The last week of the football season broke over them before Stover could
realize that the final test was almost at hand. The full weight of the
responsibility that was on him oppressed him day and night. He forgot
what he had been at end; he remembered only his present inadequacy. It
had been definitely decided to keep him at fullback, for three things
were imperative in the weak backfield: some one who could catch punts,
with nerve enough to get off his kicks quickly in the face of a stronger
line, and above all some one on the last defense who would never miss
the tackle that meant a touchdown.
In the last week a great change took place in the sentiment of the
university--the hoping against hope that often arrives with the
intensity of combat. At this time Harvard and Yale were still
reluctantly estranged, due to a purely hypothetical question as to which
side had begun a certain historic slaughter, and the big game of the
season was with Princeton, which, under the leadership of Garry
Cockerell, Dink's first captain at Lawrenceville, had established a
record of unusual power and brilliancy.
Up to Monday of the last week, the opinion around the campus was
unanimous that the day of defeat had arrived; but, with the opening of
the week and the flocking in of the old players, a new spirit was
noticeable, and (among the freshmen) a tentative loosening of the
purse-strings on news of extra-insulting challenges from the South.
At the practise, the season's marked division among the coaches was
forgotten, and the field was alive with frantic assistants. The
scrimmage between the varsity and the scrub took on a savageness that
was sometimes difficult to control. The team, facing the impossible,
with eagerness to respond, had clearly overworked itself. Stover himself
weighed a bare one hundred and forty, an unspeakable depravity which he
carefully concealed.
Still, the team began to feel a new impulse and a new unity, inspired by
the confidence of the returned heroes. The grim silence of the past
began to be broken by hopeful comments.
"By George, I believe there's something in those boys."
"We've come up smiling before."
"We may do it again."
"Shouldn't be surprised if they gave those Princeton Tigers the fight of
their lives."
"Oh, they'll fight it out all right."
One or two trick plays were perpetrated behind closed gates, and a
thorough drill in a new method of breaking up the Princeton formation
for a kick, under the instruction of returning scouts. The team itself
began to question and wonder.
"That fellow Rivers certainly has stiffened us up in the center of the
line," said Regan, between plays, in one of his rare moments of
loquacity. "I've learned more in three days than in the whole darn
season."
"You've got to hold for my kicks," said Stover, submitting to the sponge
which Clancy, the trainer, was daubing over his face.
"We'll hold."
"What do you really think, Tom?" said Stover as they stood a little
apart, waiting for the scrimmage to be resumed. "Do you think there's a
chance?"
"I'm not thinking," said Regan, in his direct way. "Haven't any business
to think. But we're getting together, there's no doubt of that. If we
can't win, why, we'll lose as we ought to, and that's something."
Others were not so unruffled as Regan. The last days brought out all the
divergent ways in which fierce, combative natures approach a crisis.
Dana, the captain, was plainly on the edge of his self-control, his
forehead drawn in a constant frown, his glance shooting nervously back
and forth, speaking to no one except in the routine of the day. Dudley,
at the other half, had adopted the same attitude. De Soto at quarter, on
the contrary, radiated a fierce joy, joking and laughing, his nervous
little voice piping out:
"A little more murder, fellows! Send them back on stretchers. That's the
stuff. What the deuce is the matter, Bill, do you want to live forever?
Use your hands, use your feet, use your teeth, anything! Whoop her up!"
Others in the line were more stolid, yet each in his way contributing to
the nervous electricity that sent the team tirelessly, frantically, like
mad dervishes, into the breach, while behind them, at their sides,
everywhere, the coaches goaded them on.
"Oh, get together!"
"Shove the man in front of you!"
"Get your shoulder into it!"
"Fight for that last inch there!"
"Knock him off his feet!"
"Put your man out o' the play!"
"Break him up!"
No one paid any attention to the scrubs, fighting desperately with the
same loyalty against the odds of weight and organization, without hope
of distinction, giving every last ounce of their strength in futile,
frantic effort, rejoicing when flung aside and crushed under the
victorious rush of the varsity, who alone counted.
Against the scrubs Stover felt a sort of rage. Time after time he went
crashing into the line, seeing the blurred faces of his own comrades
with an instinctive hatred, striking them with his shoulder, hurling
them from the path of attack with a wild, uncontrollable fury at their
resistance, almost unable to keep his temper in leash. The first feeling
of sympathy he had felt so acutely for those who bore all the brunt of
the punishment, unrewarded, was gone. He no longer felt any pity, but a
brutal joy at the incessant smarting, grinding shock of the attack of
which he was part and the touch of prostrate bodies under his rushing
feet.
