"What an ego!" exclaimed Frank. "But now in the privacy of our own room, will you kindly tell me, why, how and what for did you get yourself in the hands of the law to-night, whose bicycle was it you borrowed, and when are we going to get the money we advanced to release your worthless carcass from hock?"
"My, what a lot of questions. Do you mean to tell me you haven't visioned my scheme, a bright young fellow like you? Pshaw, pshaw, Armstrong, I didn't think it of you."
"Go ahead and elucidate, Sherlock Holmes!"
"It seems hardly necessary, but it is said, and truly I now perceive, that brains and brawn are not kindred attributes of the genus football man. In a word, I got myself pinched, and thereby made news for the News. Savez?"
"You got arrested on purpose to write up your own arrest?"
"Sure thing, surest thing you ever knew. Made a pretty little story of it, touched on the brutality of the officer who hauled me into the station, and, incidentally, made a strong plea for the use of the city sidewalks by heelers on bicycles when the streets are as dusty as they are now, to say nothing of a little hit at the lack of courtesy accorded the Yale student by the ordinary, garden variety of policeman."
"And this is what we provided good money for!" said Frank.
Turner advanced threateningly upon the offender. "This is what we were dragged from our room in the dead hour of night for, this is the thing for which we deposited our good money! I hope they give you a thousand dollars and costs, and send you to jail for a year, to-morrow morning."
"O, yes," continued the Codfish, not noticing Turner's outburst, "and I forgot, I wrote another little item suggesting that the Criminal Club, of which I am now a member in good standing, and which has fallen into decay, be rejuvenated and reëstablished in its glory of the olden days."
"Well, you've had your trouble for nothing, old lunatic. The News won't print anything like that."
"If they don't, they don't know good news when they see it."
"Costly news, I should say," grunted Frank. "Costly with our money. We want our money back and fifty per cent. interest for the wear and tear on our constitutions in this night air."
"I'll pay it to you out of my dividends from the News Board when I cash in."
"Then we'll never get it," groaned Jimmy. "I'm going to bed. Codfish has absolutely gone nutty."
"That's always said about geniuses by ordinary folks, old top. Time alone will prove who is the nutty gent," the Codfish shot after him as Turner went into his bedroom.
The next morning the college was agog with excitement about the proposed flight of aeroplanes over Yale field some time during the afternoon while the football game was in progress. Details of the flight were given in the Yale News, the names and histories of the aviators and the types of machines to fly. It was further stated that one of the flyers would loop-the-loop in full view of the crowds in the stands. The Codfish was bursting with pride at the sensation he had sprung, for it was his story which had set the college talking.
"It's knocking their eye out," he boasted.
"Is it coming off?" inquired Frank incredulously.
"Sure, it's coming off. It cost me a cool two hundred and fifty to get them here, and I've had a dickens of a time keeping it quiet."
"So that's what you've been at these last three days, is it?" said Turner.
"A week, my boy, you can't do big things like that in three days. This ought to give me a lead in the race. Eh, what?"
"A race for your life, if it doesn't come off."
"Always skeptical, no imagination, typical football type, slow to grasp an idea. If you had read the papers you would have seen that they're having a flying meet down at Bridgeport. With a little lubricant in the shape of cash, the rest was easy."
A great crowd journeyed to Yale Field that afternoon, so great that it resembled in a measure the days of the big football games. With three events scheduled—a Freshman game, a 'Varsity game and a flying exhibition, all in one afternoon, thousands were drawn in the direction of the field, and the football manager chortled with joy as he saw the shekels going into his treasury.
The games came and went, but no fliers hove in sight. The Freshmen were overwhelmed by the big Exeter team, and after that was over the 'Varsity proceeded to punch holes in their opponents. The spectators divided their attention between the field and the sky, but nothing came. The nearest thing to an aeroplane that appeared during the afternoon was a large hawk which floated up from the southwest, and volplaned down from the heights. For a moment it raised false hopes. The crowd reluctantly filed out of the big stands as darkness began to settle over the field and still no flying men put in their appearance.
The Codfish was puzzled but not alarmed. Nothing could disturb his buoyant nature. He rode back to the city on a car loaded with people who indignantly proclaimed a fake by the Yale News for the purpose of drawing a larger attendance for the game, but although he heard, the Codfish kept his own counsel. Arriving at his room he found a telegram from the manager of the meet at Bridgeport, notifying him that owing to a disagreement among the fliers, they would not be able to come to New Haven at all, and that his check would be returned next day.
"Well, this lets me out," soliloquized the promoter of the flying meet. "I'll write this up, describe the disagreement in detail, and hand it in for Monday's paper. Great thought," he added aloud, "more credit for yours truly. We play them both ways and the middle, there's no chance to lose."
Just then Frank and Jimmy came in. The game had not been one to enliven their spirits. They were caustic in their remarks to the Codfish.
"You are certainly a bum flying meet promoter," said Frank. "With two such stories as you have pulled off in our conservative little News, you might as well die."
"On the contrary, I've just begun a little story," as indeed he had, "which will explain the matter satisfactorily. Fliers are said to be uncertain birds anyway, and I guess they are. This story," he added, "will put me straight with the editors and the editors straight with the college. No harm done at all. Exhibition arranged, all in good faith, some aviator has the pip, no flight, telegram explains, I explain, more news at every turn, and there you are."
"Yes, and there you are," said Turner scowling. "Your roommates get the blame for not letting you be locked up, as you should be."
"O, I didn't see you scoring any touchdowns to-day. Come in," he yelled as a knock came on the door. A young Freshman heeler entered with a note which he handed to the promoter of the flying exhibition. "From the News," he added and went out.
