CLYDE ASKS A FAVOR
Over at the Broadmoor bench Major Loring sprang to his feet, sent his
gaze along the line of huddled forms, and called, “Locke!” Startled,
Barry pushed his head from his blanket, like an inquiring turtle, saw,
and answered. The Major led him toward the end of the bench, a hand on
his arm.
“Go in for Noble,” he said crisply, “and kick out of there. Mind you,
don’t speak to any one but the officials until after the first play.
You’ll have to work fast, Locke, for those fellows are going to block
if they can. Keep your head, boy, lock your leg, and wham it! Go ahead!”
[Illustration: “KEEP YOUR HEAD, BOY, LOCK YOUR LEG, AND WHAM IT!”]
And Barry went ahead, trailing his blanket well onto the field before
he remembered that it still hung from one arm, rather scared but still
more determined to give a good account of himself, as he ran repeating
the coach’s brief instructions.
He reported breathlessly, took Noble’s head-guard, and slipped into
position. Zinn gave the signal and he smashed in behind Haviland. There
was a moment of frantic swaying and grunting and then the whistle
and the referee’s voice:
“Second down! About seven to go!”
Johnny Zinn, trotting back from a deceptive sortie toward the left
of the line, called signals as he came: “_Locke back! Twenty-seven,
sixty-one, fourteen! Twenty-seven, sixty-one, fourteen!_”
Barry shuffled his feet two yards behind the goal-line, came to rest,
stretched his hands toward the stooping Sisson. Beyond the line of his
own forwards, he saw the swaying, eager forms of the enemy, feinting,
pawing the air, desperation on every face. Then something brown left
the trampled sod ahead of him, grew larger as it turned lazily over
in its flight, and came to rest in his outthrust hands. Ten yards
away turmoil and confusion sprang to life. Forms leaped against the
sky as Barry took his step, dropped the ball, and swung a stiff right
leg through its arc. There came to him the reassuring concussion of
leather against leather, but he sensed it rather than heard it, for the
air was filled with cries and the pounding of feet and the rasping of
canvas-clad bodies. Then a charging enemy hurtled against him and he
went spinning aside and rolled over and over on the turf.
When he found his feet again the scene of battle was far off, for the
ball had covered more than forty-five yards and, its flight deflected
by the wind, had escaped a Murray back and bounced across the side-line
squarely in front of the Broadmoor bench and the Broadmoor coach.
Barry went limping up the field, trailing the green-hosed youth who
had thrown a hundred and sixty pounds against his ribs. The ball was
being stepped in midway between the forty-five and the fifty yards.
Broadmoor, on the stand, was still voicing its satisfaction. Johnny
Zinn, coming back to safety position, grinned at Barry.
“Corking work, Locke!” he commented as he passed.
Murray had asked for time and was mending her offense with new
material. But there were seconds left now instead of minutes,――not
more than ninety of them,――and the score on the board up there was
not destined to change. Murray tried desperately to get a man loose,
throwing thrice to the tall forward-pass specialist, but twice the ball
grounded and once only did he get his hands on it, securing then six
yards with Barry clinging to his legs. And then, with the Murray punter
stepping back, the end came, and Broadmoor had won, 6 to 0.
Barry, secretly still thrilled by the memory of that punt, though
trying hard not to show it, followed the well-worn path that led across
the field to the gymnasium, a silent member of a vocally triumphant
stream of players. He still limped a little, but he wasn’t aware of it.
He was supremely glad that he had come through so well. He wondered
if Major Loring was pleased. Some one ranged alongside and Barry
recognized behind a mask of grime the broad countenance of Pete Zosker.
“Lucky thing you got that guy, Locke,” said Pete, affably.
Barry stared up, perplexed. It seemed to him a strange way in which to
refer to a punt. But he nodded and Pete added:
“He’s a mighty good hand with those things. Wish we had him!”
“You mean...?” murmured Barry.
“Yeah, that long-legged half-back of theirs. If you hadn’t stopped him
that last time I’ll bet he’d have scored. He can run, that long-legged
kangaroo!”
It dawned on Barry then that the center was talking about his tackle
in the last minute of play and not about the punt, and he hurriedly
readjusted his thoughts.
“Oh!” he said. “Well, I guess Zinn would have got him.”
“Not a chance,” declared Pete, convincingly. “I don’t believe any
one could stop that cuss after he once got started!” Pete drew away,
leaving Barry sorely perplexed. Not a word about that forty-five-yard
kick, made with the enemy charging wildly down on him, made by one who
had never before that season taken part in a game with an outside team!
Not even mention of it! As for that tackle of the chap who had received
the forward-pass, why, it hadn’t seemed to him worth a thought. He had
been the nearest to the enemy and had instinctively made for him. By
good fortune he had got him. Any fellow could have done that, could
scarcely have avoided doing it, but that punt――well, he guessed that
even Pete Zosker wouldn’t have done any better under the conditions!
