Chapter D: Appleton and Company (4)

“Hard luck,” said Payson Walsh as the departing couple passed down the short brick walk to the street and went off through the rustling leaves that lay thick on the sidewalk. “Poor Jack! I’ll bet he’s feeling perfectly rotten.”

“I know he is,” said Larry Logan. “When Jack doesn’t laugh once in a quarter of an hour――――” He shook his head eloquently.

“We’ll miss him Saturday,” mused the coach. “I don’t mean any reflection on you, Logan.”

“I know. A team always feels lost without its captain. It’s going to make a difference in our chances of winning, too. I still think we can pull it out, but――we’ll have to work harder to do it.”

“Funny to have it happen in a game like to-day’s,” grumbled the manager. “Why, it was the easiest game of the season!”

“You never can tell about that,” replied Logan. “You get hurt when you least expect it. Remember two years ago when Tommy Winship broke his arm in the gym? He didn’t fall three feet! Well――――” He stretched and yawned widely. “Gee, I’m tired! It was too blamed hot to-day for football.”

“Yes,” the coach agreed, absently. He was making meaningless marks on the edge of the paper before him. After a moment: “I suppose it would be a decent thing to please Jack under the circumstances and start Morely instead of Preston,” he said thoughtfully. “I don’t believe it would matter much, anyway.”

“Pleasing Jack isn’t what we’re here for,” said Payson Walsh, frowning. “We want to win a week from to-day, Coach. That’s our stunt. Ted Morely’s a sort of protegé of Jack’s, and Jack thinks Ted’s been misjudged, and he wants to give the chap a chance to prove it. He said so himself. But we’re not staging the contest for Morely’s benefit. If he’s got the reputation of being a quitter――and as a matter of fact he has, as you know, Larry――it’s his own fault. It isn’t up to us to worry. Preston’s the man for the job and I say, use him.”

The coach nodded. “You’re probably right,” he said.

Had Ted Morely known what was being said about him down in the village he would not have sped his pen so calmly over the paper, but, as it was, he was at peace with the world. He was writing of the afternoon’s game at length and with, perhaps, unnecessary detail, for his father and mother knew woefully little about football. Having reached the end of the third page, he laid down his pen and read over his effort.

“It was rotten luck for Jack, and everyone’s awfully sorry for him. They say he’s quite out of the Fairfield game. Isn’t that the limit? I haven’t seen him since they lugged him off the field, but I guess he’s beastly cut up about it. I took his place after he was hurt and played all of the fourth quarter. You know I’ve been fighting Preston all Fall, and now it looks like I’d won. Anyway, if Jack doesn’t play Saturday I’m bound to get in sooner or later, for Fairfield plays a stiff game and not many fellows last through. To-day we were 17 to their 7 when I went in and Thornton ran in a lot of subs and we only tried to hold the other fellow from scoring any more. You needn’t worry about my shoulder because it’s just as good as it ever was. I wouldn’t have said anything about it if it had been serious――――”

He scored that out heavily and wrote above it. “It was only a wrench and nothing to bother about. I’ve been in mean luck this Fall about getting bunged up. You remember I had tonsilitis when we played Camden High and then there was the time I sort of fainted at practice one day, but that was only something I’d eaten, the doctor said, and then hurting that old shoulder took me out of the Fielding game. I’ll bet you that if they let me play Saturday there won’t be anything the matter with me, or if there is no one will know it! We want to win this year pretty bad and the school’s made up its mind to do it, too. I wish you could see some of the meetings we’ve been having. Talk about enthusiasm, gee, no one’s got anything on us. Well, I’ll write again after the game and you’ll know then how it comes out. If you want to know before that you will find it in the Reading paper, I guess. Now I must stop and go to bed. I’ve written a pretty long letter for me. Lots of love to you both.”

He signed it “Your aff. son, Ted,” folded it away into the envelope, wrote the address and leaned the letter against the drop-light so that he would see it and remember to borrow a stamp from his room-mate and post it the next morning. Then, with a comfortable yawn, he arose and removed his jacket. In doing so he winced slightly, frowned and rubbed his left shoulder a moment before he began to wind the old-fashioned silver watch that had been his father’s and had descended to him on his sixteenth birthday, nearly a year ago. When his room-mate came in Ted was fast asleep and dreaming brave dreams.

Toward Jack Groom, Ted entertained an admiration that was closely akin to hero worship. Jack was not quite two years older, but to Ted he seemed more than that, and with liking went a respectful awe that to-day, the Sunday following the next to the last game of the Staunton schedule, kept Ted from doing what he really wanted to do, which was cross the yard to Fenton Hall and call on the captain. He wanted to let Jack know that he was horribly sorry about the accident and very sympathetic, but he was very much afraid of being thought presumptuous: only to himself Ted called it “fresh.” Ultimately he did go, but it was because Milton, Jack’s room-mate, hailed him after dinner with: “O Morely! Jack wants to see you. He’s over in the room. Run over now, will you?”

Jack was propped up on the window-seat when Ted entered, his offending foot pillowed before him. Ted’s condolences stumblingly uttered, Jack came to the reason for the summons. “I can’t play Saturday, Ted,” he announced, “and so I’ve dropped out of it entirely. Logan’s taken my place. I haven’t any more say about things. I wanted you to know that because it looks as if Preston would have the call over you. I think Thornton will start him Saturday. I’m sorry, Ted. I think you could play as good a game as Preston, maybe better, but Thornton thinks you’re a bit light. Of course, you’ll get in before the game’s over. You can’t help it, I guess. And, in any case, Thornton’ll see that you get your letter. I just wanted you to understand that it isn’t my doing, Ted.”

