FRANK TAKEN TO WARWICK.
While the advent of the telegraph line occupied the attention of our
friends in the evenings, it must not be thought that they were any
the less intent on the football doings in the afternoons. The end of
the season was drawing rapidly to a close and only one game--that
with Porter School on the Queen's grounds--remained on the schedule
to be played, with the exception of the final match with Warwick.
This latter game was to be played at Warwick, which was considered a
disadvantage, as the Queen's eleven seemed to fight better on home
grounds. It will be remembered that the Warwick game was played at
Queen's the previous year. These matches always alternated--one year
at Warwick and the next at Queen's, and so on.
After Frank had won his place on the Second eleven, there was a
general brace by the School eleven. Dixon, seeing his position in
danger of being invaded by Frank, put forth his best efforts, and
he was so clever a quarter that when he did his best he was hard to
beat. Horton was delighted with the change and attributed it in a
considerable degree to the dashing play of Frank Armstrong, who had
been, as he expressed it, "a regular find."
Then came the Porter game. "This is our test," said Jimmy the Friday
night before it was played. "If we get away with this one, there's a
chance that we can pull off the Warwick game."
"A fighting chance, yes," said the clear-headed Codfish. "You may be
able to hold them, but I don't see how you can score against their
defense. Warwick is as good or better than last year. The only way
you can beat a strong defense, under these rules that the football
fathers have doped out, is to have a drop kicker."
"Well, we haven't got one, so we'll have to get off a forward pass or
something tricky, and catch those big guys napping. It all depends on
what we can do to-morrow."
The boys turned in early. Frank fell asleep with hopes of a chance at
to-morrow's game in his head.
It was a glorious day, and every one far and near turned out to see
the test of the School eleven against the strapping boys from Porter.
Knowing well the erratic course that the Queen's eleven had been
steering, the invaders, who came gayly decked as for a celebration,
freely expressed themselves as to the size of the score. They would
not consider for a moment that the score might be against them.
Nearly all, excepting the most optimistic of the Queen's followers,
were shaking in their shoes because a defeat to-day meant disaster a
week later. A victory would hearten the team so much, that they might
even triumph over the proud and confident eleven up the river.
From the moment of the first clash of the lines the Porter boys
showed their superiority. They took the ball and on straight rushes
carried it far down the field, only to lose it when they seemed to
be sure of scoring. Red-headed Jimmy was everywhere on defense. Half
a dozen times the Porter runner with the ball was through the line,
but was nailed with deadly precision by this half-back. Dixon also
played magnificently. He was playing to hold his place, and although
Frank, sitting on the side-lines wrapped up in a blanket, saw his
opportunity for a trial disappearing through the brilliant play of
Chip, he could not but admire it.
Time after time the Porter School eleven carried the ball half the
length of the field. Stone, their full-back, out-punted Wheeler,
and their ends covered the long punts with deadly certainty. Porter
played harder and harder and made ten yards of ground to one for
Queen's, but they were met down around the 25-yard line with so
fierce a resistance that they could go no further. Twice they made
weak attempts to drop-kick a goal, but each time the trials failed.
Once a Queen's end recovered the ball and carried it 70 yards down
the field, where he was felled by the Porter tackle, who outran him.
This hammering game went on for three quarters, but, in the fourth
quarter, Queen's seemed to gain strength. Twice they stopped the
Porter rushes at midfield, and with unsuspected power carried the
ball inside the 10-yard line, only to be stopped when success seemed
certain. Quickly the minutes flew by. Dixon drove his men with
increasing speed in spite of the fact that they were about ready to
drop. They responded to the call splendidly. It was the best football
they had shown the whole fall, but in spite of their best efforts
Porter stood a barrier to the goal line, and the whistle blew with
the game a tie, without scoring by either side.
"I was praying that they'd call you in and give you a trial, Frank,"
said Jimmy that night, "when we were down on their goal line. But,
after a conference, Dixon thought he could take it across and
Wheeler thought so, too. And they failed. It would have been an easy
drop--right in front of the posts. If I had been captain I'd have
tried it every time I got inside the 15-yard line, but Horton doesn't
think that way."
"Wait till you get to be captain," said the Codfish, "and you'll have
them kicking goals all over the field, eh, old speed?"
"Well, I'd be a little freer with them than the Captain is. But it's
his team and I'm not grouching. As the fellow in the poem says:
"'Mine not to reason why,
Mine but to do or die.'"
"And you died, I notice, and you'll die some more up at Warwick next
Saturday," prophesied the cold-hearted Codfish.
Very little was done on the gridiron during the week preceding the
Warwick game. The players were rested after the hard struggle they
had gone through with the Porter School team. There was some secret
practice and several trick plays were run over. The last work-out was
on Wednesday afternoon.
"Only light drill to-morrow," announced Horton, "and nothing at all
on Friday."
"Do you know the signals of the First eleven?" inquired Horton of
Frank when he was coming out of the shower bath that night.
"I've picked up most of them, yes, sir," said Frank.
"I thought so," said Horton, grinning, "by the way you played on
defense. Here's a set of them. Get them well in your head. Perhaps we
may need you to-morrow."
Frank's heart took a great leap in his breast. "'Perhaps we will
need you to-morrow,'" he kept repeating to himself. "But after all
it is only 'perhaps.' Well, that's better than nothing." That night
Horton's "perhaps" kept him awake half an hour longer than usual, and
he went to sleep finally to dream of the clash of battle in which he
had a part.
Thursday was given to signal drill, short, sharp and snappy.
The bleachers were well filled with boys who had come down in an
organized mass to try out their new songs. As the players rolled and
tumbled around on the ground, the sharp cheer rang out, and at its
end was the name of a player.
