“70,000 WITNESSES”
As Johnny listened to Drew Lane’s rapid-fire report of events and their
outcomes, he realized that he had played no small part in the breaking up
of a notorious band of gamblers and the thwarting of their plans.
“More luck than skill on my part,” he whispered to himself.
Just then a thought struck him with the force of a blow. What if the
gamblers’ plans had not been thwarted after all? Had Drew Lane talked too
soon? How could they know that the Red Rover had reached the city safely?
Hour by hour, with monotonous regularity the radio reported: “Still
missing.” Was he still missing? Would he fail to appear when the team
lined up for the kick-off?
“We’ll know that soon enough.” He glanced at the clock on the wall.
“Twenty minutes more, and then—” He took a long breath.
“It means so much!” He all but prayed.
Then again doubt assailed him. Suppose the Red Rover _had_ reached the
city; suppose he did line up with his team? He had been away from
practice for days; had missed all the elaborate plans made for this game
of games. He had not lived as players live who are training for a major
event. “And every one feels that if he were only there the game would be
won before the kick-off!” He fairly groaned.
Once again he glanced at the clock. “Fifteen minutes to go.”
With nervous fingers he snapped on the radio.
“Here we are,” the announcer was saying. “The seats are rapidly filling
up. The aisles are packed. What a picture! Gay sport costumes; bright
banners; pennants waving; bands playing. Listen!”
Out from the radio came the stirring notes of a march.
“There! There!” the announcer shouted into the microphone. “They’re
coming out now. The players are coming on the field. There’s Old Midway.
Number twenty-one, Masters, the giant fullback; eighteen, Dwyer, right
half.”
Johnny caught his breath. Was it known by now? Would Red come upon the
field? His number was twenty. Would he hear it?
“Twenty-eight, Sullivan, the slim quarterback,” the announcer recited.
“Seventeen, Clarke, the center; and now Johnson, the left half, who as
you know, replaces the famous All-American star, Red Rodgers.”
Johnny heard no more. His hopes sank. From the corner came an exultant
whisper.
But the whisper came too soon. Jimmie Drury, the slender reporter from
the News, had carried the Red Rover and his diminutive companion, Berley
Todd, speedily and safely from the enchanted isle back to the city. After
landing in an open field close to the city, they tramped into the suburbs
and registered under assumed names at a small hotel. Jimmie made no
effort to get in touch with his paper. In his pocket he carried a story
that would have made the first page in every newspaper of the land. “The
Red Rover has been found. He is safe. He will play.” He could see it
across the page in glaring letters.
The story was not told. Jimmie was loyal, loyal to the core. Drew Lane
had told him what to do. He would do it, cost what it might.
“These men,” Drew had said sternly, “must not know. They must pay in full
for their greed and for their cowardly deeds.”
“And they shall pay!” Jimmie had agreed. So it came about that just as
the ball was being placed for the kick, a youth whose shining new suit
bore the number twenty came trotting out to say a word to the referee,
then to tap number fourteen on the back and to mumble apologetically:
“Sorry, Johnson. Better luck next time!”
It was the Red Rover.
From the vast throng there came a sound like the wind flowing through the
tops of a thousand trees. They had seen that number. Were they to believe
their eyes?
The sigh, the whisper, grew to a shout. Then the sons and daughters of
Old Midway leaped to their feet and such a cheer rent the air as was
echoed back again and again by the distant skyscrapers.
Hearing this, Red Rodgers felt a chill rise up his spine. They had seen
him. They expected so much.
“And if I lose,” he murmured low, “if I lose!”
He set his teeth hard. He could not, he must not lose!
On far away Passage Island Johnny Thompson and Drew Lane heard the shout
that, growing in volume, came welling forth from the radio like the
increasing roar of a raging sea. They heard it and understood. And from
the corner where the kidnapers sat there came again a low groan.
At this moment Johnny was tempted to feel sorry for these men who had
lost so much. “And yet,” he told himself, “a week ago they were riding in
powerful cars purchased by crooked money. They wore diamonds. Nothing was
too good for their ladies; furs, silks, jewels. They denied themselves
nothing. Then, that they might win still greater wealth, they kidnaped a
boy who had nothing, who was working his way through college.
“At the same time they snatched a defenseless girl. These they would have
murdered had it served their purpose. They know no mercy. They deserve
none. They—”
“Look!” came the announcer’s shout from the radio. “Look! There’s the Red
Rover! Can you beat that? You can’t even tie it! He was kidnaped, as you
know, several days ago. The country has been gone over with a fine-tooth
comb. They couldn’t find him. Every detective in the country was on the
trail of the abductors. And now he walks calmly out on the field to take
his place. It can’t be the Red Rover. It must be his ghost. And yet—yes,
it is!
“Listen to that crowd roar! They’re standing up. All over the stadium
they’re on their feet. Even Northern is applauding. Good sports! What a
game this is going to be!”
And it was; such a game as one witnesses but once in a lifetime. And yet,
as Drew Lane and Johnny Thompson sat there in that room on Passage
Island, looking away now and then to the tossing waters of Lake Superior,
listening always with all their ears, they sank lower and lower in their
chairs. Something seemed to be wrong. The Red Rover could not get going.