The Codfish took the letter and tore off the end of the envelope. "Big assignment I imagine, expected as much, they're beginning to see I'm onto my job."
But as the Codfish read, a change came over his face. He went through the short note once and then again, while his roommates watched him curiously.
"Well, what is it, an assignment, eh?" said Frank. "Something big?"
"An assignment, yes," returned the Codfish weakly, "an assignment to quit. What do you think of this?" and he read aloud:
"G. W. Gleason,
Pierson Hall.
Dear Sir:—
It is the unanimous opinion of the Board that you had better confine your activities to some other field of endeavor than the News. An imagination like yours is wasted on the ordinary business of publishing a college paper. We do not deal entirely in fiction. We respectfully suggest that you try the Courant, which will more nearly suit your peculiar type of genius.
Very truly yours,
John P. Murray, Chairman."
"Fired, by gosh," said the Codfish.
"Fired it is," said Turner. "I knew your zeal would carry you over the falls."
"Well, I had a good time going, anyway."
"O, I say," said Frank, "what did they give you at City Court this morning?"
"Five dollars and costs, not much for the experience. It was worth all the trouble. Experience is what I live for."
"You funny duffer," said Frank, laughing. "Now pay up," and the Codfish did.
"Well, there's one thing I still have left, my crew job. They can't shake me there."
"How does that ankle feel?" inquired the Freshman coach of Frank Armstrong one afternoon at practice on the week following the Exeter game. "I see you stepping around quite lively on it."
"I think it is good enough, sir," said Frank. It was far from a well ankle, but Frank was desperately anxious to get into the game from which he had been denied on account of his accident, and was willing to take a chance with it. He had felt that he was going to be overlooked entirely in spite of the fact that he had kept in training and had done as much as he could under the conditions.
"Good enough then. Do you know the signals?"
"Yes, sir."
"Well, then take some practice now and later I want to try you at quarter on the Second. You played there on your prep. school team, eh?"
"Yes, sir," said Frank, his heart jumping at the thought that he was to have his chance, after all.
"All of you over to the 'Varsity field," commanded the coach. "The exhibition of tackling in that Exeter game was enough to make a strong man weep, not a half dozen clean ones in the whole game. I'll teach you to stop a man or kill you in the attempt," and Coach Howard, with a determined face, led his squad into the great wooden amphitheater where at one end below the goal line stood two tackling dummies, looking very much like gallows, each with the canvas-clad shape of a man dangling from a rope over a pit of sawdust and loam. There had been some tackling practice early in the season in which Frank had not participated on account of his injured ankle, so the experience for him to-day was to be a new one.
"Now, this is the way, watch me carefully," said Howard. "Start from here," indicating a point about fifty feet from the dummy, "get under way quickly, increase your speed toward the end of the run, spring off one foot, not a dive, remember, strike the dummy with your shoulder just under the hips, and wrap your arms around the legs. This way," and suiting the action to the word, Howard, who was in football uniform, dashed at the swinging figure, struck it with a crash, carried it from its fastening on a clean, driving tackle.
"Now line up and all take your turn," said the coach as he came back to the group. "Lead off, Bostwick." Bostwick was an old end from Andover, who had come down to Yale with a reputation already made, and who had been chosen captain of the team.
After Bostwick ran a steady string of the Freshmen tackling the dummy, some cleanly, some awkwardly. A field assistant picked up the canvas-clad figure, and replaced it on the hook after each savage assault, ready for the next man, while the coach stood by, offering criticism and suggestion.
"Too low, too low," he shouted to a candidate. "Your man would get away from that. Just what you did Saturday." Or to another, "Don't slow up; he won't bite you. Drive into him hard, and carry him right off his feet and keep a good grip with both hands, both hands," he yelled as one of the tacklers slapped one arm around the canvas legs.
It was Frank's turn. He sprinted down the runway, sprang head-first at the swinging figure, hit it cleanly, and grasping it tightly with both arms, crashed down in the sawdust pit.
"Wrong, wrong," cried Howard. "That was a diving tackle. Your team would be penalized for that; you've got to make that last step a long stride, not a jump, remember. Otherwise it was O. K."
Frank picked himself out of the pit, and walked back limping a little. He had leaped with all his vigor from the injured leg, and winced with the pain of it. But he was not going to show it. On his second trial he did better, but was so anxious to favor the ankle that he slowed up and took a succession of little short steps just before he sprang, which drew the fire of the coach down upon him, and caused a smile to go around the waiting line.
"Afraid of it?" queried the coach, sarcastically. "It isn't stuffed with anything harder than excelsior, and it won't bite you."
Frank walked back to his place at the end of the line crestfallen, but determined to show a better result on his next trial. Several of the 'Varsity coaches had strolled over from the other tackling dummy, where some of the 'Varsity line men were being put through their paces, and all of them were on the lookout for likely material for future 'Varsity teams.
But, try as he might, Frank could not satisfy the coach. Something was wrong with all his attempts. The coach did not know that the injured ankle was throbbing like a toothache. Frank was afraid to admit it for fear he would be relegated to the side-line for another period of waiting. So he blundered through his tackling at a great disadvantage.
"That's enough," said the coach at last. "You are a sad bunch at this game, but we'll give you a daily dose of it and see if it helps any. Come back to the Freshman field for a scrimmage," and followed by his squad of pupils, he led the way.
That afternoon was a nightmare for Frank. Favoring his ankle as much as he dared, he ran the Second team without snap or vigor, and although he got away on two quarterback runs for ten or fifteen yards each, and nearly got a field goal from a difficult angle, he was pulled out of his position and sent to the side-lines before the scrimmaging was finished, firmly convinced that he was not cut out for a quarterback.
