Right Guard Grant

Then Kendall booted a nice goal and made it seven points, and going back up the field Carpenter and Dakin and half a dozen others whacked Leonard on the back and pantingly told him that he was “all right,” or words to that effect. Then first kicked off again and went after another touchdown. You might criticize the second’s science, but you had to acknowledge that when it came to fight she was right on hand! Second didn’t hold with Mr. Cade or Quarterback Carpenter when they assured the first that there was another score to be had. Second denied it loudly and with ridicule. She dared first to try to get another score. First accepted the challenge with ejaculations of derision and the trouble began again.

You mustn’t think that Leonard played through some ten minutes without receiving his share of censure from the coach and the quarterback, for nothing like that happened. Mr. Cade showed little partiality, and every one came in for criticism or rebuke. What Carpenter said worried Leonard very little. Quarterbacks are always nagging a fellow. But he did wish, toward the last, that Mr. Cade would stop barking at him. Of course he knew that he didn’t play the position perfectly, but he was doing his best, gosh ding it, and no one was making any gains through him! If only he was a little bigger and had more beef he’d show Johnny some real playing!

As it was, though, he was doing so well that the coach was secretly marvelling. Mr. Cade viewed Leonard’s height and his none too broad shoulders and then glanced at the big Garrick on one side and the rangy Cash on the other and wondered. “When,” reflected the coach, “he told me he was a guard he knew what he was talking about!” Much of Leonard’s success this afternoon was due to following Billy Wells’ advice. Leonard looked his man in the eye and discovered that, in some strange fashion, he could tell what the chap was going to do a fraction of a second before he started to do it. It was almost like mind-reading, Leonard thought. And he profited, too, by the other tips that Billy had given him. He couldn’t adopt Billy’s stance thoroughly, but he did try a modified form of it and found that it gave him a quicker start. And to-day no one drove his head back and made him see whole constellations of wonderful stars! No, sir, the old chin was right in against the neck!

First didn’t succeed in scoring again, but she did throw a scare into the adversary in the final minute of play. By that time Leonard’s original opponent had been replaced by a fresher but, as it was soon proved, no more formidable youth, and Mr. Fadden had made other substitutions in his array of talent. So, too, had Mr. Cade, although the latter’s resources were nearly exhausted. Cruikshank went in for Carpenter, and a new half-back appeared. Cruikshank brought a little more “pep” to the first, and she got the pigskin down to second’s twenty-eight yards. There, however, the enemy stiffened and tightened and took the ball away on downs. Wisely, she elected to punt on first down, but there was a poor pass, and the ball was missed entirely by the kicker. It hit him somewhere around the feet and bounded to one side. Instantly twenty-two youths made for it. Some four or five reached it more or less simultaneously. Of the number was the first team right guard. How that happened was a subject of official investigation later by Mr. Fadden. However, the second team’s troubles are not ours. What interests us is the fact that not only was Leonard the first man through the second team line but he was the first man to lay hand on the ball. He accomplished the latter feat by diving between two hesitant adversaries and, being doubtless favored by luck, capturing the erratic pigskin during one brief instant of quiescence. A fraction of a second later that ball would have toppled this way or that, or jumped into the air, eluding Leonard’s grasp just as it had eluded others’, but at the instant it had presumably paused for breath. Anyhow, Leonard reached it and pulled it under him and tucked his head out of the way. Then half a dozen of the opponents sat on him more or less violently or tried to get covetous hands on the prize. The whistle blew and finally he breathed again. Having been pulled to his feet, his breathing was again disturbed by emphatic blows on his back or shoulders accompanied by brief but hearty expression of commendation. He was still fighting for breath when Cruikshank piped his signal, and Dakin drove harmlessly into the second team line. Then, to the intense disgust of the first and the vast relief of the second, with the ball on the seventeen yards and a score as sure as shooting, some idiot blew a whistle!

There was almost a scrap about that. Up in the locker room Dakin accused Winship, the assistant manager who had acted as timekeeper, of having cheated the first of a score. “Time,” answered Winship coldly, “was up when the whistle blew.” “Yah,” responded Dakin impolitely. “You’re crazy! You didn’t see straight! Bet you there was a good thirty seconds left!” “There was not! If anything, you had a second more than was coming to you, for the whistle didn’t blow until I’d called to Tenney twice. No use being sore at me, Dakin. Much better have done something when you had the ball that time!” “Is that so?” snarled the full-back. “How’d I know you were going to cheat us out of – ” “Don’t you say I cheated!” “Well, what do you call it, you fathead? Step up to the gym with me if you’re looking for trouble!”