Midway’s hopes had been centered on him. The team had been built around
him. A strong offensive team, able to charge the line, to block and to
run; yet always as he followed through the opening made for him, some one
from the opposing team broke through and downed him. Sometimes they
smeared him for a loss.
Red could not understand this himself. Had the opposing players schooled
themselves so thoroughly in defensive tactics that no man could go
through for a touchdown? In the days away from his team had he grown
soft? He hated those kidnapers with a bitter hate; was tempted even to
hate old Ed, the scout, Berley Todd and Drew Lane.
“Ah, no!” he grumbled to himself once, as he lay sprawled upon the turf
during “time out.” “‘The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars but in
ourselves that we are underlings.’ I’ll blame no other one than myself.
I’m not so good. But this once I must win. I must! I _must_!”
But could he? On the defense his team acquitted itself well. During the
first half not a touchdown was made on either side.
Then, at the very beginning of the second half catastrophe befell them.
Midway kicked off. Northern carried the ball to Midway’s forty-yard line.
A forward pass was completed, a second following in quick succession. One
mad plunge, and Northern went over for a touchdown. Their fans went mad.
The kick for an extra point was successful. The score stood Northern 7.
Midway 0.
Gloom, deep and ominous, settled down upon the room out there on far away
Passage Island. Gloom, but not for all. From the corner came in a loud
whisper:
“Tony. We are going broke play by play. Just like he said, play by play.”
This was followed by a hoarse chuckle that made Johnny’s blood boil. If
Drew Lane heard it he did not show it by so much as the flicker of an
eyelash.
“Does he believe that the Red Rover can still go through to victory?”
Johnny asked himself.
Then, as if what appeared almost sure defeat were not enough, at the
middle of the third quarter one more terrible thing happened.
To Drew and Johnny it appeared all the more terrible since, receiving it
on the radio, they could but half understand what was going on. “Now play
will be resumed,” the announcer droned. “The men are taking their
positions. Northern has the ball on their own forty-five yard line.
“The crowd is on its toes. Seventy thousand people. Bright blankets,
fluttering flags. Plenty of color out here. Plenty of noise.
“Marvelous day. Clear as glass. Not a cloud. Snappy. Just the kind of day
that makes them fight.
“Now they’re lined up. Now—
“Oh! Oh!” There came a sudden change in the announcer’s voice.
“Something’s happening down there. A player comes racing onto the field.
He’s leaping at some one. Looks like the Red Rover. It _is_ the Red
Rover! What do you make of that? Two men of Old Midway fighting it out
before seventy thousand witnesses!
“Now a tall youth in black leaps in. They’re piling up. What a scrap!”
In the corner of a room up there on Passage Island Tony and Spike stirred
uneasily. Johnny leaned far forward as if he would drag more words from
the radio. But for a time it was still. Deep silence fell in the room.
Drew Lane, keeping a wary eye on his prisoners, waited for more.
The thing that had happened there on Soldiers’ Field was scarcely to be
credited. Tom Howe, who had appointed himself bodyguard for the Red
Rover, had been seated on the bench near the door leading from Old
Midway’s dressing rooms. A youth in a brand new uniform had walked out
from that door, had stood quite still for a moment, studying the field.
“Looking for some one,” Tom told himself. Then he got a good look at the
man’s face, and caught his breath. This fellow seemed old for an
under-graduate. There was about that face a suggestion of long nights and
dissipation such as one does not see topping a varsity football uniform.
“Looks like a tin horn gambler!” Tom rose slowly to his feet.
Next instant the stranger went trotting toward the field. It was a
nervous trot. Nothing nervous about the man that followed him, Tom Howe.
Of a sudden, as he neared the group of players, the man in the football
suit, flashing a knife, leaped at Red Rodgers.
Tom Howe was light and quick. With a panther-like leap he was upon the
mysterious assassin.
Down they went. Rolling over and over, they strove for possession of the
knife. Now Tom had it. Now it was wrenched from his grasp. Now he gripped
the other’s wrist. He was fighting with the power of desperation, this
stranger. Prison bars yawned for him. He knew prison. He had been there.
Now by sheer strength he forced Tom’s arm back until the point of the
knife was within an inch of Tom’s good right eye.
“Let me go!” hissed the dark assassin.
“Never!” Tom set his teeth hard.
All this happened in the space of seconds. Then a terrific blow from the
right sent the dark stranger rolling over the earth. His knife went
spinning high in the air.
The Red Rover had seen. He had understood. He had struck.
Leaping once more upon the stranger, Tom dragged him to his feet. “You
would!” he hissed. “One more of those ‘seventy thousand witnesses’
stunts. But it don’t go. The hoosegow for you!”
He led him from the field.
Just how much of all this the vast throng understood would be hard to
say.
All that Drew and Johnny got over the radio was a brief account of a more
or less mysterious fight on the gridiron. They were shrewd enough to
understand that an attempt had been made upon the Red Rover’s life and
that quick-witted Tom Howe had saved the day.
“Saved!” Johnny breathed. “Saved! But the score is still 7 to 0. Wonder
how a football player behaves after an attempt has been made upon his
life.” He was to see.