the ball began to slip
through the struggling feet into the hands of those behind, who sent it
shooting over the heads of the forwards into more open ground. The
quarter-backs and half-backs on either side ran and got round the
scrimmages; and when at last they were collared, took to ending up with
an expiring drop-kick, which sent the ball far in the direction of the
coveted goals.
Nothing could have happened worse for Saint Dominic's, for the strain
fell upon them just at their weakest point. Stansfield groaned as he
saw chance after chance missed behind his scrimmages. Young Forrester
played pluckily and hard at quarter-back, and shirked nothing; but he
could not kick, and his short runs were consequently of little use.
Callonby, of course, did good work, but Loman, the half-back, was
woefully unsteady.
"What a jackass I was to put the fellow there!" said Stansfield to
himself.
And yet Loman, as a rule, was a good player, with plenty of dash and not
a little courage. It was odd that to-day he should be showing such
specially bad form.
There goes the ball again, clean over the forwards' heads, straight for
him! He is going to catch it and run! No; he is not! He is going to
take a flying kick! No, he is not; he is going to make his mark! No,
he is not; he is going to dribble it through! Now if there is one thing
fatal to football it is indecision. If you wobble about, so to speak,
between half a dozen opinions, you may just as well sit down on the
ground where you are and let the ball go to Jericho. Loman gets
flurried completely, and ends by giving the ball a miserable side-kick
into touch--to the extreme horror of everybody and the unmitigated
disgust of the peppery Stansfield.
Yet had the captain and his men known the cause of all this--had they
been aware that that flash, half-tipsy cad of a fellow who, with half a
dozen of his "pals," was watching the match with a critical air, there
at the ropes was the landlord of the Cockchafer himself, the holder of
Loman's "little bill" for 30 pounds, they would perhaps have understood
and forgiven their comrade's clumsiness. But they did not.
Whatever had brought Cripps there? A thousand possibilities flashed
through Loman's mind as he caught sight of his unwelcome acquaintance in
the middle of the match. Was he come to make a row about his money
before all the school? or had anything fresh turned up, or what? And
why on earth did he bring those other cads with him, all of whom Loman
recognised as pot-house celebrities of his own acquaintance? No wonder
if the boy lost his head and became flurried!
He felt miserable every time the ball flew over to Cripps's side of the
ground. There was a possibility the landlord of the Cockchafer had only
come up out of curiosity, and, if so, might not have recognised his
young friend among the players. But this delusion was soon dispelled.
The ball went again into touch--this time close to the spot occupied by
the unwelcome group, and was about to be thrown out.