COTTON MAKES A WAGER
I often wonder what Kendall’s sensations would have been had he learned
of the plot to make him football captain. Disbelief, first of all, I
fancy, and then wonder and alarm, and, finally, absolute stupefaction!
But he never did learn, never so much as suspected what was going on.
There was no reason why he should. Number 28 Clarke had long been a
popular place of gathering, as Kendall, who had spent a year in the
same corridor, well knew, and if it sometimes seemed to him that the
room was rapidly degenerating into a club it never occurred to him that
he had anything to do with it. He often wished that Gerald was less
popular, for the gatherings in Number 28 often seriously interfered
with his studying. All kinds of fellows came and went, and Kendall met
them all sooner or later. Had he given the matter special thought he
might have remarked on the fact that while the visitors represented
about every interest in school they were all fellows worth knowing,
fellows who had made good in one way or another, fellows whose words
carried weight and who held influence. They were by no means all
football chaps, nor even all athletic chaps. What Harry Merrow called
“the High-Brow Element” was well represented. At one time or another in
that month of October Gerald managed to attract to his room, and always
in the most natural and casual way, about all the prominent fellows in
Yardley. And Kendall thought it was very nice and enjoyed meeting the
visitors, and, having no ax to grind, was diffidently polite and did
more listening than talking. One evening after Merriwell and Simms, of
the football team, and one or two others had been in and gone again
Gerald took Kendall good-naturedly to task.
“Look here, Kendall,” he said, as they were getting ready for bed,
“it’s a fine thing to be modest and all that, but, as the negro said,
‘it don’t get you nothin’!’ Why don’t you talk a little more?”
“Why, I――I guess I don’t think of anything to say, Gerald.”
“Rot! You talk more sense than most fellows when you do talk. I’m not
suggesting that you jabber just to make a noise, but you’re overdoing
the wise owl act, old man. Fellows may get it into their heads that you
don’t approve of their statements and remarks, you see. Loosen up now
and then, Kendall, loosen up!”
There was no more said, but the suggestion bore fruit. Kendall really
made an effort on the next occasion. He wasn’t exactly chatty, but he
hazarded an opinion now and then, and was both surprised and flattered
to find that what he said was listened to with at least a show of
interest. A chap who doesn’t talk often is pretty certain of a hearing
when he does say anything, and as Kendall seldom spoke unless he had a
remark of some value to offer he soon became certain of his audience.
But all this took time, and in the meanwhile life was pretty busy with
him and he had far more important affairs to think of than polite
conversation in Number 28.
St. John’s School came and departed with trailing banners. Kendall
played through two periods of that game and acquitted himself with
honor. Jennings Academy proved a harder conundrum for the wearers
of the Yardley blue. Jennings was a new opponent, having been given
a place on the schedule that Fall for the first time, vice Carrel’s
School. Jennings had Yardley pretty well scared for three periods,
during which she ran up ten points to the Blue’s five. But in the final
ten minutes Yardley buckled down and hammered her way almost the length
of the field and sent Simms dodging and twisting across the line for
another score. Luckily Fales barely managed to place the pigskin over
the bars in the try-at-goal, and Yardley nosed out of the fray victor
by one point. It was by this time well past the middle of October, and
the remaining contests, with Porter Institute, Forest Hill, Nordham
and Broadwood, were all of the major variety. Yardley was to go away
from home for the Porter game, and this year it was Broadwood’s turn
to entertain her rival, but the other two games were to be contested
on the Yardley field. The Nordham game, for the reason that Nordham
had trounced the Blue the preceding Fall, was looked forward to with
unusual interest and a grim determination to wreak revenge. Not that
Coach Payson meant to endanger his chances of defeating Broadwood the
week afterward, or that any of the fellows wanted him to. However, if
it was in any way possible to square accounts with Nordham without
overexerting or injuring her players, Yardley meant to do it.
Football practice was no longer a romp, although Coach Payson never
allowed the work to become so severe as to be distasteful. Many a day
the players, First Team, Second Team and substitutes, trailed back up
the hill to the gymnasium tired in every muscle and almost ready for
mutiny. But always by the time they had had supper the bruises were
forgotten, the muscles had stopped aching and their thoughts were set
eagerly on the morrow’s practice. Of course, there were the usual
minor injuries to contend with during the early season, the usual
cases of overtraining, but no serious setback to the progress of the
team occurred. That progress was slow and steady. More time than usual
had been given this year to the fundamentals. It was not until after
the Jennings game that tackling the dummy ceased to be a part of the
afternoon programme. Even then the stuffed figure continued to swing
and dance between the uprights and was occasionally visited by some
player who had failed to grasp the knack of stopping the runner. The
kickers, Kendall amongst them, held a half-hour of practice each day.