“Of course,” muttered the younger boy vaguely. “That’s all right, Jack. I――Preston――――” He paused and swallowed. “I guess he’s better than I am, Jack.”

“Piffle! Next year you’ll put it all over him. Don’t mind about Saturday, old man. You’ve got another year yet.”

Which, reflected Ted, retracing his steps under the leafless maples, was true but not very consoling at the moment. He wished he had not written home with so much assurance. Still, if anything happened to Preston early in the game――not that he wished Preston ill-luck, of course. That would be pretty low-down. But accidents did happen! However, he put that line of conjecture out of his mind presently and strove to find comfort in the patriotic reflection that if Preston was preferred by the coach it was with good reason and meant that Staunton’s chances of winning would be bettered. And, after all, what everyone wanted, Ted amongst them, was a victory over Fairfield. By Monday afternoon he had learned to accept the disappointment with a fair degree of philosophy.

The coach’s intentions were not apparent during practice, either that day or on any other of the remaining work days. Ted and Preston were used alternately at right half and no favoritism was discernible. Preston, thought Ted, was worried and nervous. The fight for supremacy was telling on him and Tuesday afternoon he called down the coaches’ condemnation by twice “gumming up” plays. Ted knew that he was thinking too hard about Saturday’s contest to do justice to himself. As for Ted, he had seldom played the position better. Certain that the struggle was over, the consequent relief allowed him to put all his mind on his game, with the result that he went at it in a hammer-and-tongs style that was almost spectacular. He managed to forget very completely that Saturday would find him on the bench instead of on the field, and got a lot of joy and satisfaction from the moment. But after practice on Tuesday he got to thinking about Preston, and when Fate arranged a meeting on the gymnasium steps he yielded to an impulse. He and Preston were always extremely polite to each other, formally friendly, as became antagonists who thoroughly respected each other.

“I say, Preston,” began Ted, “I――there’s something you ought to know. I heard it by――by accident, but I know it’s straight.” Preston looked politely curious. “Thornton’s decided on you to start the game,” blurted Ted. “I thought you’d like to know it. Now you won’t have to――to worry, you see.”

“Why, thanks, Morely, but――you’re not stringing me, are you? Where did you hear it?”

“I can’t tell you that, but it’s――official.”

“Oh! Well, but――it’s a bit tough on you, Morely. Maybe you’re wrong. You’d better wait and see.”

“I don’t need to.” Ted smiled. “I know. I’m telling you so you can――can buckle down to business, Preston. You see, I know what it is to have the other fellow on your mind all the time! One of us had to lose out, Preston, and it happens to be me. Thornton thinks I’m too light. I dare say he’s right. Anyway, he’s the doctor, and as long as we beat Fairfield I don’t mind. Much,” he added as a sop to Truth.

“Well, it’s mighty decent of you,” said Preston warmly. “You’ve certainly given me a dandy scrap, and I don’t mind telling you that you’ve had me worried pretty often. I hope you get your letter.”

“Thanks. Maybe I will. So long.”

The last practice was on Wednesday and was largely signal work, although the kickers had a fairly stiff session later. On Thursday the school marched over to the field and cheered and sang and the first team substitutes went through a twenty-minute contest with the second eleven. Ted didn’t see it, for he was sent back to the gymnasium with the first squad, but he could hear the onlookers cheering the disbanding second when the scrimmage was over. And a few minutes later, while he was tying his shoe-laces, the marching, enthusiastic horde grouped in front of the gymnasium entrance and cheered the players individually, and the coaches and the trainer and everyone else. Ted listened rather anxiously for his own name. It came presently. He was somehow very glad of that. He would have felt horribly disappointed had they left him out.

Fairfield descended on the scene in force Saturday noon and the Campus and the village and the road between were gay with the flaunting blue of the enemy. The day was an Indian summer day, still, warm and hazy in the distances. Ted trotted with the rest to the field at a quarter to two and went through the warming up stunts. Then he donned a blanket and watched while the rival captains met in mid-field and a coin spun glittering in the sunlight. Fairfield had won the toss and had elected to give the ball to Staunton, thus upsetting Coach Thornton’s prophecy.

“All right now,” announced the latter. He referred to the little red book he carried in a vest pocket. “Aikens, Breadwell, Boyd, Morris, Walsh, Denton, Conley, Logan, Moore, Preston and Farnsworth. On the run, fellows!”

Presently a whistle piped, the new brown pigskin arose high against the blue sky and the final test of the long season’s work was begun. The cheering had stilled on both sides of the field and some two thousand pairs of eyes followed the long flight of the ball. Then a Fairfield half-back had it and was dodging back up the gridiron. Breadwell almost got him, but he slipped past. Then Larry Logan wrapped two sturdy arms about the runner’s legs and brought him crashing to the yellowed turf. Fairfield came hard then and Ted watched anxiously as the Staunton line bent and buckled against the heavy assault. But the line didn’t break much and presently the ball was in air again. Then came the first trial of the Staunton wide-open attack, and a mighty shout arose as Moore burst through outside right guard and reeled past two white lines. Again Moore got through, and then the Fairfield defense solved the play and shifted to meet it, and Farnsworth, faking a kick and then plunging at the Fairfield left, was spilled behind his line. A forward pass failed and again the ball flew through the air, propelled by Farnsworth’s boot, and the teams raced down to the Blue’s thirty-yard line. That quarter ended without anything approaching a score, the honors even. But Thornton’s plan to “get the jump” on the enemy and score in the first few minutes of play had failed.