But some of the others stepped in just there, and hostilities were prevented, and somewhat later Dakin, having been cooled by an icy shower-bath, apologized handsomely and the entente cordiale was reëstablished.

That evening, his briar pipe drawing nicely and his feet comfortably elevated, Coach Cade turned the pages of his little memorandum book and made marks here and there. Once he reversed his pencil and, using the rubber-tipped end of it, expunged a name entirely. The last thing he did was to draw a black mark through the words “Grant, Leonard” and through half a dozen mysterious hieroglyphics that followed them and then, turning a page, enter the same words again very carefully in his small characters. At the top of the latter page was the inscription “Guards.”

CHAPTER XV

A TIP FROM MCGRATH

Leonard regretted that Slim hadn’t been at the field during scrimmage that afternoon, for he wanted Slim to know that he had – well, done not so badly. All he told the other, though, when they met before supper was that Johnny had run out of guards and that he had played at right for awhile.

“Guard?” said Slim in surprise. “You mean Johnny stood for it?” Slim frowned. “Look here, General, let me give you a word of advice. You never get anywhere by changing jobs. You stick to being a tackle. The next time Johnny wants to shift you to some other position you put your foot down.”

“It wasn’t Johnny did it, Slim. They yelled for a guard and I ran on.”

“More fool you, son. You’ve got to specialize, or you’ll just sit on the bench forever and ever. The fellow that does a little of everything never does much of anything, as some one once very wisely remarked. How did you get along?”

“All right,” answered Leonard. “It was easier than tackle, Slim. I – I was more at home there, I suppose.”

“Huh,” grumbled Slim, “don’t get to looking for the easy jobs, General. You stay put, young feller. Why, only a couple of days ago Billy Wells was telling me what a wonderful tackle you’d make!”

“Wells was?” exclaimed Leonard. “Get out, Slim!”

“He was, honest to goodness! Why, Billy’s a – a great admirer of yours, General. He said more nice things about your playing than I ever heard him say about any fellow’s – not excepting his own! And now you go and let them make a goat of you. Too bad, son.”

“We-ell, I’ve half a notion that Johnny will let me play guard after this,” said Leonard. It was more a hope than a notion, though. Slim shook his head doubtfully.

“I wouldn’t bank on it,” he said. “You know, General, you aren’t quite built for a guard.”

After supper – Slim had been eating at training table for a long while now – Leonard was leaning over a Latin book in Number 12 when the door opened violently and things began to happen to him. First he was precipitated backward until his head touched the floor and his feet gyrated in air. Then he was sat on while rude hands tweaked his nose and the lately occupied chair entangled his feet. About that time Leonard began to resent the treatment and got a firm hold on Slim’s hair. But Slim wouldn’t have that.

“No, General,” he announced firmly. “Be quiet and take your medicine. You are being disciplined, son. This isn’t a mere vulgar brawl. This is for the good of your poor little shriveled soul.”

“Well, let up on my nose then, you crazy idiot! What am I being disciplined for! And get off my tummy a minute so I can kick that blamed chair out of the way!”

“Don’t vent your spleen on the poor inanimate chair,” remonstrated Slim reproachfully. “It never did anything to you, you deceiving goof. Look at me! In the eye – I mean eyes! Why didn’t you tell me what happened this afternoon?”

“I did.”

“General!”

“Ouch! Quit, you – you crazy – ”

“Why didn’t you tell me all? Look at me, consarn yer!”

“I am, Slim! Doggone it, will you quit?”

“Stop struggling! General, you’ve got to come clean. Did you or didn’t you deceive me?”

“I did not.”

“General, you did. Since then I have learned the truth. You went and made yourself one of these here football heroes, you did, General. Broke through – no, crashed through the enemy line and fell on the fumbled ball, thus bringing victory to your beloved Alma Mater! Not once, but twice did you do this thing. I know all, and lying won’t help you any longer. Confess, drat your pesky hide! Did you or isn’t they?”

“They is!” groaned Leonard. “For the love of Mike, Slim, get off my supper!”