"Come on, get into this, now," shouted the cheer leaders--
"'Rah, 'rah, 'rah, 'rah, 'rah, 'rah! Queen's!--_Wheeler!_"
The boys raised their voices with a will. Even the second and third
substitutes came in for their share, and Frank felt a strange thrill
run down his spine as he heard his own name, "_Armstrong_," snapped
out by the bleachers. That it was well down toward the end of the
list and not among the important members did not particularly matter.
It meant that he was a possible candidate for the team and that was
enough to fill him almost to bursting with happiness. And his joy was
not lessened on seeing the bulletin near the gymnasium door, pasted
there by Horton, after the practice. His name was among those who
were to take the train for Warwick Saturday afternoon.
It seemed to the boys that Saturday would never come, but come it
did at last, a glorious day in early November. The exodus for Warwick
began early. The Queen's boys went by train, by automobile, by team,
and some of those given to pedestrianism even walked the five miles
up the river. Every Queen's boy bore his banner or badge of blue and
gold, the school colors. Some carried them modestly while others
flaunted their flags to the breeze and made sure that the entire
populace would know that they came from Queen's, and that they were
sure of victory.
"Isn't it great," said Jimmy, as he and Frank hurried for the 12:30
train which was to take the team to Warwick, "to see this turn-out?
It makes me feel as though I could play my head off when the whistle
blows."
Boys who have not attended a preparatory school or college can hardly
understand the intense feeling of loyalty which a body of students
has for its teams. They may be good or they may be poor, but since
they represent the school, if the school has any spirit in it at
all, the boys are behind the teams. This intense loyalty often
actually makes a team strong that would otherwise be indifferent or
distinctly poor. And so it was with the Queen's School eleven that
Saturday with which our story deals. The bad record of the season was
forgotten for the time, and every player who wore the Blue and Gold
felt himself nerved to do his best, or more than his best, because
his schoolmates were with him heart and soul.
"I've a hunch that we are going to win this game," said Jimmy as the
train neared Warwick on its short run.
"Of course we are," said big Wheeler, overhearing the remark. "Don't
believe anything but that and we'll show them who's who, and don't
you forget it."
At the little Warwick railroad station a hundred boys who had
preceded the team and all those on the train gathered around the team
as it alighted from the car and, with hats off, gave it a ringing
cheer. Then, as the players piled headlong into the 'bus that was
to carry them to the Warwick grounds, the crowd fell into line four
deep and followed along, occasionally sending up a cheer to vary the
School marching song. And in this martial array Queen's invaded their
rival's grounds.
"Let them sing," said a Warwicker who sat in a group of boys on
the Library steps as the Queen's phalanx went swinging along, proud
and haughty under the banners of Blue and Gold; "they will be quiet
enough after the game is over."
The Warwick crowd were confident of victory, and the remark of the
boy on the steps of the Library reflected the feeling of every one in
the school. And they had good reason to feel confident. The Warwick
eleven was a strong one, most of whose members had played together
for two years. The team had won all its games by big scores, and what
served to make assurance almost certain, was an easy victory over
Porter two weeks before the day Queen's had played the same team to
a tie. The Warwickers would not even admit that Queen's had a chance
to get within striking distance of the Warwick goal on straight
offensive strength. "Of course, there's always danger of a fumble or
something," said those who liked to consider themselves fair to the
other fellow, "but the chances are against that."
Warwick also made a brave showing with their school colors. Flags
hung from the dormitory windows, and over the door of the gymnasium
was draped an enormous Warwick flag. Down on the big flagstaff by
the track house another flag--Maroon with a big white "W"--floated
lazily in the breeze. Boys gathered in doorways and on the walks and
discussed with eagerness the coming struggle.
The game was scheduled for two o'clock and long before that hour the
crowds were streaming across the playing fields in the direction of
the football stands. Suddenly was heard the music of a band, and
soon it swung into view from behind the Library where the Warwick
procession had been formed; and after it came a long tail of boys,
hands on each other's shoulders, skipping and dancing along in
the peculiar zig-zag step. The crowds opened to make room for
this procession, and some joined in the Warwick songs as the band
thundered out the melody. But you may be sure that the Queen's boys
refrained from taking part in the Warwick jollification. They did do
their best, however, to make their own songs heard above the din.
Soon the crowds filed into the stands and were seated by the ushers,
who were distinguished from their fellows by a big Maroon silk badge
on their coat lapels. The ushers, in spite of their duties, managed
to keep one eye on the field where the members of the two teams were
running through the signals.
Queen's had the west and Warwick the east stand, and during the
preliminaries hurled defiance at each other across the brown
gridiron. Warwick, with a greater body of supporters, kept up a
steady yell, varied now and then by a song. The Queen's followers,
gathered compactly into two or three sections of the stand, made
their presence known by their snappy school yell. The cheer leaders
worked incessantly, and whenever there was any evidence of lagging,
heckled the sections through their megaphones: "Come on here, this
isn't a whispering match! What did you come up here for?" and such
like taunts.
Suddenly a hush fell on the crowds on both sides of the field.
Wheeler, captain of Queen's, and Burns of Warwick, with the referee,
met at midfield. They shook hands and held a little conference. After
a minute or two the referee snapped a coin into the air. The crowds
could not hear what was said, but as Burns turned away and waved
his hand to the north end of the field, the Warwick cheer leaders
interpreted the sign as meaning, and rightly, too, that Warwick had
won the toss and had taken the north end of the field, which was
favored by a little breeze.
The information imparted to the Warwick stand by the megaphones, a
cheer burst out spontaneously. The rattle of yelling went the length
of the stand. In another instant Warwick's measured yell, beaten by
the waving arms of half a dozen cheer leaders working in unison,
rolled out on the crisp air as the teams trotted to their places. A
moment later the whistle blew and the great game was on.