Thursday and Friday the practise was lightened for all except for the
backs. For an hour he was kept at his punting in the open and behind the
lines, while the scrubs, reënforced by every available veteran, swarmed
through the line, seeking to block his kicks.
To one side a little knot of coaches watched the result with critical
anxiety, following the length of the punts in grim silence.
Tompkins, behind him, from time to time, spoke quietly, knowing that his
was a nature to be restrained rather than goaded on.
"Watch your opposing backs, Stover. Keep your punts low and away from
them so as to gain as much on the ground as you can. That's it! Here,
you center men, you've got to hold longer than that! You're hurrying the
kick too much. Get it off clean, Stover. Not so good. Remember what I
say about placing your punt. You're going to be out-kicked fifteen
yards; make up for it in brain work. All right, Dana?"
"That'll do," said Dana, after a moment's hesitation.
"All over?" said Dink, dazed.
"All over!"
The scrubs, with a yell, broke up, cheering the varsity, and being
cheered in turn. Stover, with a sinking, realized that the week of
preparation had gone and that as he was he must come up to the final
test--the final test before the thousands that would blacken the arena
on the morrow.
The squad went rather silently, each oppressed by the same thought.
"We'll go out to the country club for the night," said Tompkins's shrill
voice. "Get your valises ready. And now stop talking football until we
tell you. Go out on the trot now!"
From the gymnasium he went back to the house. As he came up the hall he
heard a hum of voices from his room.
"Dink's got the nerve, but what the deuce can he do against that
Princeton line? Do you know how much he weighs? One hundred and fifty."
Stover listened, smiled grimly. If they only knew his real weight!
"Do you think he'll last it through?"
"What, Dink?" said McCarthy's loyal voice. "You bet he'll last!"
"Blamed shame he isn't at end!"
"By ginger! he'd make the All-American if he was."
"Yes, and now every one will jump on him for being a rotten fullback."
"Dana be hanged!"
Stover went back to the stairs and returned noisily At his entrance the
crowd sprang up instinctively. He felt the sudden focus of anxious,
critical glances.
"Hello, fellows," he said gruffly. "Tough, help me to stow a few duds in
my valise."
"Sure I will!"
Two or three hurried to help McCarthy, in grotesque, unconsciously
humorous eagerness; others patted him on the back with exaggerated good
spirits.
"Dink, you look fine!"
"All to the good."
"Right on edge."
"Dink, we're all rooting for you."
"Every one of us."
"You'll tear 'em up."
"We're betting on you, old gazebo!"
"Thanks!"
He took the bag which McCarthy thrust upon him. Each solemnly shook his
hand, thrilling at the touch, and Hungerford said:
"Whatever happens, old boy, we're going to be proud of you."
Stover stopped a moment, curiously moved, and obeying an instinct, said
brusquely:
"Yes, I'll take care of that."
Then he went hurriedly out.
That night, after supper--a meal full of nervous laughter and assumed
spirits--two or three of the older coaches came in, and their spirit of
hopefulness somehow communicated itself to the team. Other Yale elevens
had risen at the last moment and snatched a victory--why not theirs? It
lay with them, and during the week they certainly had forged ahead. Dink
felt the infection and became almost convinced. Then Tompkins, moving
around as the spirit of confidence, signaled him.
"Come out here; I want a little pow-wow with you."
They left the others and went out on the dim lawns with the lighted
club-house at their backs, and Tompkins, drawing his arm through
Stover's, began to speak:
"Dink, we're in for a licking."
"Oh, I say!" said Stover, overwhelmed. "But we have come on; we've come
fast."
"Stover, that's a great Princeton team," said Tompkins quietly, "and
we're a weak Yale one. We're going to get well licked. Now, boy, I'm
telling you this because I think you're the stuff to stand it; because
you'll play better for knowing what's up to you."
"I see."
"It's going to depend a whole lot on you--how you hold up your end--how
badly we're licked."
"I know I'm the weak spot," said Stover, biting his lips.
"You're a darn good player," said Tompkins, "and you're going to leave a
great name for yourself; but this year you've had to be sacrificed.
You've been put where you are because you've got nerve and a head. Now
this is what I want from you. Know what you're up against and make your
brain control that nerve--understand?"
"Yes, I do."
"You've got to do the kicking in the second half as well as in the
first. You've got to keep your strength and not break it against a wall.
You won't be called on for much rushing in the first half; you'll get a
chance later. The line may go to pieces, the secondary defense may go to
pieces; but, boy, if _you_ go to pieces, we'll be beaten thirty to
nothing."
"As bad as that!"
"Every bit."