"This infernal ankle of mine," he grumbled to Jimmy Turner on their way back in the stuffy car to the city. "I couldn't do anything. My leg felt like a stick. I couldn't get out of my own way."
"I don't think you made much of a hit with the coach this afternoon," admitted that individual. "I heard him say to one of the 'Varsity men, just as we were getting on the car, that you had some possibilities, but you were too much afraid of getting hurt."
"He did, did he?" and Frank glared at Coach Howard who was sitting further up the car pointing out a play diagram to Madden, the quarter of the first team. "Thought I was a nice old lady! I'll show him something if this leg ever gets better," and he gritted his teeth in anticipation of the happy time to come when he could disprove the coach's suspicions.
Handicapped by his bad ankle, and often in agony with the pain of it on the field, Frank continued, as the days went by, to fight an up-hill but losing fight. Turner was daily strengthening his position at left halfback, and was already looked upon as of possible 'Varsity caliber for the next year. While not very fast, he ran hard and low, and it took an uncommonly hard tackle to bring him to the ground. He also had that thing which pleases the coaches, an unfailing instinct for the ball. Wherever it was, Turner was not far away.
On the Saturday of that week came the game with Pawling School. Frank sat on the side-lines with longing in his heart as he saw his teammates, for the first time in the season, play a game worthy of them. The first quarterback, Madden, ran his team with speed and judgment, and when the half was finished had driven the visitors down the field and scored two touchdowns on them. In the third quarter, Madden received a hard jolt in the stomach in a scrimmage, and Frank thrilled as he saw the coach walk down the side-line, looking for a substitute. He came on, passed Frank and selected a quarter named Barlow to take Madden's place, and who sat just beyond him. Barlow shed his sweater as he ran, and with a few words from the coach, sprang into Madden's place behind the center. Under his guidance another touchdown was added in the third quarter, and the teams changed sides for the last period of the game.
Frank gave up hope, as the minutes flew by, for any chance at that game. Barlow was not doing so well now, but there was little time to play. The Pawling team had twice succeeded in stopping the Freshmen near the Pawling goal line, and the substitute quarter had fumbled a punt which for a moment threatened a touchdown against his team. Bostwick, the vigilant end, had recovered the ball at midfield, and saved the situation, but Coach Howard was evidently anxious. He had made many substitutions to give new men practice, and had thus weakened the team, while Pawling seemed to gather new strength. Down the side-line came Howard again. This time he stopped opposite Frank.
"I'm going to send you in, Armstrong, to get a little practice. Hang onto the ball and keep your head. Steady that line up and look out for the forward pass. Hurry it up."
But there was no need to tell Frank to hurry. He had torn off his sweater with the first hint of his opportunity, and was listening to the coach with body poised for the run onto the field. In his eagerness he had entirely forgotten about the ankle.
With the coming of the new quarterback, the team took fresh life. Under his urgings, they began to mow down their opponents as they had in the first part of the game, and the crowd gathered along the side-lines expressed their appreciation of the brace the team was taking in joyous howls. A pretty forward pass, Turner to Bostwick, put the ball on Pawling's 15-yard line.
Harrington, the big center, made a bad pass on the next play, but on a slice outside of tackle, Turner made five yards. The Pawling team braced, and cut the advance down on the next play to a single yard.
Bostwick stepped back to Frank and whispered something to him. Then he called the whole team around him, and with arms over each other's shoulders, they conferred on the next play. Dropping apart quickly, the linemen sprang into position.
"Look out for a fake," cried the Pawling quarter, dancing around in front of the goal posts.
"A forward pass!" cried another of the backs.
But it was neither a fake nor a forward pass.
Armstrong ran quickly to a point ten yards behind his crouching line, coolly measured with his eye the distance from where he stood to the cross-bar, and a moment later, receiving the ball on a long, true pass from Harrington, dropped it to the ground, swung his toe against it as it rose, and sent it spinning directly between the posts.
The kick was as pretty a one as could be desired, and its appreciation was testified to by jubilant yells and the skyward flight of sweaters and blankets along the side-lines.
A kick-off at midfield which Turner ran back 30 yards, a single rush, and the whistle ended the game.
"Why didn't you tell me you could do that?" said Coach Howard giving Armstrong a hearty slap on the back as he trotted over to the side-line to pick up the discarded sweater. "You put that over like a veteran!"
"Didn't have a chance before," said Frank, grinning.
"Guess you didn't. Well, I'll see to it that you get a chance after this." And then, as the throng of grimy players and the spectators straggled off to the cars, "I had pretty nearly come to the conclusion that you were too soft for the game of football."
"My ankle isn't as good as it ought to be," said Frank, looking down. "I was afraid of doing more damage to it."
"I'll take a look at that ankle in the gym," said Howard. "Maybe we can make a quarterback of you yet. I want you to come over to the Freshman training table after this."
It was a joyful gathering in Pierson that night, with a full attendance, for little by little the Armstrong-Turner-Gleason-Powers combination began to have a following in the dormitory and in the class. Friends began to drop in to talk over matters of the moment as they passed to and from their rooms, and if they were the right kind they always had a welcome. The room became the central one for spreads and parties, when the fun raged until ten o'clock.
"All over," Frank would shout. "Lights out." Both Turner and Armstrong believed in keeping strict training hours.
On this particular night the Codfish was in his element.
"Three cheers for our own little quarterback," he howled.
"Sit down, you fish," shouted Turner. "You didn't even see the game."
"O, but I have ears. All the little birds sang it as I was coming up from the boathouse this evening."
