MURRAY SCHOOL THREATENS
Friday was a day of leisure for many of the squad. The afternoon’s
proceedings began with a blackboard lecture in the gymnasium which all
attended, but after that the first-string players were through for the
day. For the others the scrimmage started late and twilight was already
threatening when the substitutes kicked off to the third. Clyde was at
right half on the subs and Barry found himself filling a like position
in the opposing line-up.
For some time the battle waged with neither side able to gain much
ground. Barry was called on for several punts, and although he had one
blocked, most of them were creditable. Not until darkness threatened
was the dead-lock broken. Then, after the subs had kicked out on their
own forty-six yards, and two attempts at the enemy had failed, Brush
called for kick formation and sent Barry back.
But the following signals didn’t call for a punt, and Barry thought
for an instant that he had misunderstood them. Then he quickly decided
that he hadn’t and, with his heart beating fast, held forth his arms.
This time the line held and the ball came true. Barry went through
the motions of punting and then swung to his left and with the ball
tightly clasped sped off toward the opposing right end, already coming
through. But Brush charged the end and Barry turned in. For an instant
he thought himself done for, but magically the subs parted, under the
persuasion of some really clever interference, and he was through. A
sub back charged him, arms wide for the tackle, but Barry feinted,
whirled, and passed him safely; and as he did so he saw that the player
was Clyde.
There was still danger from the subs’ safety man, but that danger
was soon over. Gissing had somehow disposed of his man and was now
spurting at Barry’s right, and it was Gissing and not Barry who met
the fierce tackle of Ike Boardman. The two merged in one confused blur
in the twilight as Barry went on. Footsteps pursued and voices shouted
encouragement or dismay, but Barry had only to keep the pace he had set
over five gray lines, and that he did. Well, perhaps not quite that,
for past the last yards his feet went slower, but he was over the goal
line well ahead of the nearest desperate pursuer.
Third got quite a thrill from that touchdown, and Pitkin, a six-foot
Second Classman with a voice that always shot up into a soprano under
stress of emotion, hauled Barry to his feet and piped shrilly: “Ata
kid! Ata kid! Pretty runnin’, Locke!” And Brush, panting hard, grinned
approval and would have hustled his men back to the five-yard line for
the try-for-point had not the Major intervened.
“That’s all for to-day, fellows,” he announced. “Never mind the goal,
Brush. It’s too dark for any more.”
In the locker-room Barry stole a troubled glance at Clyde. The latter,
pulling off his togs, was talking to Hal Stearns in undertones. His
lowered countenance looked to Barry most forbidding, and not until
Clyde was through the door that led to the showers did Barry take his
towel from a hook and follow. He didn’t want to meet Clyde just then.
Short of the doorway he was halted by Major Loring.
“Oh, Locke,” said the coach, “you didn’t get in any punting practice
to-day, did you? Better take a half-hour in the morning. Think you can
make it?”
“Yes, sir, I’ll have plenty of time to-morrow.”
“Good. Noble will help you. Tell him what time you’ll be out. And
try to keep that leg stiff, Locke, that’s your trouble now. You’re
improving, but I want to see you do a lot better yet. That was a nice
sneak you made, by the way. I saw that you hung to your interference
very cleverly.”
“Well, if I did,” laughed Barry, “I didn’t know I was doing it, Major.”
The Major smiled.
“All the better,” he said. “If you do a thing instinctively you’re not
likely to forget to do it. Boardman thinks he ought to have you on his
squad to do the punting, so to-morrow you join the subs. Good night.”
“Join the subs”! The words repeated themselves long after the icy water
was hissing over his bare shoulders. That could mean only one thing;
that he was to become Clyde’s rival for right-half position. What would
Clyde say? Gee! what _would_ he!
To his relief, Clyde had left the locker-room when he regained it. Of
course he would have to see Clyde, but he was willing enough to have
the meeting postponed. He went back to his room in a troubled state of
mind that remained with him until he had reached the supper table. As
usual, food proved cheering, and he discovered almost to his surprise
that he had brought a very vigorous appetite with him. Before long he
had put his problem aside and was chatting light-heartedly with Zo and
the others.
