THE FIRST GAME
DON sat on the bench and watched the game with Thacher School. With him
were nearly a dozen other substitutes, but they, unlike Don, were in
football togs and might, in fact probably would, get into the game
sooner or later. There was no such luck for Don so long as his hand
remained swathed in bandages, and he was silently bewailing his luck. At
his right sat Danny Moore, chin in hand and elbow in palm, viewing the
contest from half-closed eyes. The trainer was small and red of hair and
very freckled, and he was thoroughly Irish and, in the manner of his
race, mightily proud of it. Also, he was a clever little man and a good
trainer.
An attempted forward pass by the visitors grounded and the horn squawked
the end of the first period. Danny turned his beady green eyes on Don.
"Likely you're wishin' yourself out there with the rest of 'em, boy," he
said questioningly.
Don nodded, smiled his slow smile and shook his head. "I guess I won't
get into it for a week yet. Doc says this hand has got to do a lot of
healing first. He has a fine time every day pulling and cutting the old
skin off it. Guess he enjoys it so much he will hate to have it heal. I
should think, Danny, that if I had a heavy glove, sort of padded in the
palm, I might play a little."
"Sure, I'll fix you up something real nate," replied Danny readily.
"Nate an' scientific, d'ye see? An' so soon as the Doc says the word you
come to me an' I'll be having it ready for you."
"Will you? Thanks, Danny. That's great! I would like to get back to
practice again. I'm afraid I'll be as stiff and stale as anything if I
stay out much longer."
"Go easy on your eating, lad, and it'll take you no time at all to catch
up with the rest of 'em. Spread this hand for me while I see the shape
of it. What happened to your finger there?"
"I broke it when I was a little kid, playing baseball."
"Sure, whoever set it for you must have been cross-eyed," said the
trainer, drily. "'Tis a bum job he did."
"Yes, it's a little crooked, but it works all right."
"You'd have hard work gettin' your engagement ring over that lump, I'm
thinking. It's a fortunate thing you're not a girl, d'ye mind."
Don laughed. "Engagement rings go on the other hand, don't they, Danny?"
"Faith, I don't know. Bad luck to him, he's done it again!"
"Who? What?" asked Don startledly.
"Jim Morton. That's twice today he's spilled most of the water from the
pail. Well, I'll have to go an' fill it, I suppose."
Danny went off to get the water bucket and the teams lined up again near
the visitors' twenty-five yard line. Coach Robey had put in a somewhat
patched-up team today. Captain Edwards was at left end, Clint Thayer at
left tackle, Gafferty at left guard, Peters at centre, Pryme at right
guard, Crewe at right tackle, Lee at right end, Carmine at quarter, St.
Clair and Gordon at half and Martin at full. It was not the best line-up
possible, but it was so far handling the situation fairly
satisfactorily. The practice of the last two days had developed one or
two strains and proved more than one of the first-choice fellows far
below condition. Tim Otis was out for a day or two with a twisted knee
and Tom Hall with a lame shoulder. Thursby had developed an erratic
streak the day before and was nursing his chagrin further along the
bench. Holt, the best right end, was in trouble with the faculty, and
Rollins, full-back, had pulled a tendon in his ankle. A full team of
second- and third-string players were having signal work on the practice
gridiron.
In the stands a fairly good-sized gathering of onlookers was applauding
listlessly at such infrequent times as the maroon-and-grey team gave it
any excuse. Thus far, however, exciting episodes had been scarce. The
weather, which was enervatingly warm, affected both elevens and the
playing was sluggish and far from brilliant. The Brimfield backs, with
the exception of Carmine, who was always on edge, conducted themselves
as if they were at a rehearsal, accepting the ball in an indifferent
manner and half-heartedly plunging at the opposing line or jogging
around the ends. As the first half drew to a close both goal lines were
still unthreatened and from all indications would remain so for the rest
of the contest. A slight thrill was developed, though, just before the
second period came to an end when a Thacher half-back managed to get
away outside Crewe and romped half the length of the field before he was
laid low by Carmine. After that there was an exchange of punts and the
teams trotted off to the gymnasium.
Don left the bench with the others, but did not follow them to the
dressing room. Instead, he strolled down the running track and across to
the practice field, where Tim was superintending the signal practice.
Don joined him and followed the panting, perspiring players down the
field. Tim's conversation was rather difficult to follow, since he
continually interrupted himself to instruct or admonish the toilers.
"I feel like a slave-driver, pushing these poor chaps around in this
heat. How's the game going? No score? We must be playing pretty punk, I
guess. What sort of a team has--Jones, you missed your starting signal
again. For the love of mud, keep your ears open!--Thacher must be as bad
as we are. Who's playing in my place? Gordon? Is he doing anything?--Try
them on that again, McPhee, will you? Robbins, you're supposed to block
hard on that and not let your man through until the runner's got into
the line.--I could have played today all right, but that idiot, Danny,
wouldn't let me. My knee's perfectly all right."
"Then why do you limp?" asked Don innocently.
"Force of habit," said Tim. "What time is it?"
Don consulted his silver watch and announced a quarter to four.
"Thank goodness! That'll do, fellows. You'd better get your showers
before you try to see that game. If Danny catches you over there the way
you are he will just about scalp you! By the way, McPhee, you saw what I
meant about that end-around play, didn't you? You can't afford to slow
up the play by waiting for your end to get to you. He's got to be in
position to take the pass at the right second. Otherwise they'll come
through on you and stop him behind the line. There ought to be
absolutely no pause between Smith's pass to you and your pass to
Compton, or whoever the end is. You get the ball, turn quick, toss it to
the end and fall in behind him. It ought to be almost one motion. Of
course, I know you fellows were pretty well fagged today, but you don't
want to let your ends think they can take their time on that play, old
man, for it's got to be fast or it's no earthly good. Thus endeth the
lesson. Come on, Don, and we'll go over and add the dignity of our
presence to that little affair."