"That's awful--a Yale team." He drew a long breath and then said: "What
do you want me to do?"
"I want you to get off every punt without having it blocked; and that's
a good deal, with what you're up against."
"Yes, sir."
"And hold on to every punt that comes to you--no fumbling."
"No fumbling--yes, sir."
"And kick as you've never kicked before--every kick better as you go on.
Put your whole soul into it."
"I will."
"You won't miss a tackle--I know that; but you'll have some pretty rum
ones to make, and when you tackle, make them remember it."
"Yes, sir."
"But, Stover, above all, hold steadfast. Keep cool and remember the
game's a long one. Boy, you don't know what it'll mean for some of us
old fellows to see Yale go down, but out of it all we want to remember
something that'll make us proud of you." He stopped, controlled the
emotion that was in his voice, and said a little anxiously: "I tell you
this because a first game is a terrible thing, and I didn't want you to
be caught in a panic when you found what you were up against. And I tell
you, Stover, because you're the sort of fighting stuff that'll fight
harder when you know all there is to it is the fighting. Am I right?"
"I hope so, sir."
"And now, do a more difficult thing. Get right hold of yourself. Put
everything out of your mind; go to bed and sleep."
This last injunction, though he tried his best to obey it, was beyond
Stover's power. He passed the night in fitful flashes of sleep. At
times he awoke, full of a fever of eagerness from a dream of success.
Then he would lie staring, it seemed for hours, at the thin path across
the ceiling made by a street lamp, feeling all at once a weakness in the
pit of his stomach, a physical horror of what the day would bring forth.
The words of the coach framed themselves in a sort of rhythmic chant
which went endlessly knocking through his brain:
"Catch every punt--get off every kick--make every tackle."
In the morning it was the same refrain, which never left him. He rose
tired, with a limpness in every muscle, his head heavy as if bound
across with biting bonds. He stood stupidly holding his wash-pitcher,
looking out of the window, saying:
"Good heavens! it's only a few hours off now."
Then he began feebly to wash, repeating:
"Get off every kick--every kick."
Breakfast passed like a nightmare. He put something tasteless into his
mouth, his jaws moved, but that was all. The brisk walk to chapel
restored him somewhat, and the consciousness of holding himself before
the gaze of the crowd. After first recitation, Regan joined him, and
together they went across the campus, no longer the campus of the
University, but beginning to swarm with strangers, and strange colors
amid the blue.
"How are you feeling?" said Regan in a fatherly sort of way, as they
went through Phelps and out on to the Common.
"Tom, my shoes stick to the ground, my knees are made of paper, and I'm
hollow from one end to the other."
"Fine!"
"Oh, _is_ it?"
"You'll be a bundle of fire on the field."
"Let's not walk too far. We want to keep fresh," said Stover, feeling
indeed as though every step was draining his energy.
"Rats! let's saunter down Chapel Street and see the crowds come in."
"You old rhinoceros, have you any nerves?"
"Lots, but they're a different sort. By George, isn't it a wonderful
sight?"
Side by side with Regan, a certain shame steadied Stover. They went
silently through the surging, arriving multitude, all intoxicated with
the joy and zest of the great game. In and out, newsboys howling papers
with headlines and pictures of the team thrust their wares before their
eyes, while a pestiferous swarm of strange pedlers shrieked:
"Get your colors here!"
"Get your winnin' color."
Suddenly Stover saw a headline--his name and the caption:
STOVER THE WEAK SPOT
"Let's get a paper," he said, nervously drawn to it.
"No you don't," said Regan, who had seen it. "Come on, now, get out of
here, some one might walk on your foot or stick a hatpin in your eye."
"What time is it?"
"Time to be getting back."
"Tom, do you know how much I weigh?" said Stover irrelevantly.
"What the deuce?"
"I weigh one hundred and forty-one pounds," said Stover solemnly, as
though imparting a State secret.
"Go on, be loony if you want," said Regan. "I've seen bruisers before a
fight act like high school girls. If you've got something on your mind,
why talk it out, it'll do you good."
"It's awful--it's awful," said Stover, shaking his head.
"What's awful?"
"It's awful to think I'm the weak spot, that if they only had a decent
fullback there would be a chance. I've no right there--every one knows
it, and every one's groaning about it."
"Go on."
"That's all," said Stover, a little angry.
"Well, then come on, I'm getting hungry."
"Hungry! Tom, I'd like to knock the spots out of you," said Dink,
laughing despite himself.
"Dink, old bantam," said Regan, resting his huge paw on Stover's
shoulder in rough affection, "you're all right. I say so and I know it.
Now shut up and come on."