Simms, the quarter, was a fairly proficient drop-kicker but had never
showed much punting ability, and Payson meant he should learn the art.
Graduation had deprived the team of one or two fair punters, and it
was necessary to replace them. The material was not very promising at
the beginning of the season, if we except Kendall. Kendall had proved
himself a born kicker, but no coach wants to depend on one man for
the whole season. So Fales and Crandall and Plant were added to the
kicking staff, and by the middle of the season Fales had become a
drop-kicker of some ability and Plant was getting off punts of forty
and forty-five yards. But Kendall still held his superiority in both
lines.
It was the Monday after the Jennings game that Kendall ceased being
a substitute and took Fayette’s place at right half-back. The change
surprised no one, not even Fayette, I think, for the school had all
the Fall expected Kendall to make the team and had only wondered why
Payson had not placed him before. A player with Kendall’s ability to
punt, drop-kick or place-kick deserved a position on the team even if
his football ability ended there. But Kendall’s didn’t, and he proved
it time and again as the season wore on. He was a daring runner with
the ball, a brilliant ground-gainer, who dodged and whirled through a
broken field like a small cyclone, and was as difficult to seize and
stop! He was so dependable, in fact, that when the First Team was in
a tight place one was likely to hear murmurs along the side-lines of,
“Why don’t they give it to Burtis?” But Kendall had his limitations,
too, for at line-plunging he failed to gain as did either Marion or
Crandall. He was lighter than those players and could not hit the line
as hard. But if the opening was there Kendall could knife himself
through as well as anyone, and once going he was harder to stop than
the big Marion.
But if the Jennings contest decided favorably the fortunes of
Kendall it also brought disaster to the ambitions of another of our
acquaintances. Charles Cotton was dropped on that Monday. Others went
with him in that final cut, and I doubt if any deserved banishment more
than Cotton; and I’m sure none took it less gracefully. Cotton’s soul
was filled with bitterness and wrath and his speech with condemnation.
Since that first unsuccessful visit to Number 28 Cotton had called
many times. Gerald bore with him for the sake of Kendall, and Kendall,
secretly weary to death of him and disliking him more and more each
time, tried his best to blame himself for the distaste he felt for
Cotton and, for fear he was doing that youth an injustice, was as nice
as pie to him. Cotton always seemed to know when Captain Merriwell or
other influential football fellows were in Number 28, and timed his
visits by such knowledge. He “swiped” frankly and assiduously. He tried
his hardest to make a hit with Merriwell, but only succeeded in making
the captain loathe the sight of him. He was boastful, sarcastic and far
from kind-hearted, but for a while he managed to make even Merriwell
and, in a lesser degree, Gerald believe in his football prowess. He
never hesitated to praise himself and his playing, and if one does
that often enough and with sufficient enthusiasm one will impress the
audience. Unfortunately, however, Cotton was unable to prove on the
gridiron what he proclaimed in the dormitory, and as elocution doesn’t
win football games Cotton’s career came to an end. He selected the
evening of the day of his demise to call on Kendall. Perhaps he hoped
to find Merriwell there and to make a plea for reinstatement. If so he
was disappointed, for only Gerald and Kendall were in the room when he
made his appearance.
“Well, I see you struck it, Burtis,” he announced after greetings were
over. “Very glad, I’m sure. You can play all around Fayette.”
“Thanks,” murmured Kendall. “It was just because I am a bit handier at
kicking than Fayette is that they gave me his place. He may have me out
again before the big game.”
“Pshaw, don’t you worry! Payson loves you; Merriwell does, too; you’re
popular. That makes a difference.”
“Just what do you mean by that?” asked Gerald, with a frown.
“Oh, you know well enough what I mean. A fellow hasn’t much show here
to make anything unless he’s got plenty of friends. Look at me. I can
play end as well as Fox can; better, for that matter; but I get pitched
out and he stays in. Fox has been here two years and has a pull. I’m a
new fellow and haven’t. That’s all.”
“If you can play better than Fox,” exclaimed Gerald impatiently, “why
the dickens don’t you?”
“I have! All the Fall! Ask any one.”
“I don’t need to. I’ve watched practice myself almost every day until a
week ago, and I’ll tell you frankly, Cotton, you never showed anything
when I was looking!”
“I didn’t know you considered yourself an authority on football,
Pennimore. I thought running was your specialty.”
“It is, but I’ve played some football, and I’ve seen a heap of it, and
if you want my opinion I’ll tell you plainly that you play the game
about as well as a piece of cheese! I don’t want to hurt your feelings,
Cotton, but there’s no sense in making charges of favoritism here. In
this school a fellow wins on his merits, and when you’ve been here
longer you’ll realize it.”