The second period was a repetition of the first, save that Fairfield had the ball once on Staunton’s twenty-two yards on a fourth down and missed a goal from the field by a bare half-foot margin. Ted trotted back to the gymnasium with the others and sat around in an atmosphere of steam and liniment and excitement and listened to the babel of voices. Jack was in uniform but had not joined the players for a moment, and it was Larry Logan who fumed and implored and advised. Coach Thornton looked confident and had little to say until just before half-time was up. Then he made a quietly forceful appeal and, at the end, called for a cheer. Thirty-two voices answered thunderously.

Fairfield scored two minutes after the third period started. The kick-off was fumbled by Logan, and, although he fell on it, at his eighteen yards, Fairfield blocked Farnsworth’s punt and an end broke through and captured the trickling pigskin a foot behind the goal line. Fairfield brought the ball out in triumph, and it was then that Ted saw that one brown-legged player was stretched on the turf. “Tink” was diving toward him with slopping bucket. Ted’s eyes sped from player to player of his side. Only Preston was missing along the goal line! Something pushed his heart into his throat, turned it over once and let it slip slowly back again. He watched “Tink’s” sponge in fascination. Then they were lifting Preston to his feet. For an instant it seemed that he was as good as ever, but suddenly his head fell over sideways. They were carrying him off now, bringing him to the bench. Someone amongst the subs leaped forward with a blanket. The stand behind was cheering bravely for “Preston! Preston! Preston!” Thornton met the slowly-approaching group at the side line, looked, listened to a word from Tinker and whirled on his heel.

“Morely! Get in there! Hurry up!” he called.

Ted squirmed from his sweater and raced. Panting, he slipped between Breadwell and Moore under the cross-bar and waited. A hand waved downward, the ball flew toward them, there was a moment of suspense and a roar of relief arose from the Staunton stand. Fairfield had failed at the goal. Six points to nothing was the score, and virtually half the game remained to be played.

Larry Logan shot a dubious look at Ted as the latter fell into place beside Moore when Fairfield had the ball again on her own thirty-four yards. But he managed a cheerful: “All right, Ted! Let’s see what you can do! Hard, now!”

But it was Fairfield’s policy to slow up now, and she halted in her signals and wasted all the time she could without risking a penalty. Staunton held gamely and then spoiled a forward pass and took the ball on downs. The wide-open attack was still working, for Fairfield’s men were a bit heavier and a bit slower and Logan was getting a lot of jump into his plays. Ted got his chance and crashed through for a scant three yards, got it again and was downed almost in his tracks by an unguarded end. Then Moore slipped around right tackle and ran twelve yards before he was forced over the side line. Staunton got to the enemy’s twenty-three before she was held, and then Farnsworth tried a place kick and missed the goal by five yards.

And so it went, Fairfield sparring for time, Staunton forcing the playing, smashing desperately, running hard, aching to score. Changes were made. Morris went out at center and young Joyce took his place. Greenough came in for Breadwell. With three minutes of the quarter left the ball was Staunton’s in mid-field. Loring had wasted a down on a weird trick play that had lost four yards and now Farnsworth was called on. It was the old fake kick and wide run, but it worked, just as it so often does, and the big full-back galloped over three white streaks before they stopped him. Then, with the line-up close to the side of the field, Logan called on Ted. Moore crossed over in front of him, Farnsworth ran with him. Larry hid the ball a moment and then, as Ted rushed past, thumped it against his stomach. The Fairfield line was wide open in the middle and Ted went through like a shot. After that he had to spin and feint and dodge, but he kept going forward, kept wresting himself from clutching hands, kept passing the lines underfoot. The goal came closer and closer and for a wonderful moment he thought he was going to make it. But the Fairfield quarter spoiled that. He refused to believe in Ted’s move toward the side line and got him firmly about the knees and wouldn’t be kicked loose. And then, when Ted toppled to earth, clutching the ball frenziedly, a pursuing end crashed down upon him and a million stars blazed before Ted’s astonished eyes and he fainted.

When he came around, barely a half-minute later, they were pumping his arms and he had to gasp with the pain of it. Then came Tinker and the water pail and the big, dripping, smelly sponge, and Tinker’s anxious: “Where’d they get you, boy?”

Ted did a lot of thinking in something under a second. Too often already this season had he had to be led off the field. He dared “Tink’s” searching eyes and gasped: “Nowhere ... Tink. I’m ... all right!”

“You’re not! Don’t be telling lies.” Tinker’s crafty fingers went exploring. Up one leg, down another, over the boy’s chest――Ted never flinched. He smiled railingly.

“Let me up, you ninny,” he expostulated. “I’m all right. That fellow knocked the breath out of me, that’s all.”

Tinker doubted and looked it. But he dropped the sponge back into the pail and stood up. “Come on, then,” he commanded. “Let’s see.”

Ted raised himself with his right hand and sprang nimbly enough to his feet, laughing. Tinker grunted, shot a suspicious look, saw no evidences of injury and swooped down on his pail. “All right!” he said. “Go to it!”