"How's the Freshman crew coming on?"
"I'm on the second now. You should have seen us scare the First boat this afternoon. Had a mile spin. Started up by the Quinnipiac bridge, and finished at Tomlinson, points you land-lubbers know nothing about."
"And the Second was licked, of course?"
"Only by a blade, my son. We gave them the race of their lives, fairly tore down the river, scared the oysters and all that sort of thing, to say nothing of the First Freshmen."
"And when do they put you in the first shell?"
"'Nother week, about, I guess. Wouldn't be right to the other fellow to advance me too fast."
"Great stuff, Codfish," said Turner, laughing. "I think you have confidence enough to steer the 'Varsity crew over the course at New London right now."
"Sure thing," said that worthy. "There's nothing to it. Mind over matter, as I hinted to you once before; kind of scientific attitude." The Codfish was busy untying a voluminous box which he had brought home with him.
"For heaven's sake, what have you got there, a prehistoric horse?" inquired Turner.
"No, my little halfback, it is a guitar," and having finished unwrapping the instrument, he swung it over his head. "I'm going out for the musical club stuff. I must have some activity, some life; can't get it with two grumps like you fellows, so I must go after it."
"Jove," groaned Frank, "haven't we suffered enough with you and the piano without having a guitar?"
The Codfish lay back on the window seat, strummed the untuned guitar, and began to hum:
"When I was a student at Cadiz
I played on the Spanish guitar—"
"You'll be a student in Hades if you don't let up!" shouted Turner. "We can stand anything excepting the picture of you as a student at Cadiz. Please desist."
"O, tush, old fellow, your soul is not attuned to music. What's the next line? I seem to disremember it——"
"When I was a stoogent at Cadiz." strum, strum, strum, strum,
"I played on the Spanish guitar."
"Good night!" yelled Frank. "Come on, let's go to Poli's and hear some real music. We'll let the Codfish be 'a stoogent at Cadiz' all to himself."
"S'matter?" said the musician reproachfully. "Well, if you must go, good night. I cannot frivol my time away at Poli's vaudeville when true art is stirring in my soul."
"Let her stir then," said Frank. "We're off," and the door banged.
The week of the Princeton game was a hard one for the Freshman team. Coach Howard, assisted by several members of the 'Varsity coaching staff, drove the team with all his might, but the results were not encouraging. Frank had been established as quarterback on the second team on the Monday following the Pawling game, and was making good there. He was now a substitute to Madden, and twice had been called over to the first eleven when Madden went out of the game temporarily. Away back in his head was the hope that he might still win out in the race for the quarterback position. But Madden had come to Yale with a big reputation justly earned at Hill School, and was a hard man to displace. When Frank's hopes were highest the crash came.
Bostwick, the captain and end, threw out his knee in a fierce scrimmage, and was carried groaning to the side-lines.
"The fifth end hurt this fall, confound the luck," said Howard as he stood looking down at the captain. "And no one to take your place that's worth a cent."
"I'll be all right in a day or two," moaned Bostwick. "Stick some one in till I get a brace on this thing. I can play in the game Saturday."
"Maybe you can and maybe you can't," said the coach. "Did you ever see such beastly luck, and we were just beginning to round into shape. Who am I going to put in there? There's half a dozen ends and none of them worth a tinker."
He ran his eye over the squad which crowded around the injured captain. "Here, Armstrong," he called, "did you ever play end?"
"A few times in prep. school, sir."
"Well you can learn it, can't you?" said Howard petulantly. "Bostwick may pull through in time, and maybe he can't, and you are better than anything I have."
"I'll do my best," said Frank, feeling his hopes for a place on the team slipping away, for he knew well that in the short time still left in the season his chances were small to learn that most difficult of line positions—end.
"You are fast and about the only clean tackler I have on the squad," said Howard. "Get in and try it."
Bostwick, having been temporarily fixed up and led limping away in the arms of two of the substitutes in the direction of the car, play was resumed with Armstrong in his new position.
"Don't you let anyone get past you on the outside," commanded Howard. "And don't be drawn in, no matter what happens. If you can't break the interference, spill it so the defensive half can get the man with the ball. Come on, try it."
Frank did try and tried hard. His ankle had improved, and under the punts he went down the field like a streak of lightning, missing but few tackles. But when the team was on the defensive, he showed the weakness of inexperience.
"Outside of you that time," bawled the coach, and when the new end moved out further, the play went inside. Sometimes he stopped the interference and sometimes, digging desperately through the tangle of legs, he got the runner on a driving tackle, which earned for him a "Good boy, Armstrong," from Howard.
But it was bitter hard work, and never in his life had the welcome "That's enough for to-day" found him so ready to quit. His body felt bruised and sore all over from the driving work of the afternoon and his legs were as heavy as lead, as in the gathering dusk he dragged himself to the waiting trolley car which was there to carry the team to the city.
"You did well to-day, Armstrong, for a starter," said the coach kindly as he came through the car. "It's a hard dose I've given you."
Frank smiled a wan smile as he loosened his shoe laces.
"How heavy are you?"
"Guess about a hundred and forty-one or two," said Frank, straightening up while the muscles of his back protested.
"Too light, too light," said the coach, shaking his head. "If you had another ten or fifteen pounds on you, you'd do. But Bostwick may be able to get into the game by Friday," he added, and passed along to his seat.
Walking over from the training table that night, Turner railed bitterly at Frank's luck. "You had a chance, a bare chance to get in at quarterback for a part of the game anyway, in spite of your bad start, and now you are dished, sure as shooting. The Captain will be O. K. It didn't look like a bad injury to his knee."