After the meal, when he saw that Clyde’s place at table was vacant and
knew that the right moment for finding that youth at home had arrived,
he recalled the necessity for looking up something in the library, and,
accompanied by Zo, sought the reference room and spent a good twenty
minutes delving into tomes. When he at last climbed the stairway in
Dawson and reached Number 42, that study was empty and dark. Vastly
relieved, he hurried after Zo and caught up with him just beyond the
gate. The younger boy noticed that Barry’s spirits were much lighter
than before the parting in front of Dawson.
The next morning he spent a half-hour punting to Noble, between two
recitations, and then came dinner, and suddenly the morning had passed
and he had not so much as set eyes on Clyde. However, he would find
an opportunity during the afternoon’s game to square himself――if he
could! But circumstances worked against him. In the gymnasium Clyde was
constantly in company with Hal Stearns or Goof Ellingham, and when
they reached the field warming-up practice began at once and while
Clyde remained on the bench Barry went down to an end of the gridiron
with three others and punted to the backs. When the first team took
the field Barry would have seated himself beside Clyde on the bench,
but there was Hal Stearns at Clyde’s elbow. Besides, Clyde’s chilly
nod of recognition earlier in the afternoon had done little to lend
Barry encouragement. He decided to wait until the next day. He could be
almost certain of finding Clyde on Sunday.
Broadmoor’s adversary was the Murray School team, a likely looking lot
of green-hosed lads who, in practice at least, handled the pigskin very
knowingly. The afternoon was sunny but crisp, and a fairly brisk breeze
quartered the gridiron from the northwest. Broadmoor presented her best
line-up at the kick-off, and no changes were made in it until near the
end of the second period. Then Rusty Waterman went in for Sinclair at
right guard, the latter limping off on an injured ankle. Neither team
scored in the first half. The Purple-and-Gray showed much improvement
over its performance of the previous week, but Murray presented a
strong defense and the home team’s two opportunities to score were
spoiled by the adversary.
When the third period began it was evident even to the lay eye that
Broadmoor had changed her tactics. With the wind favoring her to some
extent, she started a kicking game as soon as Murray had booted the
ball from mid-field to the waiting hands of Demille. Tip Cartright
kicked on second down from Broadmoor’s fifteen yards, the wind carrying
the ball out of bounds on the enemy’s forty-two. Tip’s punts were
not all perfect, but, aided by the quartering breeze, he managed
to make many of them difficult to catch. Finally, Broadmoor having
reached Murray’s eighteen yards, Haviland and Demille were called
on, and after the former had lost a six-yard gain because an end had
been caught off-side, Cartright faked a forward-pass and Demille,
on a Statue-of-Liberty play, scuttled around the left wing and went
across just inside the boundary. But Broadmoor had to be satisfied
with six points, for Murray broke through savagely and blocked Tip’s
try-for-point. The quarter ended after two more plays and the teams
changed sides.
Cartright showed wear now, and his return punts, made only when all
other methods had failed, were becoming short or erratic. With Murray
in possession well inside Broadmoor territory, and some six minutes of
the fifteen left, disaster came. Punting from his thirty-three, he sent
the pigskin almost straight into the air and the wind caught it, played
with it a moment and then dropped it close to where it had started
from, and Murray lined up on Broadmoor’s thirty-eight yards on first
down!
A gangling green-stockinged youth romped on from the side-line and took
over the left half’s head-guard and office, and then things began to
happen. The gangling youth turned out to be a specialist in pulling
forward-passes out of the air. He could do it in more ways and from
more positions than Barry, watching anxiously from the bench, had
thought possible. Murray gained seven yards and then five with his
help. An end run added three and then the specialist took a short
heave over center and laid the ball on Broadmoor’s nine yards. From
there a quarter-back run took it to the five-yard line. Murray faked
a place-kick and shot the ball far across the field to the demon
left half and with no one near to challenge him, he seemed to have a
touchdown for the taking. But Fate took a hand. Somehow, as he ran
backward, arms stretched out for the catch, he stumbled, and, although
he instantly recovered, the ball only tipped his fingers and grounded.