Slim removed himself, and Leonard struggled out of the clutches of the chair and got to his feet. “For two cents,” he said, “I’d lay you over that blamed chair and paddle you, Slim.”

“No, you wouldn’t, son. You know very well that you deserved all you got, and a little bit more. You deceived me, me your friend! You – ”

“Oh, dry up,” laughed Leonard. “What did you expect me to do? Tell you how good I was? Those second team fellows that played against me were dead easy, Slim. A child could have got through those chaps. Why, you could yourself, Slim! Well, I won’t go that far, but – ”

“I pay no heed to your insults, you gallery-player!”

“Shut up! There wasn’t any gallery to-day. It was too cold.”

“Gallery enough. Fellows at table spent about half the time talking about you and your stunts. And I had to make believe I knew all about it and keep nosing around for clews. Not for worlds would I have confessed that I knew naught of which they spake. Fancy my position! Me who raised you from a cradle! Aren’t you ashamed of yourself?”

“Awfully,” said Leonard. “Now will you dry up and let me get this Latin?”

“I will not. Say, General, I wish you’d set to work and get Renneker’s job away from him.”

“That’s likely,” scoffed Leonard. “What you got against Renneker?”

“Nothing. Only – ” Slim sobered, and after a moment’s pause continued: “Only that yarn of Johnny McGrath’s makes me sort of wonder whether – well, if Renneker wasn’t on the team, General, there wouldn’t be anything to worry about!”

“I thought you’d decided that there wasn’t anything in that idea of McGrath’s.”

“So I had. I’m still that way. Only – well, I wish some one would find out the truth of it. Or you’d beat him out for the place!”

“I’ve got a fine chance, Slim! Look here, if you think there’s a chance that McGrath isn’t mistaken why don’t you ask Renneker about it?”

Slim shrugged. “It isn’t my funeral. Besides, what’s to prevent him from lying?”

Leonard shook his head. “I don’t believe he would, Slim. He doesn’t seem that sort, you know.”

“No,” agreed Slim, grudgingly, “he doesn’t. Oh, well, I should worry. Gee, I’ve got enough to attend to without turning reformer. There’s the class dinner Saturday, and Cash tells me only about half the bunch have paid up so far. By the way, have you heard anything?”

“Not a thing,” replied Leonard.

“Guess you haven’t tried very hard,” grumbled the other. “I’d like to know what the freshies are up to. They’ve got something planned. You can see that by the knowing look of ’em. Some fool stunt the juniors have put ’em up to, I’ll wager. Well – ”

Slim relapsed into thoughtful silence, and Leonard edged his chair back to the table. After a minute he asked: “That all?”

“Huh?” inquired Slim absently.

“If you’re quite through I’ll have another go at this Latin,” said Leonard politely. “But of course if there’s anything else on your mind – ”

“Go to the dickens,” growled Slim.

On Tuesday the first-string players returned to a full diet of work and, excepting Smedley, now pronounced out of football for the season, all the guard candidates were on hand when the scrimmage started. Nevertheless Leonard displaced Renneker in the second period and Raleigh went in at left guard, relieving Stimson. Billy Wells greeted Leonard heartily with a playful poke in the ribs and, “Well, here’s the General! See who’s with us, Jim!” Jim Newton turned and grinned. “Hello, sonny,” he said. “You get behind me and they won’t hurt you.” Leonard, almost painfully aware of the difference in size between him and the big center, smiled apologetically. “Thanks,” he answered, “I will if you happen to be on your feet.” Billy yelped gleefully, and Jim’s grin broadened. “You win, young feller,” he said.

Leonard didn’t break through to-day and capture a fumbled ball, but he did more than handle his opponent and very early in the second period the scrubs discovered that the right of the first team line was a particularly poor place at which to direct attack. Leonard and Wells worked together very nicely. Just before the end, much to his disgust, he was forced to yield his place to Falls, and he and Raleigh, also relieved, made their way back to the gymnasium together. Raleigh was an excellent example of the player who is able to progress just so far and then stands still, in spite of all that coaches can do. He had been a second-string guard last year and had, early in the present season, been picked as a certainty. Renneker’s advent, however, had spoiled his chance, and since then Raleigh seemed to have lost his grip. Just now he was not so much standing still as he was sliding backward. He confided something of this to Leonard on the way across to the gymnasium.