“That’s your opinion,” growled Cotton. “You’ve always had everything
you wanted, and you think you’ve earned it all. I’ll bet you that if
you hadn’t known lots of the fellows who give out favors you’d be just
where you were when you came.”
Kendall, who had been listening with an anxious countenance, attempted
the rôle of peacemaker. “Well, you’ve got another year yet, Cotton. I
wouldn’t feel badly about it. After all――――”
“Badly! Oh, I’m not breaking my heart,” replied Cotton, with a sneer.
“It’s no great honor to win your place by a pull. Besides, that team
will be beaten to a froth this year. Why, Broadwood will put it all
over them! You wait and see!”
“You’re one of the sort who doesn’t want to play on the losing side,
are you?” asked Gerald disdainfully. “Then I guess the team’s well off
without you, Cotton.”
Cotton turned toward Gerald with an angry light in his pale eyes, but
whatever the words were that sprang to his lips they never got past.
His reply to the taunt was so gentle that both Gerald and Kendall
stared in surprise. “I can take a licking as well as the next fellow,”
said Cotton quietly. “But I do think it’s a shame to keep good players
off the team and get beaten for it by Broadwood.”
“The team’s no worse than last year’s,” replied Gerald, regaining his
good nature, “and that was good enough to lick old Broadwood, my
friend.”
“Yes, by a goal from the field! Broadwood had you beaten before that.”
“What’s the odds? A field goal is a field goal, and we won. And we’ll
do it again this year.”
“Bet you don’t!”
“Bet we do! That is, I might bet if betting was allowed,” continued
Gerald with a chuckle.
“Well, what will you bet?” Cotton demanded eagerly.
“Not allowed,” responded Gerald. “Betting is barred.”
“You know you’d lose,” taunted the other.
Gerald’s eyes snapped. “Wait a bit, Mr. Cotton! Seems to me you are
pretty certain, considering that the game is a month away.”
“I _am_ certain. Broadwood will make your team――――”
“Why mine? Why not _ours_?”
“Well, our team, then! Broadwood will make it look like――like a bunch
of has-beens!”
“May I ask on what you base your judgment?” asked Gerald.
“On lots of things! On the players, and the coaching system――――”
“You don’t approve of our coaching system?”
“I certainly don’t! Payson works the fellows like a lot of dray horses,
for one thing. And he’s old-fashioned, too. He sticks to old formations
and plays that were worn out when Walter Camp was a baby. And look at
the way he runs practice! Every fellow doing about what he likes! When
does he begin to teach team-play, I’d like to know? In Saturday’s game
there was about as much coördination”――Gerald blinked――“as there is in
a pack of hens!”
“You mean a swarm of hens,” corrected Gerald gently. “Well, all that
may be true. I wish, anyway, you’d mention it to Payson; he ought to
be warned. But――_but_, my caustic and critical friend, we’ll send
Broadwood home with its tail between its legs!”
“Maybe, but you don’t believe it hard enough to bet anything on it!”
“Merely because betting is not allowed and because I have been taught,
besides, that it isn’t nice. Still――――” Gerald paused and considered.
“Still, we might perhaps come to an agreement that would――er――add a
personal interest to the outcome of the game. Let me see, Cotton. I’ll
tell you!” Gerald viewed him in mild triumph. “If Broadwood wins I’ll
invite you to spend Christmas recess with me in New York and give you
a good time, all differences and animosities forgotten. On the other
hand, if Broadwood is defeated you will――what the dickens _will_ you
do?” Cotton opened his mouth to speak, but Gerald went on. “I have it!
If Yardley wins you will stand on the steps of Oxford at five o’clock,
give a cheer for Yardley, and proclaim a certain passage from a play of
one William Shakespeare which I will indicate when the time comes.”
“That’s silly,” growled Cotton.
“Maybe; what’s the difference? Do you agree?”
“Yes. If Broadwood wins you’re to give me a week at your place in New
York at Christmas――――”
“Ten days, if you like.”
“And if Broadwood loses I am to stand in front of Oxford Hall and cheer
for Yardley and say something out of Shakespeare.”
“At five o’clock on the day of the game. And you’re to cheer and speak
loud enough to be heard――er――at the farthest edge of the stupendous
throng.”
“It’s a bargain,” agreed Cotton, with a grin. “I expect to have a
pretty good time at recess. Much obliged. Now I’ll be going. I’m sort
of sorry for you, though, Pennimore.”
“So shall I be if I lose,” laughed Gerald, as Cotton’s footsteps died
away down the hall.
“What is it you want him to repeat?” asked Kendall.
“If he loses? Why, nothing but that famous passage from Mr. Shakespeare’s
‘Much Ado About Nothing.’ You remember the words of our old friend
Dogberry? ‘Masters, remember that I am an ass; though it be not written
down, yet forget not that I am an ass!’”