It was Moore who gained the next two yards and Moore who lost them again. Farnsworth bucked through past guard for four. It was maddening to be on the eleven yards with only one down left and six to go. Larry hesitated and the enemy jeered. A forward pass was all that would answer, and Staunton’s forwards had signally failed all the afternoon. But what must be must be and Larry gave the signals. It was Farnsworth who remonstrated. Larry listened to his whispers and looked doubtful and finally shook his head. But shaking his head was only camouflage, for the signals were changed. Ted’s heart leaped as he heard them. Then the silence of the portentous instant before the impact, and the signals repeated, and Ted taking the ball on a longish pass from Joyce and springing away to the left, with Moore interfering. Then came the frenzied cry of “_In! In!_” and, sure enough, as Moore went down, a hole opened, and Ted, pivoting, turned toward the goal line. It was only a few yards distant, but the Blue’s backs were flocking to its defense and Ted was already in the midst of them. Arms settled at his waist, but he tore away. Someone crashed into him from behind and he was flung forward, his feet stumbling behind him. They got him then. A hand brushed past his face and thumped down on his left shoulder and Ted gasped and doubled up and went down, vainly, as it seemed, trying to push the pigskin forward as the trampled turf leaped up to meet him. And as he fell he found himself saying to himself in a darkness lurid with whirling stars and meteors: “I won’t faint! I won’t faint!”

He didn’t, but he lay very still when they pulled the foe from him and he had to be fairly lifted to his feet. And when he was on them he could only lean against Farnsworth and whisper gaspingly: “Don’t let go of me, please! Just a minute! Just a minute!” So Farnsworth, grinning happily, for the ball was over the line by three inches, held him up and no one paid much attention to the fact. Presently things stopped whirling madly around in Ted’s world and he groped his way back to the gridiron and dazedly watched while Farnsworth, after much cogitation amidst a great silence, lifted the pigskin straight over the cross-bar!

The quarter ended a moment later and the teams changed places. Staunton fought for time now, as Fairfield had done before, but went to no undue lengths to secure it. She was a point to the good and would have been satisfied had the game ended then and there, but she had also learned the joy of battle and was willing to fight on. Fairfield came back with a desperation that for the first few minutes lifted the home team from her feet. But she rallied on her thirty and took the ball away by a carefully measured two inches and started back again. She could not afford to risk anything now and so it was a case of hit the line and hold the ball. And she did hit it! Moore had to give up, but the eager substitute who took his place made good. Farnsworth still pegged away, as mighty as ever, although when play stopped for a moment he could hardly stand up and Tinker was watching him frowningly from the side of the field. Ted had more chances and played them through, gaining more often than not. But he, too, was almost gone it seemed, and Larry was considerate for what he had already done.

The shadows lengthened and the game drew to its end. Fairfield was still cheering on the stands, still hopeful on the field. A misjudged punt brought a groan of dismay from the Staunton adherents and gave the enemy her opportunity to pull the game from the fire. It was Stirling, the substitute left half, who erred, and of a sudden the enemy was pounding at the Staunton gate. From the twenty-six yards to the fifteen she fought her way in the four downs. There, unwisely, perhaps, scorning a field goal, she raced against the clicking seconds of the timekeeper’s watch and plunged on toward a touchdown. Two yards――three――one――and there were but four to go, with Staunton digging her cleats into the torn turf of the last defense.

The enemy staged a try-at-goal, but Staunton refused to believe in it, and, as it was proved, rightly. For the ball went back to a half instead of the kicker and he sped off toward the left and the line broke and followed him. His run started near the twenty yards and he ran in to the fifteen before he began to circle. By that time the interference was solid about him and when he turned in it seemed that sheer weight of numbers would carry the ball over. The Staunton defenders went down battling gamely, the rush slowed but kept moving. Somewhere in that mêlée was the runner with the precious ball hugged tightly to his body. They were pushing past the ten-yard line now. Cries of exhortation, of despair and of triumph arose above the panting and gasping and the thud of bodies. To the eight yards――to the seven――――.

A brown-legged player picked himself from the turf with distorted face and plunged at the struggling mass. Somehow he penetrated it and was swallowed from sight. And then, wonder of wonders, the forward movement stopped, the mass swayed, gave before the desperate force of the defenders and moved back. From somewhere a faint gasp of “_Down!_” was heard. But already the whistle had blown.

The ball was found just past the six yards. Above it lay a grim-faced Fairfield half-back and above him, one arm, the right, wrapped tenaciously about his knees, lay Ted. And, although they had to fairly pry that arm and its clutching fingers loose, Ted knew nothing about it, for he had fainted again!

The home team rushed once, kicked out of danger and the game was over and the crowds overflowed the field, Staunton cheering ecstatically and wildly as she sought to capture her players. But Ted, over by the bench, knew very little of that. He felt Tinker’s tenderly cruel fingers exploring his left shoulder and he groaned. He didn’t mean to, but he couldn’t help it. And he heard Thornton ask solicitously: “Break, Tink?”

“Sure. Shoulder blade. A nice clean break, too. He did it when they tackled him down near their goal that time. He wouldn’t let on and he had me fooled till I noticed a few minutes ago that he wasn’t using his left arm much!”

“Hm!” said the coach.

“And that ain’t all of it either,” continued the trainer, his fingers still at work. “It feels to me like he’d had trouble there before. There’s a sort of lump――All right, lad, I won’t hurt you any more. You’re a plucky little divil! I’ll say that for you!”