“I don’t suppose I’ll even get a smell of the big game,” he said sorrowfully. “Renneker’ll play at right and Stimson at left, and you and Falls will be next choice. It was that big guy that queered my chances.”

Leonard didn’t have to ask who was meant. Instead he said comfortingly: “You can’t tell, Raleigh. You might beat Stimson yet. And you’ll surely have it all over me for first substitute.”

But Raleigh shook his head. “Not a chance, Grant. I know a real player when I see him, even if I’m getting to be a dub myself. You’re a live-wire. I wouldn’t be surprised if you got Stimson’s job before the Kenly game.”

“Me? Much obliged for the compliment, Raleigh, but I guess Stimson isn’t frightened much! I haven’t got the weight, you know.”

“You don’t seem to need it,” replied Raleigh enviously. “You’ve got speed to burn. Wish I had a little of it!”

The next day Leonard was called to the training table, where he took his place between Lawrence and Wilde and where, after his second or third repast, he was no longer Grant but “General.” On Wednesday he discovered with something of a thrill that Coach Cade was taking him seriously as a candidate for a guard position, for he was given a hard thirty-minute drill in blocking and breaking through in company with Renneker and Stimson and Raleigh and Falls. Soon after that, just when Leonard didn’t know, Squibbs disappeared from the football squad. It will be remembered, perhaps, that not long before Coach Cade had erased a name from a page of his little book.

It was on Thursday evening that Johnny McGrath appeared at Number 12 Haylow in response to Leonard’s invitation. Both Leonard and Slim were at home, and Johnny had no cause to doubt that he was welcome. The conversation was not particularly interesting. Or, at least, it wouldn’t sound so if set down here. There was one subject not included in the many that were discussed, and that was the resemblance of Gordon Renneker to George Ralston. Just before he left Johnny said, a trifle hesitantly: “By the way, Slim, heard anything about Saturday?”

“About the dinner, do you mean?” Slim’s eyes narrowed.

“Yes. I wondered if you’d heard any – er – any rumors.” Johnny looked very innocent just then. Slim shook his head slowly.

“Nothing much, Johnny. Have you?”

“Why, I don’t know.” Johnny appeared undecided. “You see, I’m a junior, Slim, and maybe I oughtn’t to give away any freshman secrets.”

“Huh,” Slim grumbled, “if it wasn’t for you fellows putting ’em up to the mischief – ”

“Sure, I had nothing to do with it,” laughed Johnny. “And what I heard didn’t come from my crowd. ’Tis just something I accidentally came on.”

“Well, out with it. What are the pesky kids up to?”

“I’m not knowing that, Slim.”

“Well, what the dickens do you know, you Sinn Feiner?”

“All I know,” replied Johnny evasively, as he opened the door, “is that if I was President of the Sophomore Class I’d be watching out mighty sharp come Saturday evening.” Johnny grinned, winked meaningly and vanished.

“Humph,” said Slim. “He does know something, the silly ass.” He started up as if to go after Johnny, but then sat down again and shrugged his shoulders. “He wouldn’t tell, I suppose.”

“What do you think he was hinting at?” asked Leonard.

Slim shrugged again. “How the dickens do I know? I dare say the freshies have cooked up some plot to make me look silly. Maybe they think they can keep me away from the dinner. All right, let them try it!” And Slim looked grim as he began to disrobe.

On Saturday Leonard made his first trip away from Alton with the football team, being one of twenty-six fellows who journeyed to New Falmouth. Last fall Alton had just managed to defeat the clever High School team by one point, and to-day the visitors weren’t looking for any easy victory. It was well they weren’t, as events proved. New Falmouth was too powerful for the Gray-and-Gold. With only one more game on her schedule, and that against a rival high school of smaller calibre, New Falmouth was in position to use everything she had in to-day’s contest. And she certainly held nothing back. Last season’s game, lost to her through her inability to convert two touchdowns into goals, had been a disappointment, and she fully intended to take her revenge.

Coach Cade started with several substitutes in his line-up, but this was not because he held the enemy in contempt. His real reason was that he hoped to hold New Falmouth scoreless in the first half of the game and use his best talent to tuck the victory away in the last. But that wasn’t to be. Before the second quarter was half-way through Johnny Cade was hurling his best troops onto the field in a desperate attempt to turn the tide of battle. For by that time New Falmouth had scored twice and had 10 points to her credit on the score-board while the visitors had yet to show themselves dangerous.