They reached the bench just as the two teams trotted back and
Brimfield's supporters raised a faint cheer. Don imagined that there was
a little more vim in the way the maroon-and-grey warriors went into the
field for the second half and the results proved him right.
It was the home team's kick-off, and after Captain Edwards, in the
absence of Hall, had sped the ball down to Thacher's twenty yards and a
Thacher player had sped it back to the thirty, Brimfield settled down to
business. Probably Coach Robey's remarks in the interim had been
sufficiently caustic to get under the skin. At all events Brimfield
forced Thacher to punt on third down and then almost blocked the kick.
As it was, the ball hurtled out of bounds near the middle of the field
and became Brimfield's on her forty-eight. Two plunges netted five
yards, and then St. Clair, returning to form, ripped his way past tackle
on the left and fought over two white lines before he was halted. Gordon
and Martin made it first down in three tries and Carmine worked the left
end for four more. Thacher stiffened then, however, and after two
ineffectual plunges St. Clair punted and Brimfield caught on her goal
line and ran back a dozen yards, Lee, right end, missing his tackle
badly and Steve Edwards being neatly blocked off. But Thacher found the
going even harder than her opponent had and in a moment she, too, was
forced to punt.
This time it was St. Clair who caught and who, eluding both Thacher
ends, ran straight along the side line until he was upset near the
enemy's thirty-five yards. As he went down he managed to get one foot
over the line and the referee paced in fifteen yards, set the ball to
earth and waved toward the Thacher goal.
Martin faked a forward pass and the ball went to Gordon for a try at
right tackle. Thayer and Gafferty opened a fine hole there and Gordon
romped through and made eight before the Thacher secondary defence
brought him down. Martin completed the distance through centre. From the
twenty-four yards to the ten the ball went, progress, however, becoming
slower as the attack neared the goal. On a shift that brought Thayer to
the right side of the line, St. Clair got around the short end for three
and Martin added two more, leaving the pigskin on the five-yard line. It
was third down and Martin went back to kick. But after a moment's
hesitation Carmine changed his signals and the ends stole out toward the
side lines. Thacher proceeded to arrange her forces to intercept a
forward pass and again Carmine switched. The ends crept back and Martin
retired to the fifteen-yard line and patted the turf. Carmine knelt in
front of him and eyed the goal. Then the signals came again, and with
them the ball, and it was Martin who caught it and not Carmine. Two
steps to the right, a quick heave, a frenzied shouting from the
defenders of the goal, a confused jostling, and Captain Edwards, one
foot over the line, reached his arms into the air, pulled down the
hurtling pigskin, tore away from one of the enemy, lunged forward and
went down under a mass of bodies, but well over the goal line.
Brimfield found her enthusiasm then, and her voice, and cheered loudly
and long, only ceasing when Carmine walked out with the ball under his
arm and flung himself to the turf opposite the right hand goal post.
Thursby, hustled in by Coach Robey, measured distance and direction,
stepped forward and, as the line of Thacher warriors swept forward with
upstretched hands, swung his toe against the ball and sent it neatly
across the bar.
With the score seven to nothing against her, Thacher returned to the
fray with a fine determination, but, when the teams had changed places
after the kick-off and the last period had begun, she speedily found
that victory was not to be her portion. Mr. Robey sent in nearly a new
team during that last ten minutes and the substitutes, fresh and eager,
went at it hammer-and-tongs. Thacher enlisted fresh material, too, but
it couldn't stop the onslaught that soon took the ball down the field to
within close scoring distance of her goal. That Brimfield did not add
another touchdown was only because her line, overanxious, was twice
found off-side and penalised. Even then the ball went at last to within
six inches of the goal line and it was only after the nimble referee had
dug into the pile-up like a terrier scratching for a bone in an ash-heap
that the fact was determined that Thacher had saved her bacon by the
width of the ball. She kicked out of danger from behind her goal and
after two plays the final whistle blew.
It was a very hot and very weary crowd of fellows who thronged the
dressing room in the gymnasium five minutes later and, above the swish
of water in the showers, shouted back and forth and discussed the game
from as many angles as there had been participants. Possibly Brimfield
had no very good reason for feeling proud of her afternoon's work, for
last year she had defeated Thacher 26 to 3. That game, however, had
taken place two weeks later in the season, when the Maroon-and-Grey was
better off in the matter of experience, and so perhaps was not a fair
comparison. At all events, Brimfield liked the way she had "come back"
in that third period and liked the way in which the substitutes had
behaved, and displayed a very evident inclination to pat herself on the
back.
Tim, who had haled Don into the gymnasium on the way back to hall, tried
his best to convince all those who would listen to him that they had
played a perfectly punk game and that nothing but the veriest fluke had
accounted for that score. But they called him a "sore-head" and laughed
at him, and even drove him away with flicking towels, and he finally
gave it up and consented to accompany Don back to Billings, limping a
trifle whenever he thought no one was looking.
Don missed Tim at supper, for the training tables started that evening
and Tim went off to one of them with his napkin ring and his own
particular bottle of tomato catsup, leaving his chum feeling forlornly
"out of it."