And last of all Ted heard Jack Groom’s voice from a great distance: “And that’s the fellow you said was a quitter!”

Then, following that beastly habit of his, Ted fainted again!

“PUFF”

Tom Burrill drew up in the shade at the side of the road, jumped from the car with a wrench in his hand and, lifting the hood, began to inspect the spark plugs.

He was a healthy, well-built, intelligent-looking boy of seventeen, with a lean, sunburned face. Clear gray eyes, a straight nose, a mouth that showed a sense of humor and a chin that indicated determination were his most noticeable features. He was tall for his years and had the look of one who spends much time out of doors.

The automobile deserves quite as full a description as its owner. It was small, low hung and light in weight――more a cycle car than a full-grown runabout――and was painted a bright red, all except the wheels, which were painted black. Its name was “Puff.” There was no doubt about the name, for it was conspicuously painted in black on the gasoline tank behind the seat.

Tom’s father had proposed calling the car “_E Pluribus Unum_,” since it was decidedly one out of many! Tom had built it himself; he had got the parts at secondhand――here, there and anywhere. The small, two-cylinder, twelve-horse-power engine that supplied the motive power Tom had picked up for a song at a repair shop in Kingston. The body he had built himself, and the engine hood he had had made at the local stamping works. You would never have suspected that under the two coats of brilliant red paint the hood was nothing more than a fair quality of zinc!

The car was air-cooled and chain-driven, and when Tom drove it over rough roads it rattled like half a dozen dish pans. But for all that it could do its thirty miles an hour, and perhaps better were it permitted to! Tom had spent most of his spare time that spring in building the car; but he had had a great deal of pleasure, to say nothing of his final triumph when he made his first trip through Kingston, to the confusion of the scoffers who had predicted failure!

But Puff had its troubles, just as larger and more expensive cars have theirs, and so far that summer much of its life had been spent in the stable, undergoing repairs. If the truth were told, however, Tom got almost as much pleasure out of Puff in the stable as he did out of Puff on the road, for he was never happier than when he was tinkering with machinery.

This morning he had overhauled the little car with more than ordinary care, for he was to make the run to Bristol and back, a matter of forty-eight miles all told. The trip was in the nature of a supreme test of Puff’s endurance. All had gone well until Kingston lay two miles behind. Then Puff had begun to skip and lose power, and Tom had at last been forced to investigate.

The investigation, however, was not very successful; both spark plugs were bright and appeared to be firing perfectly. With a puzzled shake of his head, Tom replaced them and began to survey the wiring. It was at this moment that a sound up the road toward home drew his attention. He had barely time to raise his head and look before a huge touring car raced past him in a cloud of dust.

Yet it did not travel so fast that Tom failed to identify the make. It was a Spalding of the latest model――a big, six-cylinder car painted battleship gray, with bright red wheels. In the big tonneau sat a single passenger, a man in a light gray overcoat and a cloth cap. The chauffeur was in brown livery. All this Tom saw before the car was lost to sight round a bend in the road. It did not, he was sure, belong in Kingston, for there was only one six-cylinder automobile in the town, and that was a Wright. Probably the car belonged in Bristol, for the Spalding factory was in that city. It was doubtless returning from a trip to Kingston, he concluded.

He started his engine again and climbed back to the seat. Puff started off well, and Tom was congratulating himself on having unwittingly repaired the trouble, when again the engine began to miss fire. It seemed very puzzling. His errand made it necessary for him to reach Bristol before the bank closed at twelve, and so he did not dare to spend too much time on the road. As long as Puff made its twenty miles an hour――and it was doing that and more, as the small speedometer showed――he decided that he would keep on. After he had delivered the envelope that was in his pocket at the bank and thus done his father’s errand, he would look for the trouble.

“If I can’t find it,” he said to himself with a smile, “maybe I’ll drop round to the Spalding factory and exchange Puff for one of those ‘six-sixties’! Only,” he added half aloud as he swung round the turn, “they’ll have to give me something to boot!”

The next instant he was staring ahead with interest. Beyond, drawn up at the side of the road, stood the big car. The chauffeur was leaning under the raised hood and the passenger was watching from the car. As Tom approached he slowed Puff down a little. He would have been less than human had he not experienced an instant of mild satisfaction. Puff had cost him something like eighty dollars, whereas the big Spalding, as Tom well knew, was priced at nearly four thousand dollars; and certainly, as far as the quality of “get there” was concerned, the big car was at that moment inferior to the little one.

As Tom approached, he noticed that the man in the gray overcoat looked cross and irritated, and that the chauffeur was worried. It seemed rather ridiculous for him to offer assistance, he reflected, but, nevertheless, he stopped. “I don’t suppose I can be of any help, sir?” he inquired.

The man in the car shook his head impatiently, with only a glance toward him; but the chauffeur, casting a quick and wondering look over the small car and wiping his hands upon a bunch of waste, replied sarcastically, “Not unless you’ve got a spare cylinder.”

“What!” cried the man in the car. “Cylinder gone?”

“Piston’s broken, sir. Thought maybe it was only the valve was stuck or something, but I guess it’s the piston, all right.”

“But jumping cats!” snapped the man in the gray coat. “You can’t mend a broken piston rod!”

“No sir.”

“And she won’t run?”