"Can't be helped," said Frank. "We've got to take our medicine in this old game. That's part of the training at Yale, isn't it?"
"It is, but it's not easy stuff to swallow."
"Well, there's nothing to do but swallow it, and I'm going to be game, but it hurts. Bostwick may not make it, and I may get in against Princeton, after all."
Turner shook his head. "I don't think there's a chance; you are only filling in. I can see the handwriting on the wall. He'll come back, and you will be his substitute. The only chance is that he may get hurt again, but I hope he won't for he is the best we've got on that side of the line."
"I hope he comes back," said Frank fervently, "because with me in there I wouldn't give three cents for our chances."
"Which are not any too good with the best we have."
It proved to be as Jimmy said. Bostwick was put under heroic treatment in the baking oven for sprained and injured limbs, and to the great joy of all, Frank included, appeared on the field on Thursday. He was a little stiff because of the hampering action of the brace that Howard had devised for him, but went to his old place in the line while Frank was sent to the side-lines.
The practice went well. "We still have a chance against the Tiger cubs," said the coach. "Only a signal drill for fifteen minutes to-morrow," he called out as the squad was leaving the field. "Get to bed early and don't worry yourselves to death. We're going to give them the time of their lives Saturday."
The cheerfulness of the coach was largely assumed, for the Princeton cubs were coming up from Tigertown with a long string of victories to their credit. Only twice during the whole season had they been scored on, and one of these was a lucky drop-kick. The Yale Freshman team, on the contrary, had staggered through the season with a showing far from creditable, and the critics were all predicting a big score for the visitors.
But in spite of the gloomy forecastings, the Yale Freshmen went into that game with a determination to do or die, and while they did not win, neither did the much-heralded Princeton cubs win. Frank watched from the side-lines the desperate battle up and down the gridiron. He saw his roommate giving the best that was in him in the struggle, and prayed fervently that Bostwick might last it out. Every man on the team was a hero that day, and when the final whistle blew, with Captain Bostwick still on his feet and playing a whirlwind game in spite of his injured knee, the score stood at a tie, nothing to nothing.
Going in on the car the coach had nothing but praise for the team. "We didn't lick them, but it is a good start for Harvard next Saturday," he said. "We have a week left, and we'll give the Johnnies a run for their money, all right."
"Armstrong," the coach added, as he dropped down beside him in the trolley car, "I'm sorry you didn't get in, but better luck next time."
"O, that's all right," returned Frank. "I was mighty glad to see Bostwick go through, he showed his sand with that bad knee."
"He certainly did, and he deserves a lot of credit. But I'm going to keep you at end just the same because I may need you."
"All right, sir," said Frank, but he well knew it was the end of his ambitions for a place on the team excepting for an accident to the Captain, which he did not want to think about.
Four days of practice the week after the Princeton contest brought the team to a condition of fitness which they had not before reached that year, and on Friday afternoon, escorted to the train by a hundred of their class, the team with substitutes, coaches, trainers and a goodly crowd of supporters, set out for Cambridge. As the 'Varsity was away, the Freshman game had the honor of being staged on the main gridiron.
That game in the towering Stadium was one that hung long in Frank's memory. It was a game of desperate attack and defense. Three times in the first period the rushing red-legged players had the Blue team down inside the five-yard line, and three times they were stopped by the stone-wall defense. All through the first half the Yale team fought on the defensive, crumpling up before the fierce rushes of the Harvard players, but somehow stiffening as the goal line approached.
So certain were the Harvard players of scoring a touchdown that they disdained to try for a goal from the field, and each time they were stopped by the men from New Haven they took the ball back with dogged determination, only to lose it again.
"We have them now," said Howard as his men were being cared for between the halves. "Go after them. They've shot their bolt, and it's our turn."
After the kick-off in the third quarter, Turner raised great hopes by running the ball back through the Harvard team, and, before he was tackled, laid it only twenty yards away from the Harvard goal line.
A smash at center earned only two yards.
"Armstrong, get ready, I'm going to send you in to try for a goal," said the coach, running down to where Frank was sitting, shivering with the excitement of the struggle that was going on out in the field. Frank slipped off his sweater, and made ready, but the chance he so longed for never came.
Madden's signal was mixed somehow, and the man who was to take the ball wasn't where the quarter expected him to be. He started to run with the ball himself, but was upset by a savage tackle, and dropped the pigskin, which went bounding backward toward his own goal. Half a dozen players took a driving shot at the leather, but it eluded them as if it had been greased. Finally a lanky Harvard end wound his body around it at midfield. Yale's chance to score at that particular moment was lost.
Frank gritted his teeth and slipped on his sweater again. The battle was once more taken up with renewed vigor. The advantage lay first with one team and then with the other, but never again did Yale have so good a chance to score.
Again striking its stride, after a lot of futile punting, the Yale Freshmen got together and began to plough through their opponents. Turner was playing like a demon while the little Yale contingent matched yell for yell with the Harvard supporters on the other side of the field. Turner on two tries reeled off twenty-five yards, and put the ball just across the center of the field. A forward pass netted fifteen yards more, and again the coach began to look for a chance to score, not for a touchdown, for the attack had not shown itself capable of beating down that splendid defense, but by a drop-kick if the opportunity came.
But again when hope was high in every heart came a sudden disastrous fumble, and again the red-legged end had the ball.
"Take it away from them," howled the Yale crowd.
"Throw 'em back."
"Eat the Johnnies up."
But that husky Harvard team was not a whit disturbed by the ferocious cries from the Yale side of the field. They settled down to business again, and slowly, but surely, worked the ball down toward the Blue goal line.
