During the rest of that evening, and most of the following day a new rumor was to be met at every corner. Excitement was followed by consternation as the school came to a fuller realization of the gravity of the catastrophe. A new coach could be found to direct the Team’s course for the rest of the way, but he would be handicapped from the start by a lack of knowledge both of the men he was to handle, and of the foundation already constructed by his predecessor. He might, too, fail to command the confidence of the players. The report that Mr. Hilliard was to take charge met with little enthusiasm. “Pinky” doubtless possessed the advantage of Mr. Otis’s confidence, and he knew the ground, but few of the First Team credited him with the qualities required of a successful coach. Oddly enough, the solution of the quandary arrived at by the Athletic Committee Tuesday occurred to few beforehand. The Committee’s decision was awaited impatiently. The rumored meeting did not take place Monday evening, and until after dinner on Tuesday the school had to be satisfied with speculation. Then, at last, the news was out.
Mr. Babcock would succeed Mr. Otis as First Team Coach. Mr. Hilliard would continue as Assistant Coach. Mr. Connover would take over the Second Team.
Wyndham School blinked its eyes and wondered why it hadn’t thought of “Cocky”! Why, “Cocky” was just the ticket! Oh, anyhow, he was lots better than a stranger who wouldn’t know anything about anything! On the whole, the decision met with hearty approval. Even those who knew little of the practical side of football, but had encountered Mr. Babcock in his rôle of Physical Director felt certain that he possessed to a degree the stern, disciplinary qualities associated by them with the gridiron martinet. Those who had ever really tried Mr. Babcock’s patience during gymnasium instruction gave it as their studied opinion that “‘Cocky’ was a hard-boiled egg, and ought to make a corking coach for the First!” Perhaps there were some on the First who didn’t wholly approve of the Football Committee’s selection, but they were few in number and were not talking for publication. It remained for the Scrub Team to utter the only disapproving note. Scrub protested loudly that it wouldn’t stand for it! What was the idea, snatching its coach like that? Didn’t it have any rights? And what in the dickens did “Steve” Connover, the baseball coach, know about football? What was to become of the Scrub Team, anyway?
This, of course, was a selfish view of affairs, one which took no thought of “the greatest good to the greatest number” and all that sort of thing, and so it found little sympathy. And after its first burst of indignation the Scrub relapsed into grumbles and accepted the inevitable—and “Steve.” “Steve” was rather a surprise, too. He proved in short order that, while he might be a specialist in baseball, and not know everything there was to know about the gridiron game, he was quite competent to see the Scrub Team through the rest of its season. And he made rather a hit with the fellows at the outset by not “pulling a line of guff,” as “Wink” Coles elegantly expressed it, about being unfamiliar with the duties and relying on them all to help him. No, “Steve” didn’t ask any assistance. He just took hold on Tuesday afternoon at twenty minutes to four, and gave each and every one a good, hard “six licks at the dummy,” not hesitating to tell them how rotten they were—most of them—nor being at a loss for improving instructions. They resented his criticism more because it seemed to reflect on “Cocky” than for more personal reasons, but they didn’t harbor resentment long. “Steve” kept them too busy, maybe. They trotted over and tried to take a fall out of the First at four-thirty, and didn’t do so badly, for the First still lacked the services of Fargo, and one or two other lesser lights, and, besides, appeared to be suffering slightly from unsettled nerves. The Scrub sent Johnny Thayer across the big team’s goal in the second half of the game, and was scored on thrice by the opponent.
Fargo sat on the bench, his left knee enormously bandaged and padded, and scowled darkly on the world. Report had it that the fullback would be all ready to play in Saturday’s game if needed. As Saturday’s contest, the next to the last on the Wyndham schedule, was with High Point School, he very likely would not be needed, for High Point was not a strong aggregation, and had been selected for that reason. To-day “Swede” Hanbury worked at fullback most of the time, being relieved by Massingham and Badger toward the last. There was not much choice evident, although Hanbury possessed the advantage over his competitors of being a good kicker. Scrub, still resentful over the loss of its coach, and reminded of the fact by the sight of “Cocky” devoting his energies to the First, played a bit more savagely this afternoon and neither asked nor gave mercy. But the First was undoubtedly suffering from an inferiority complex and offered almost nothing in the way of reprisal. Al Greene and Billy Desmond, between whom a friendly feud had existed all season, ended the game with the honors all Al’s for the first time.
It was Billy who, in response to Tom’s thirst for information, voiced the verdict of the First Wednesday evening. “Why,” said Billy in the privacy of Number 34, accommodating his body with muffled groans to the peculiarities of the couch, “‘Cocky’s’ all right, Tom. He goes at it differently from Otis, but he seems to know what he’s doing and why he’s doing it. And he doesn’t mind you knowing, either. You see, ‘G. G.’ never would let any one in on his plans. ‘G. G.’ was the Big Cheese, and you weren’t supposed to ask questions or want to know how come. Now ‘Cocky’ lets every one in on things. Maybe it doesn’t make us play any better, but it lets us think we’re more than just so many machines without anything above the boilers! He’s having us up in the rowing room before practice to talk things over. Of course, he does most of the talking—he and Dave, and sometimes Stoddard—but we like it.”
“You’d better,” said Tom. “‘Cocky’s’ a grand coach, and a sight better than you guys deserve. Heck, he knows more real inside football than ‘G. G.’ ever thought of!”