“No, sir, not to speak of. She’s pushing the charge back into the carburetor. We might limp along about ten miles an hour, Mr. Fletcher, but I shouldn’t like to say that we’d not spoil another cylinder.”

“But I’ve got to get back by eleven! Can we get another car round here?”

“There’s a garage at Kingston, sir. Maybe――――”

“How far back is it?”

“A matter of three miles, I guess.”

“About two and a half,” Tom corrected.

The passenger looked at his watch and frowned impatiently.

“I suppose it would take half an hour to get it,” he said. “It’s 10.18 now and my train leaves at 11.04. There’s less than an hour, and I’ve got to get that train to Chicago. Look here!” He swung round toward Tom. “Will that thing you’ve got there run?”

“Yes, sir,” answered Tom a little coldly. He did not like to have Puff called a “thing”!

“Will, eh?” snapped the man. “Well, there’s fifty dollars in it if you’ll get me to Bristol in time for the 11.04 express. Can you do it?”

Tom shook his head. “No, sir. If it’s 10.18 now, there’s only forty-six minutes and the distance is twenty-two miles. This car can do thirty on good roads, but――――”

“Tut! tut! tut! Any car that can do thirty can do thirty-five if you push it. I tell you I’ll give you fifty dollars if you get me there. Isn’t that enough?”

“Plenty, thanks,” replied Tom quietly. “But I’m not running very well to-day. Something wrong with my plugs, I guess; or maybe it’s the wiring. Anyway――――”

But Mr. Fletcher was already climbing out of his car. “Dennis!” he said sharply. “Bring some spare spark plugs!”

He was across the road in a second. “Get your plugs out,” he ordered Tom, “and see if mine will fit. Get a move on, if you want to earn that fifty.”

Tom hesitated for an instant. Then he said, “I’ll do the best I can, sir.”

By the time the chauffeur had found the new plugs Tom had taken the old ones out. Fortunately, the new ones fitted and the chauffeur quickly screwed them in. As Tom connected the wires, Mr. Fletcher issued directions to the chauffeur.

“Get my bag, Dennis. Put it between my feet here. You stay with the car and I’ll send out and have you towed home. Put it in the shop and tell Morrison to give you something to use while it’s being fixed. Meet the 4.10 to-morrow afternoon. All right, son! Now let’s see what you can do.” He pulled his watch out again. “You’ve got forty-four minutes!”

Tom started the engine, sprang to the seat, threw in the clutch, changed to high speed and bounded gayly off. The seat was narrow and low, and Mr. Fletcher, who was of ordinary height and stockily built, filled his half of it to overflowing.

“Most uncomfortable seat I was ever in!” he exclaimed. “What make of a car is this, for goodness’ sake?”

“Burrill, two-twelve, Model A,” replied Tom gravely, clinging to the wheel as the car swung round the next bend in the road.

“Never heard of it,” said the other. “Won’t it go any faster than this?”

The hand on the speedometer was hovering back and forth round thirty. Tom drew the throttle down another notch and the hand went to thirty-three. The new spark plugs had evidently done the work, for there was never a skip now. Puff was running as smoothly as a Spalding Six!

“That’s better!” grunted the passenger, holding on tight to keep from being jounced out. “If the thing sticks together we may make it. How much do they get for these things?”

“It cost me about eighty dollars,” answered Tom, tooting his horn frantically as he saw a wagon ahead.

“Oh, second-hand, eh?”

“Most of it, sir. I made it myself.”

“Made it yourself!” There was both surprise and admiration in Mr. Fletcher’s tone. “Well, you’re a mechanic, my boy. I’ll apologize for any disparaging remarks I may have made. Sorry if I hurt your feelings.”

“That’s all right,” replied Tom, as he swung almost into the ditch to get round the wagon, the driver of which was fast asleep on the seat. “It isn’t much of a car, but it does pretty well. And I haven’t broken any pistons yet!”

“Hum!” said Mr. Fletcher. “Well, send her along, son. If she’ll keep this up we may make it. By Jove, we’ve got to make it! I wouldn’t miss that appointment in Chicago for a thousand dollars! Let her out another notch. You’ve got a straight road.”

But Tom shook his head. “I’d rather not. We can make it this way if nothing happens.”

Mr. Fletcher grunted. The little car was going at its best speed; to Tom, who was clutching the wheel with strained muscles and intently watching the road ahead, it seemed to leap past the fences as if it were alive.

“So you made this yourself?” Mr. Fletcher said presently. “Must have been something of a job. I’ve made a few myself, but――――”

There was a sharp _crack_! Mr. Fletcher’s side of the car suddenly sank, and he grabbed wildly at Tom in an effort to keep his balance. As Tom set the emergency brake, the car swerved and came to a stop. Tom leaped out and viewed the damage.

“Spring’s busted,” he reported. “I always thought they were too light.”

“Spring, eh? Well, she’ll run, won’t she?”

“Yes, sir, but it’s going to be uncomfortable, because the body’s right down on the axle on your side.”

“H’m, I guess a little more discomfort won’t matter! Let’s get on, let’s get on!”

They went on, with the speedometer wavering round thirty-three miles an hour. Twice Tom had to slow down: once when the road dipped and turned sharply under a railway bridge, and again when they passed through the little village of West Adams. At intervals Mr. Fletcher, carefully releasing his hold on the car, took out his watch and reported the time.

“Ten thirty-eight,” he said, as they speeded up again beyond West Adams. “How much farther?”