The tired boys from New Haven fought on grimly in the fourth period, making the gains against them shorter and shorter as they were pushed back. Turner intercepted a forward pass which would have surely made a touchdown for Harvard, and for a time there was a respite for the Yale Freshmen for the fullback kicked the ball far down the field, only to have it caught and brought back past Bostwick, this time, for thirty yards.
At it again went the two teams, Yale defending stubbornly, but vainly, against the powerful rushes of the Harvard backs, who, now that the end of the game was drawing near, threw their last bit of energy into the attack. Through center and tackle went the bull-like rushes of the backs. Bostwick's end was circled for fifteen yards, and he was laid out for a while, but revived soon after a little dabbing of the sponge on his face.
"I want you to be ready, Armstrong," said the coach, hurrying up to Frank whose eyes were glued on the field, and whose heart was pumping with the excitement of the struggle. He was straining almost as hard as his mates out on the field, lunging his shoulder into the substitute who sat next to him, in the unconscious effort to help stop the Harvard rushes.
"Touchdown, touchdown," sang out the Harvard Freshmen supporters.
"We want a touchdown!"
"Hold 'em!"
"Hold 'em, Yale!" was the defiant cry from the opposite side of the field.
"Show the Johnnies where you come from!"
With the ball on the Yale ten-yard line it looked as if no power in the Yale team, at least, could stop the victorious march. Bostwick was again laid out, but was up on his feet after a minute of attention.
"Good old Bostwick," cried Frank, stirred by the game fight his captain was making.
"Long cheer for Bostwick!" and the dancing cheer leaders led a ringing yell for the fighting captain, which seemed to stiffen up the boys out on the field. They stopped the next Harvard rush without a yard of gain. Standing like heroes together, the Freshmen line did the impossible, repulsed the fierce assaults the Harvard team could give, and took the ball.
"Y-a-a-y——" yelled the Yale stand, rising as one man. Hats and caps went into the air. The cheer leaders tried to get order, and give a cheer, but no one paid any attention to them. The crowd continued to yell like Comanches, as the lines settled themselves again.
"Time must be nearly up," said a substitute.
"It can't be," cried Frank, gritting his teeth in a frenzy. "They must have five minutes more to play. They've got to have it," and he drove his heels into the unoffending ground as if at that distance he could help in the charge that was to be delivered against the red host.
"What's Madden going to do, rush it?" inquired a voice.
"I hope not," said Howard. "A short kick would mean a free catch and a chance for a placement goal. Good boy," he shouted as Madden changed the signal, and the fullback, who had gone back behind the goal line, came running up again to the regular formation.
"Put it through them!"
"Smash it out, boys!"
The signal came sharp and clear from the lips of the quarterback, high above the background of yells from the partisans.
"Turner's ball," whispered Frank to himself.
The pass was swift and true. Turner took the ball from Madden's hands at full speed. The play was intended to be a slice off tackle, a play that had gained a good deal of ground during the afternoon. But, alas for the best laid plans of men, mice and football players, he never reached his destination. The tired Yale line sagged and broke. Through gaping holes poured a stream of Crimson-jerseyed men. Two tacklers struck Turner, who was practically on his goal line, at the same time, and swept him backward like chaff. So swift and sudden had been the deluge that the halfback was carried off his feet and over the goal line before he had even a chance to yell "down."
The crowd did not at once appreciate the significance of the matter, but a few, recognizing a safety for Harvard, set up a scattered cheer. A moment later the fateful information was flashed from the scoreboard, "Safety," and the Harvard stand delivered itself of a high-pitched yell.
A moment later the referee's whistle blew, and the great game was over. A host of men swept from the stands and surrounded the victors, cheering and prancing about.
With Bostwick at its head, trying hard not to limp, and with faces drawn and mud-stained, the beaten team walked wearily to the dressing rooms where they were joined by the substitutes.
"You didn't win but I'm proud of you all," said Coach Howard, slapping the jaded players on the back as they came through the door. "You were up against a better team, fifty per cent. better."
"Here, Bostwick," he added a minute later to the captain, who, sunk in gloom and with hanging head, was pulling off his wet football clothes, "cheer up. We can't always win. The main business is that you and your team played a magnificent up-hill game. I'm satisfied and Yale will be satisfied for you gave the best in you. That's always the test. You'll have another chance next year."
The excitement of football had passed like most things in college and out of it. The 'Varsity had triumphed over Princeton, and tied with Harvard in a stirring, up-hill game, and now the students had settled down to the ordinary routine. While it was late in November, the fall had been such an open one that the crews, eager to get every day of practice possible, stuck to their work in the harbor. Codfish held manfully onto the job of coxswain in the Second Freshmen eight, the long-looked-for place on the First still eluding him. He was hopeful, however. "I'll get it before the rowing stops, and if not then, when it starts in the spring," he boasted to his roommates. "Watch me."
This afternoon he was perched on the window seat, legs crossed, lolling back on the cushions, and tickling the guitar.
"For the love of Mike," cried Frank from his room, where he had gone to nab an elusive French irregular or two, "isn't that 'stoogent from Cadiz' ever going to graduate?"
"Why so peevish?" inquired the Codfish, keeping up his strumming and humming. "There are fourteen different keys, you know, Mr. Armstrong, and as you never know which one you're going to be caught in, I've got to be a Spanish student in every one of them. I only have ten more to fix in my retentive memory, so the agony will soon be through."
"How many have you circumvented?"
"Six to date. I'm going to tackle the minors to-night; plaintive little things, those minors, they get the heart-throb stuff."
"Heavens!" said Frank. "Why don't you hire a hall somewhere out in Hampden? I'll go halves with you to get rid of you."