Leonard didn’t see service until the third period. Then he went in at left guard in place of the deposed Stimson. The score was still 10 to 0, and Alton looked very much like a beaten team. New Falmouth had a powerful attack, one that was fast and shifty and hit hard. No place in the Gray-and-Gold line had proved invulnerable in the first two periods, while the home team had run the ends with alarming frequency. Only Alton’s ability to pull herself together and stand firm under her goal had prevented the enemy’s score from being doubled.

Leonard had Jim Newton on one side of him and Sam Butler on the other when the second half began. He had not played beside Butler before and didn’t know the tall youth’s style of game as well as he knew Billy Wells’, and for awhile the two didn’t work together any too smoothly. In fact, the left of the Alton line was no more difficult to penetrate than the right until Leonard discovered from experience that Butler went about his business in a different fashion from that used by Billy and began to govern his own play accordingly. Butler couldn’t be depended on, for one thing, to back up attacks between left guard and center. Such plays always pulled him in and left him fairly useless. Also, he played too high much of the time, a fact that invited more attacks at his position than Leonard approved of. Yet, when once these facts had been learned, Leonard was able to discount them to an appreciable extent and before the third period was more than half over New Falmouth was less attentive to that side of the adversary’s line.

Leonard knew that he was playing football, and extremely hard football, before the third play had been made. New Falmouth got the ball on the kick-off and started a battering-ram attack that bore the enemy back time and again. Leonard went through some punishment then, for the first three plays were aimed at the Alton left guard and tackle. He acquired a bleeding nose in the second of them and a bruised knee in the third. About that time he got interested and began to really fight. Captain Emerson went off with a bad limp and Kerrison took his place. Not much later Bee Appel, after having been aimed at since the game began, was finally downed for good and Carpenter took over the running of the team. The third period ended without further scoring, although the ball had stayed in Alton territory most of the time and was still there.

A penalty for off-side set Alton back another five yards nearer her goal just after play was resumed, and, when she had been held for two downs on the twenty-two yards, New Falmouth tried a goal from placement. For once, however, the line failed to hold and half the Alton team piled through on the kicker and the ball bounded off up the field and was captured by Reilly, of Alton, on the thirty-six yards. Alton made first down on two plunges and a six-yard run by Menge. Then, however, after three more attempts, Greenwood punted to the home team’s twenty-five, where the ball went outside. New Falmouth made two through Renneker and tore off five more around Kerrison. A third down was wasted on a plunge at center that was repulsed. Then New Falmouth tried her third forward-pass of the game, and the ball landed nicely in the hands of Slim Staples close to the forty-yard line, and Slim dodged to the thirty-two before he was stopped.

Here, it seemed, was Alton’s chance to score at last, but after Carpenter had attempted a run following a delayed pass and had centered the ball at the sacrifice of a yard, the chance didn’t look so bright. Greenwood made a scant two at the New Falmouth left, and then, with nine to go on third down, and Greenwood in kicking position, Carpenter called for an end-around play with Slim Staples carrying. Just what happened Leonard didn’t know, but somewhere between Jim Newton and Slim the ball got away. Leonard heard Carpenter’s frantic grunt of “Ball!” and swung into the enemy. Then he felt the ball trickle against his foot, thrust aside for a moment and dropped to a knee. When he got his hands on the pigskin the battle was all about him, and cries and confusion filled the air. Yet he was able to thrust himself up again through the mêlée, and plunge forward, and, having taken that first plunge, to go on. He met a back squarely and caromed off him into the arms of another, broke loose somehow and went forward again. The goal-line was startlingly near, and he made for it desperately, slanting first to the left and then doubling back from a frenzied quarter. He and the quarter met and, spinning on a heel, he staggered over the line, a New Falmouth man astride him as he fell.

Unfortunately there was no one left on the Alton team who could kick a goal once in five times, and Joe Greenwood, who tried to add another point to the six, failed dismally. The fault wasn’t entirely his, though, for New Falmouth broke through and hurried the kick. But even to have scored was something, and Leonard, still wondering just how it had happened, was appraised of the fact in most emphatic language and actions. Over on one side of the field a half-hundred or so of Alton sympathizers who had accompanied the eleven were shouting ecstatically and wildly. Denied victory, they made much of that touchdown.