“About twelve miles. We’ll do it if――――”

“We’ve got to do it!”

A few minutes later Mr. Fletcher sniffed the air. “She’s heating up, isn’t she? Got water in your radiator?”

“No, sir; she’s air-cooled.”

“Smells like it!”

A long hill rose in front, and Tom pulled down his throttle another notch or two. Puff took the hill flying, and Mr. Fletcher grunted in unwilling admiration.

“Lots of power! What’s that?”

A dull pounding noise was coming from under the car.

“Flat tire,” said Tom. “We’ll have to run on the rim.”

“Ten forty-seven!” Mr. Fletcher announced. “Can we do it?”

“If she’ll hold together! It’s only about six miles, I think.”

“When you get this side of town, where the two roads branch at the powder factory, take the right. It’s a poor road, but it’s a mile shorter and goes straight to the station.”

_Bumpity-bump!_ went the body against the axle! _Thumpity-thump!_ went the wheel with the flat tire. _Honk! honk!_ went the horn. The little car tore along. Five minutes later the smoke pall above Bristol was in sight. The road grew rougher and wagons began to dispute the way. At the powder factory Tom swung to the right on a road that was rutted by heavy teaming.

“Just fifty-seven!” shouted Mr. Fletcher above the noise.

Tom nodded. Ahead of them the city, with its tall chimneys belching smoke, was now in plain sight. Puff jumped and careened, but kept its pace. Three miles more and seven minutes left!

Suddenly an exclamation of dismay from his companion sent Tom’s gaze traveling far up the road. A quarter of a mile ahead a drawbridge spanned a river, and approaching it from downstream was a tugboat. Even as Tom looked little puffs of gray steam rose from the tug, and an instant later the whistle blasts from it reached him. She was signaling for the draw; the tender already had begun to swing the gates.

“That settles it!” groaned Mr. Fletcher.

Tom calculated the distance, pulled down the throttle, and Puff sprang madly forward.

“Reach past me and blow the horn!” Tom gasped.

Mr. Fletcher obeyed. _Honk! honk! honk!_ shrieked the little car. The bridge tender had closed one of the two gates on the farther side and was hurrying toward the other. _Honk! honk! honk!_ Then he heard, paused, looked from car to tugboat and, raising a hand, warned them back.

But Tom never hesitated. On rushed the car. The bridge was only a hundred feet away now, and Mr. Fletcher shouting unintelligible words, was working the horn madly. The bridge tender had half closed the second gate, when he changed his mind and hastily swung it open. There was a roar of planks under flying wheels, a swerve, the sound of a rear hub glancing from the end of the closed gate, and they were over. Behind them a wrathful tender shook his fist in the air!

“Three minutes past!” gasped Mr. Fletcher.

But the station was in sight, beside the platform stood the long express. Still honking wildly, Puff dashed through the slow-moving traffic and pulled up with a jerk at the platform. Waving at the engineer, Mr. Fletcher tumbled out.

“Bag!” he cried.

Tom pushed it across with one foot.

“Thanks! I’ll have to send――that fifty. What’s――the name?”

“Tom Burrill, sir, but I don’t want any money.”

“All abo-o-oard!” called the conductor.

“Nonsense! Tom Burrill? Live in Kingston? You’ll hear from me――day or two! By!”

Mr. Fletcher rushed away, and was half pushed up the steps of a parlor car as the train moved off. Ten minutes later, at the bank, Tom put a question to the man at the window:

“Is there a Mr. Fletcher who lives here in Bristol, sir?”

“Fletcher? Certainly. Mr. Henry L. Fletcher lives here.”

“And――and what does he do, please?”

“Do? Why, makes automobiles, of course! haven’t you ever heard of the Spalding car?”

“Oh!” murmured Tom.

“Made right here in Bristol. A fine car, my boy.”

“Not bad,” replied Tom carelessly as he turned away. “Weak in the cylinders, though.”

Four days later at breakfast Tom received a letter in an envelope that bore the words, “Spalding Automobile Company, Bristol.”

The inclosure was brief. He read:

DEAR SIR: We are instructed by the President, Mr. Henry L.
Fletcher, to deliver to you or your order one of our Model 14
Runabouts, fully equipped. The car is here at your disposal.
Kindly call or send for it at your early convenience. Awaiting
your instructions, we remain,

Respectfully yours,
SPALDING AUTOMOBILE COMPANY,
per W. W. MORRISON, Manager.

“And what,” inquired Tom’s father a little later, “will you call this new automobile of yours? E Pluribus Fletcher?”

Tom did not hesitate. “I guess,” said he loyally, “I’ll call it Puff the Second.”

“PSYCHOLOGY STUFF”

Joe Talmadge came to Hollins from some fresh-water college out in Wisconsin. Anyway, they called it a college, but Joe had hard work getting into the upper middle class at Hollins, and Hollins is only a prep school, so it seems that his college, which was called Eureka or Excelsior or something like that, couldn’t have ranked with Yale or Princeton. His father had died the spring before. He had been in the lumber business in a place called Green Bay and had made a pile of money, I guess. They had opened an office or agency or something in Philadelphia a year or so before and when Mr. Talmadge died the other men in the company decided that Joe was to finish getting an education right away and take charge of the Philadelphia end of the business. It was Joe’s idea to finish up somewhere in the East, because, as he said, folks back East were different and he’d ought to learn their ways. That’s how he came to duck his Excelsior place and come to Hollins.