In the locker-room two others rendered brief commendation for the
tackle, one, Harris, right end, declaring that Barry had “sure saved
the old game that time!” Barry was unresponsive. He wanted very much
to say: “Well, but what about my punt from behind the goal-line? Where
were you when that happened?” But of course he didn’t. His feelings
were somewhat salved later, though, when Major Loring paused on his
way out to say: “That was well done, Locke. I was pretty sure you could
do it.” Barry was almost certain that the coach was referring to the
punt and not the tackle.
Once, while he was achingly divesting himself of his togs, he looked
across the room to find Clyde staring at him. Clyde’s expression was
queer, Barry thought. It seemed composed about equally of resentment,
puzzlement, and respect. Barry smiled. Clyde’s grimace as he turned
hastily away was doubtless meant for a smile, too, but it was a painful
effort.
Barry’s name was in the city paper the next morning. There was a very
brief account of the Murray game, and under the word “Substitutions”
occurred the following: “Locke for Noble.” That was all, but since it
was the first time his name had ever appeared in a metropolitan paper
he was decidedly thrilled. He cut out the story and treasured it.
After dinner that Sunday he turned his steps resolutely toward Number
42 Dawson. Clyde was at home and alone, and Barry somehow received the
impression that the other had been expecting him. Clyde was friendly,
almost anxiously so, and the lately patronizing manner was strangely
absent. Barry was too much pleased to wonder. They talked of several
things connected with Hazen, New York, and their folks, before the
subject of the previous day’s game was introduced by Clyde. Clyde was
flattering in his praise of the other’s performance, so insistent that
Barry became uncomfortable and broke in with:
“I was sorry you didn’t get in, Clyde. I thought of course you would.”
Perhaps the remark wasn’t very tactful, as he realized after he had
made it, but Clyde apparently took no exception to it; rather he seemed
to welcome it.
“I didn’t expect to,” he said. “I haven’t been having much luck
lately.” Then, after a moment’s silence, he continued, “I guess you
know why, Barry.”
Barry shook his head doubtfully.
“I don’t think so.”
“Oh, yes you do! Loring’s playing you up for all you’re worth. He’ll
dump me to the third to-morrow.”
“I don’t believe so,” said the other, uncomfortably. “I guess he wants
me just because I punt a little. I’m not much good at anything else,
Clyde. You know mighty well I wouldn’t want to――to hurt your chances!”
“Yes, I know that,” replied Clyde, gratefully. “That’s why I’m going
to――well, tell you just how things stand with me. I dare say you
thought it was sort of funny when I tried to discourage you about
football, but the truth is, Barry, I knew pretty well that you’d make
good if Loring took you in hand.”
“You didn’t say that!” Barry looked puzzled.
“No, because I didn’t want you to play. I know how it sounds; sort
of low-down, Barry; but, you see, it means a whole lot to me to make
the first this fall; lots more than it does to you. I’ve only got one
more year here and then I’ll be going to college. You and I are just
small-town folks. Of course Dad has some money, but he’s downright poor
compared with some fellows’ fathers, and no one has ever heard of him
fifty miles from Hazen. I mean I didn’t have much to start on when I
got here, Barry. I haven’t done so badly, considering; I’ve got in with
the right sort, I mean. But――well, it hasn’t been easy, it isn’t easy
to keep where I am.
“When I go up to college,” he went on, “a lot of fellows here now will
be big noises in the freshman class, and I’ve got to stick with them,
Barry. Well, about all I’ve got to bank on is my football. I haven’t
social position like some of them: we aren’t wealthy. Why, Jake
Greenwalk’s father could buy my dad out with a week’s income! So――well,
you see what I mean, don’t you, Barry?”
“I suppose so,” the younger boy answered slowly. “You want to trail
along with these fellows after you get to college and you think that if
you don’t make good in football they’ll drop you. Isn’t that it?”
“Yes,” said Clyde, eagerly. “A fellow has got to know the right sort
when he enters college, because if he doesn’t he won’t get anywhere at
all. Besides, it isn’t only college, Barry; it’s afterward, you know.
A fellow has to think of what’s going to happen after he’s out, and
the right sort of friends help a whole lot. This fall I thought I was
pretty sure of making the team. I thought I had a cinch. Then Loring
took a fancy to Demille and I saw about the best I could get was a
first substitute’s job, but I knew Demille wouldn’t be here next year
and I wasn’t worried so much. But now you’ve butted in.
“Oh, I know you didn’t want to,” he hastened to add, “but that doesn’t
help much. You can punt and I can’t,――not any better than a lot of
other chaps,――and Loring means to push you hard and use you in the big
games. That’s plain. It’s fine for you, but it dishes me for fair.
I’ll not get any sort of a show from now on. If I get into the Hoskins
game it’ll be for about a minute at the end of it. So you see, Barry, I
thought I’d tell you just how things stand and――and see what could be
done.”
“Sure,” said the other, vaguely. “What――well, have you thought of
anything?”
“Yes, but I don’t know how you’ll feel about it. Of course, in a way I
have a right to ask you, but――I’d rather you did it as a favor. We’re
pretty old friends, you know. I believe if you told the Major you’d
just made up your mind you weren’t going to play any longer he’d let
you off, Barry.”