"'Music hath charms to soothe the savage beast,'" quoted the Codfish, "but not the football player."
"Music did you say?" growled Frank.
"No soul, no soul at all for the beautiful," sighed the guitar player. "Such music ought to move you to tears."
"It does, bitter tears, very bitter tears. Please desist, stop and quit. I'm having trouble with this dose of Romance language. I wonder why they ever called them Romance languages?"
"Give it up." Then, throwing down the guitar: "I say, Frank, chuck it and come down to the harbor. We are going to have a bit of a brush with the First Freshmen crew, and you've never seen your old pal hold the tiller ropes. Maybe I can get you into the launch. We go out at three. Where's Turner and David?"
"David is probably grubbing on his Lit. stuff, and there's no use in trying to get him. Jimmy went over to Chapel street to get something, and ought to be back here in a minute. Here he comes now. I'll go if he does."
Turner came into the room whistling a merry tune, threw himself on the couch and elevated his heels to the end of the desk in the national attitude.
"Gee whiz, but it's a great day! Why don't you fellows get out? Not many more days like this between now and next May."
"The Codfish has just invited us down to the harbor to see how well he can't steer a boat, and I said I'd go if you would. I've some French here, but there's no hope of doing it when this musical bug is doing his stunts."
"I'm your man," said Turner, jumping up at once. "I know the coach and maybe we can get on the launch."
"I'll attend to that," said the Codfish, majestically. "I haven't been knocking around that old boathouse two months for my health. You are my guests to-day."
"Go it, old skate. So long as we get aboard we don't mind who does the trick."
"Lead on, Macduff," quoted Frank, and like playful dogs newly unleashed, they broke for the street. Racing over to Chapel street, they caught a steamboat car at the York street corner, and, after a fifteen-minute ride, reached their destination.
On the float was a scene of great activity. The crews of half a dozen boats were standing around waiting their turn to embark. Some carried oars in their hands, others were stretched at full length on the runways, taking in to the full the rays of the warming late fall sun. Most of them were stripped to the waist as in summer, for the day had an uncommon warmth. One crew had just landed, evidently from a smart row, for sweat glistened on their bare and brawny backs, as they unshipped their oars and at the word of their coxswain snapped their shell out of the water and turned it upside down over their heads in one splendid free sweep.
They were just in time to see the 'Varsity go out, eight clean-limbed, stalwart young fellows, who carried their shell easily, with a quick and springy step, and with almost military precision. Without a word spoken, the long sweeps were quickly adjusted in the row-locks. At a word from the captain, the men stepped to their seats, bent and fastened their feet into the sandal-like attachments at the footboards. Then the boat was shoved off until the long sweeps were free to catch the water on both sides of the boat.
"Row," snapped the coxswain, and eight blades cut the water like knives, sending up a little spurt of water in the front of each one of them. Like a machine the bodies swung back and forth, the blades dipped rhythmically, and in a minute the crew was but a dot in the waters of the lower river where the 'Varsity launch, the "Elihu Yale," waited.
"By Jove," said Frank, admiration showing on his face, "that was about as pretty a thing as I can imagine."
"Don't you wish you had gone out for the crew?" inquired Turner. "They don't twist your ankles and knees down here, or muscle-bruise you."
"No, but they break your back and freeze you to death in the cold winds down here," said someone laughingly. "I just heard your friend's remark, and thought I'd enlighten you. Don't you remember me, Turner? We wrestled this fall one night, about a thousand years ago. Francis is my name."
Both then recognized the wrestler whom Turner threw over his head the night of the rush. He extended a frank hand. "Coming down to look us over?"
"Didn't know you rowed," said Turner, taking the proffered hand.
"Yes, I'm trying it. Not much good, either, but maybe I can help to push some other fellow up a peg higher. That's all we scrubs are good for, you know." He said it without any heat, merely stating the fact. "We help to cultivate the flowers, but we can't pick them. It's a part of the Yale training.
"Ta, ta, there's my call," and he dashed into the boathouse where his crew were preparing to take the shell out.
Following the Second 'Varsity, came the First Freshmen crew, and then on the heels of the First came the Second, the Codfish busying himself with an air of great importance.
Permission having been given Armstrong and Turner to watch the practice from the Freshman launch, which lay at the end of the float, they climbed in with alacrity. The launch preceded the two crews down to the bridge where it waited till the shell came up.
"Take it easy, now," said the Freshman coach as the crews lined up alongside. "Keep your stroke to about twenty-six and pull it through. Ready? ROW!"
Both crews dropped their blades in the water, pulled a long, slow stroke, and slipped rapidly up the river, the little launch darting first to one and then the other while the coach shot words of criticism at the oarsmen through a short megaphone.
"Number Five, don't slump down on the catch!"
"You're very short in the water, Number Two, finish it out and get your hands away quickly."
"Don't buck your oar, Four, on the finish; sit up straight."
"For heaven's sake," this to the Codfish. "Can't you keep that boat straight? What are you wabbling all over the river for?"
"'Vast, 'vast," he yelled as the rowing grew ragged. "'Vast" is short for "Avast," the usual signal to stop rowing.
When the crews came to rest on their oars, the coach shot a torrent of criticism at the men. No one escaped.
"Exactly like football," said Frank grinning. "No one ever gets it quite right."
"Only difference from football is," said Jimmy, "that the other fellow is getting the hot shot now. I guess I'll take mine on the field."
"Me, too," said Frank. "It doesn't strike me as inspiring, this crew business."
"And the Codfish isn't such a whirlwind as he tries to make us think," commented Turner.
The coxswain was coming in for a fire of criticism from the coach with the megaphone. "Now try it again and watch yourselves—you get worse every day."