The first time I saw him was the evening of the day before the Fall term began. They’d made me proctor on the third floor of Hyde Hall and after supper that night I was unpacking in number forty-three when I heard a beast of a rumpus down the corridor and hiked out to see what was doing. It seemed that they’d put Joe in thirty-seven with a fellow named Prentice, who hails from Detroit. Prentice was all right except that his dad had made money too quickly. He had invented a patent brake lining or something for automobiles and everyone wanted it and he had made a pile of money in about six years and it had sort of gone to Tom Prentice’s head. He wasn’t a bad sort, Tom wasn’t, but he could be beastly offensive if he set out to. When I knocked at thirty-seven no one inside heard me because there was too much noise. So I just walked in. The study table was lying on its side and the gas drop light――we didn’t have electricity in Hyde then――was dangling a couple of inches from the floor at the end of its green tube. Tom Prentice was lying on his neck on one of the beds with his heels near the ceiling and Joe was standing over him waiting for him to come back to earth. Joe didn’t look mad, but he looked mighty earnest.

He was seventeen, but big for his years, wide-shouldered and powerful looking. He had a nice sort of face, with gray eyes and very dark hair and a good deal of sunburn. His hair needed trimming and some of it was dangling down over his forehead, making him look sort of desperate, and I wondered what would happen to me if I had to step in between them. But I didn’t. Joe stopped knocking Tom around for a minute and I explained that I was proctor and accountable for the peace and quiet of that floor. By that time Tom was sitting on the bed looking dazed and holding one hand to his jaw. I never did find out what had actually started the riot, but it was something that Tom had said about the sovereign State of Wisconsin, I think. I persuaded them to shake hands and forget it and Tom said he hadn’t meant whatever it was just the way Joe had taken it, and when I went out Joe was fussing around Tom with arnica and wet towels.

* * * * *

They got on all right together after that first show-down. Maybe Tom realized that he was no match for Joe. Tom wasn’t any frail lad, either. He weighed about a hundred and sixty and was eighteen years old and played left guard on the Eleven. It was Tom who induced Joe to go out for football. Joe had played a little out West, but had never taken it seriously, and didn’t show any enthusiasm for it now, only Tom kept at him, I guess. Anyway, I saw Joe working with the dubs a day or two after the term began. They had him going through the motions at center on the fourth or fifth scrub. I remember saying to Larry Keets, who was assistant manager that Fall, that “that guy Talmadge was built for the part, all right.” Keets looked across and grinned.

“Yeah, he’s built for it, maybe, but he handles the ball like it was a basket of eggs. Morgan”――Morgan was our coach――“was eying him yesterday, but he’s still where he is. Anyway, we’ve got centers and guards and tackles to burn. It’s back field men we need, Zach, and a couple of good ends.”

Which was all true. We’d lost seven out of the fifteen men who had played in the big game last Fall, and all but two were backs. Of the two, one was an end and the other was a guard. Coach Morgan and Truitt, our right tackle and captain, were raking the whole school for halfback material and not having much success in finding any.

I ought to say here that Hollins had been having a run of perfectly rotten luck for four years. Enwright Academy was our big rival and Enwright had beaten us three times and played us to a scoreless tie once in those four years. It had got so that a win over the blue and gold was something mythical, like the dodo or the dope about Hercules and the Nemean lion. No one in school when I was there had ever seen Hollins beat Enwright at football and we’d got so that we’d stopped hoping, or at least expecting, anything like that to happen. And along about the middle of October, by which time we had been licked three times, we had resigned ourselves to the regular programme: mass meetings, secret practice, plenty of cheering, bluffing to the last minute and――defeat.

We played a ten game schedule that year. The week before the Enwright game we had Gloversville coming back for a return engagement, Gloversville being calculated to give us good practice and no risk of injuries to our players.

About the last week in October I got a surprise. I went down to the field one Thursday afternoon with a couple of the fellows to watch practice. Morgan had started secret sessions, but to-day they had opened the gates. There had been several cuts in the squad by that time and only the first and second teams were left; perhaps thirty-four or five fellows in all. They were scrimmaging when we got there and the second was trying to get over the first’s goal line from the fifteen yards. They made two tries, wide end runs both of them, and didn’t gain an inch, but after each play I noticed that one of the second team men had to trot back about twenty yards to get into position again. Whoever he was, he had just romped through the first’s line and was behind the goal posts each time. Then, when we had got over opposite the play, I saw that it was Joe Talmadge. On the next down the second’s quarter fumbled and after the ball had rolled around awhile the second team’s full-back fell on it. It seemed to me that almost any one of the first team forwards should have broken through and got that pigskin, but they didn’t, and it dawned on me that the reason they didn’t was just because the second’s center had been too stiff for them. After the second had tried a place kick and failed, the ball went back to mid-field, and during the next seven or eight minutes of that scrimmage I watched Joe closely. And what I saw made me wonder if Coach Morgan had lost his eyesight, for Joe simply played Pride to a standstill. Not once did the first make a gain anywhere near the middle of the second team’s line, and when the second finally got the pigskin again, after Stringer had made a mess of a run around left end, it was always Joe who led the way through. He would just spin Pride around like a top, or push him back like he was a straw man, and romp past him. But why Morgan didn’t see it was more than I could figure out, and that evening, after commons, I tackled Captain Truitt. Tru and I were pretty good friends, for I had got him into Arcanium the year before.