“Quit your kidding,” growled Billy. “He’s all right, just as I told you, but he isn’t the coach ‘G. G.’ is. And any one casting asparagus on ‘G. G.’ will have me on his neck.”
“Oh, well, he’s all right,” acknowledged Tom. “Say, what do they hear about him, Billy?”
“Otis? Nothing except that he’s getting along all right so far. I guess he’s just got a thundering fine case of the ‘flu,’ and you can be beastly sick with it, and not worry your doc a mite. I know. I had it.”
When Mr. Babcock went to the First Team he took Loring’s play with him, and on Wednesday evening he dropped in at Loring’s room after supper and told him so. “It’s promising,” he declared, “and I mean to make use of it, Deane, if I can get the fellows to make it go as it should. It’s got to be pulled off at the right moment, under the right conditions.” He went quite exhaustively into that. “And,” he continued, “it’s like any play in which so many are involved: you can’t blunder it. If every man isn’t just where he should be at the proper instant it will fizzle badly. I’m not going to try it against High Point because, if it is a find, I want to spring it fresh against Wolcott. And Wolcott may have some one looking on here Saturday; looking for us to try out some eleventh hour stunt like that. I’ve told the Scrub to keep away from it. Jackson wanted to use it next Saturday against the Wolcott Scrub, but that wouldn’t do.”
“Mr. Babcock,” asked Loring, “do you know why Wolcott hasn’t used Grosfawk more this season?”
“No, I don’t. That’s puzzled me a little, too. I haven’t seen his name more than twice all the fall, and last year he looked like a real find. I presume Mr. Otis had some information on Grosfawk, but I don’t know a thing. Anyhow, we’ve laid our lines for that chap, and he will be watched pretty closely. But Wolcott hasn’t showed much in the overhead game so far, and maybe she’s intending to use it only as a last resort.”
“She hasn’t shown it in public, sir,” said Loring, “but she’s practiced forward-passing ever since she started work.”
Mr. Babcock looked interested. “Is that so? How did you learn that, Deane?”
Loring indicated a binder filled with newspapers that lay on a chair nearby. “I’ve been reading the Wolcott football stuff in the papers, sir. Their correspondent is pretty close-mouthed, but he lets something out now and then. I’ve been all through the papers from the seventeenth of September to yesterday, and I’ve learned two or three rather interesting things, Mr. Babcock. One is that Wolcott’s been using the forward-pass in practice, although in outside games she’s made only about fourteen passes in all, an average of a little over two to a game. But the important thing, sir, is that out of those fourteen ten were successful. That’s an unusual average, isn’t it?”
“Decidedly! What were they, Deane, long or short?”
“Both, apparently. I couldn’t always make out which they were. But they went all right in nearly every case, and that’s something to think about, Mr. Babcock.”
“It’s something to think a whole lot about,” was the answer. “Did Grosfawk figure in any of those plays?”
“Not one, sir.”
“Cocky” stared thoughtfully at Loring and Loring looked thoughtfully back at him. Finally: “Hm,” said the instructor. “What do you make of that? Do you suppose Grosfawk petered out this year? He’s rather a youngster, I believe, and it may be he couldn’t find himself.”
“What I think, sir, is that he got hurt, hurt badly enough to keep him from hard work.” Loring took a slip of paper from his leather wallet. “Grosfawk’s name appears eight times in the stories written for the paper by the Wolcott correspondent up to October Fifth. After that it doesn’t appear at all. The Fifth of October was Friday, and Wolcott played Nelson the next day. Wolcott won by 23 to 6, or something like that. It was a slow game and Wolcott used a whole string of substitutes in the last half. But she didn’t use Grosfawk. Grosfawk was spoken of in the paper as having taken part in practice on Thursday. Now I think something happened either Thursday or Friday. Either he got hurt or he got in wrong with the faculty over studies. Up to that Fifth of October, the fellow who writes the stuff for the paper was always mentioning him. Once he spoke of him as ‘Wolcott’s spectacular end,’ and another time as ‘the speedy runner who grabbed last year’s game from Wyndham,’ or something like that. Then he drops him entirely!”
“All that is food for thought,” replied Mr. Babcock, smiling. “I dare say that you’ve figured it correctly, Deane, but, just for the sake of argument, what about this theory? Suppose they’ve kept on using Grosfawk in practice and have carefully kept his name out of the papers with the idea of letting us think he isn’t to be bothered about. You know he has played occasionally.”
“Mighty little, sir. Maybe five times, and then only for a few minutes, probably.”
“Still—”
“Besides, sir,” interrupted Loring eagerly, “if Wolcott wanted us to think that Grosfawk was—was eliminated she would have used more certain methods, don’t you think? Wouldn’t she have let the report get out that he had been injured or that he was in Dutch with the Office or—or something? See what I mean, sir? She couldn’t be certain that we’d notice his not playing.”
“Yes, probably she would have,” acknowledged the other. “Well, granting your idea’s the right one, Deane, who do you take it is to get Grosfawk’s job at catching passes and getting off with them? Or who has got it already?”
Loring shook his head. “That’s what I can’t make out, sir. They’ve been building up a forward-passing game in secret, but the reports from there don’t actually say so. You’ve got to read between the lines. In the outside games five players have taken passes, and only one of them, Loomis, is mentioned more than the others. Loomis is their regular left end. He was on their team last year, and fellows I’ve talked with say he wasn’t much of a player.”
Mr. Babcock was silent for a long moment. Then he asked briskly: “Think you could get to Cotterville next Saturday, Deane?”