"Doesn't it sound natural?" laughed Frank. "No more of that in ours for a year."
The crews, stopping and starting, but always under a shower of advice from the coach, drove their way up to the upper bridge where they were ordered to turn around and line-up for the race down stream. After much dogged paddling by fours and high-pitched orders by the coxswains, for the boats were difficult to swing around in the swift running current, they finally got about and were sent off with a word from the coach who had previously ordered them to keep below twenty-eight to the minute.
Down the river the boats flew, each crew striving with might and main. For a little time it was nip and tuck, but by degrees the First crew edged ahead, and half a mile from the start had a lead of three-quarters of a length and were rowing easily, while the winded Second was splashing along and dropping further back at every stroke. The Codfish was steering a serpentine course which further retarded his boat.
When the crews drew up at the end of the mile, both badly pumped out from the sprint, the coxswain of the Second came in for a raking by the coach.
"You wabbled down that course like a drunken man," he said hotly. "You ought to be on an oyster boat. What's the matter with you? Can't you see?"
"Poor Gleason, he's getting his this afternoon," said Frank.
For another hour the crews were kept on the jump and then, as the dusk was beginning to come down over the hills, the coach ordered them in.
"Race it for the float," he commanded, "and look out for the sand bar by the bridge. It's low water. GO!"
The Second was lying about a length ahead of the First boat when the order was given, and, seeing his opportunity, the Codfish shouted: "Now we've got them, beat 'em to it. Row, you terriers!"
Throwing what science they had learned to the winds, the Second Freshman crew drove their oars into the water and, at a stroke far above what the coach wanted, tore off for the boathouse, the shell swaying and the water flying while the Codfish urged them on at the top of his voice.
"Sock it through, you huskies, don't let them get you!"
The First crew, not to be outdone, started after the Second. At first they kept the stroke down, but the coxswain, seeing his chance of overhauling the renegades in the short distance to go, called on his stroke to "hit it up," which that individual was nothing loath to do.
"Cut them out before they get to the float," cried the coxswain of the First crew. Up went the stroke, and the race was on in earnest. The coaching launch had drifted down toward the bridge on the outgoing tide, before the coach saw what was in progress. He waved his arms, bawled through the megaphone, and gesticulated in an endeavor to stop the wild pace, but neither crew heard, nor wanted to stop if they had heard. This was not a race under instructions. It was only a private scrap and, as such, it stood, for the launch was too far off to overhaul the flying, splashing crews.
Foot by foot the First crew gained on the Second, which now, with the stroke over forty to the minute, merely stabbed their oars in the water and jerked them out again, while the spray flew from each assault of the blades. The better trained First crew kept the stroke longer, and in coming to the float were only a few yards behind. Edging in, they crowded the Second from their course, and in order to avoid a collision, the luckless Codfish steered his crew widely to the left. He knew, but had forgotten in the excitement of the race, that a narrow sand bar almost awash at low tide, was just below the central pier of the drawbridge.
"Look out there, Second crew," came the warning cry from the float now directly opposite the racing shells.
The coxswain in the Second heard, but it was too late. Straight onto the sand bar, on which rippled less than an inch of water, ran the slender nose of the shell. The brake thus suddenly applied to the frail craft checked the speed, and when the boat stuck midway of the bar, with each end suspended above deep water, every oarsman was thrown from his seat.
Immediately an ominous cracking was heard, and the front end began to sag with its load of more than five hundred pounds.
"Jump," yelled the captain, who rowed the bow oar; but before any of the forward four could free themselves from their foot harness, the slender boat snapped squarely in the middle, where it rested on the bar, and both pieces, with their crews aboard, slipped off into deep water, filled and sank.
For a moment it looked serious, but, fortunately, every member of the Second, with the exception of the Codfish, could swim. As they found themselves deeply immersed, they shook themselves free from their foot fastenings and struck out in the cold water for the float only a few rods distant, all excepting the Codfish. He kept his seat in the shell and held to the tiller ropes for dear life, while the current swept him down stream in the path of the oncoming launch.
As the rear end of the broken shell swung across the bow of the launch, the coach reached down, grabbed the ill-fated coxswain by the back of his coat, and jerked him into the launch. Then with a boat-hook both ends of the ruined craft were captured, for both ends, released from their weight, now floated buoyantly, and were towed to the float.
"I forgot about the sand bar," said the Codfish meekly, as he stood on the cockpit of the launch, the water running from him in streams.
"And you forgot my instructions, too," said the coach, his eyes blazing at the luckless coxswain. "This will do for you. Pack up your duds and don't come down here again. If I see you around this float again, I'll chuck you overboard." The bedraggled oarsmen had all made the float in safety, and enjoyed the discomfort of their coxswain who in his zeal had inadvertently given them a cold bath.
"How was I to remember the blooming sand bar?" complained the Codfish that night, radiant now in dry raiment. "We were winning. What's a sand bar in the glory of victory?"
"Are you going down again," inquired Frank, "and take the chances of a ducking?"
"Not on your tin-type," said the ex-coxswain. "The thing was beginning to pall on me. No diversity in the job, no spectators to urge you on as you have out at the field, nothing but work. I've resigned the job."
"Another way for saying you're fired, eh?" said Turner, smiling at the imperturbable roommate.
"Have it any way you want to, old sport. One thing," continued the Codfish, "even if I have lost the chance to shine in aquatics, I still have the Mandolin Club left. I'll put a dent in that by and by."
And curling himself up on the couch, with the pillows properly arranged at his back, he struck into the Spanish Fandango, the newest addition to his not very extended répertoire.