Duffield shrugged his shoulders.

“Sure,” he said, “play ’em. But don’t expect to win. That Second Team has been together all Fall and you chaps haven’t played together once yet except in practice. But it’ll be good for you. What time?”

“Four-thirty,” answered Rob. “The First Team and subs are going out on the bay. Prentiss and Hopkins think they need a rest.”

“What they need,” snarled Duffield, “is a stick of dynamite under ’em. Four-thirty, you said?”

“Yes, sir. Devens wants to wait until Hop and Prentiss get out of the way. He says the Second is crazy to play us.”

“H’m; well, look out they don’t use you up. Remember we’ve got a real game the day after to-morrow. Better get busy now and run through signals for ten minutes or so.”

A few minutes later Malcolm called the coach’s attention to the group of fellows assembling in front of Academy. “The First is getting ready to start, sir.” Duffield followed the other’s gaze and smiled cynically.

“They’re not going to walk all the way to the village, are they?” he asked.

“Why, yes, sir, it’s only a mile and a quarter by the fields.”

“But in their condition!” said Duffield in simulated alarm. “They’ll drop by the wayside, Warne! They ought to be trundled down in baby-carriages!”

Warne smiled at the thought of Merrill and Topham and the other big linesmen reclining in perambulators, and looked to find a reflection of his amusement in the coach’s face, but Duffield had dived into the mass of boys ahead of him and was already busy shuffling them back into their positions.

“Now try that again and do it right,” he commanded sharply. “These aren’t parlor tricks I’m teaching you. Get into it as though you meant it. Get back, Langton, you’re too near the line. The other half has to run in ahead of you, so give him room. Now, then, Kingsford, same play! That’s better. Jell, you’ve got to double up better than that. Get your head down so you can see just where the ball is going to when you pass it. Try the left shift, Kingsford.”

The First Team and substitutes, some eighteen in all, moved across the Yard and down the meadow slope toward the village, and five minutes later the Second Team began to trickle out of the gymnasium. They had a few minutes’ practice on the School gridiron and then Gus Devens walked across in search of Rob. The latter saw him coming and called a halt, and Duffield sent the first squad to the side-lines.

“All ready, Rob?” asked Gus.

“All ready. We’d better play over there, hadn’t we? This field is pretty rough.”

“I guess so,” Gus replied. “Who’s going to referee for us?”

“Anyone you say. How about Duffield?”

“He will be satisfactory to us, I guess. I suppose you know I’m going to get Hail Columbia for playing with you chaps?”

“I’ll bet you are,” laughed Rob. “Come on and meet Duffield.”

The coach was extremely polite but not genial, and Gus felt somehow as though he were on the wrong side of the fence.

“Will you referee, Mr. Duffield?” he asked.

“If you like. Want to toss now?”

“You call it, Rob.”

“Heads,” said Rob. Duffield picked up the coin.

“Tails,” he announced.

“We’ll take the west goal,” said Gus. “Second this way!”

Two minutes later Koehler kicked off and the game was on. Peeble, the Second Team’s quarter, caught the ball and gained nearly twenty yards before he was downed. Then the Second began to make short but unpleasantly steady gains through Chase, who played right guard, and past James at left tackle. An occasional plunge at center netted little, for Mr. George Washington Jell proved a tough proposition. The ball crept down the field to the Independents’ thirty yard-line. There Devens and Peeble held a whispered consultation and on the next play Peeble tried a quarter-back run. But he chose the wrong side of the line and Brimmer, left end, nabbed him for a loss. With twelve yards to go and only two downs left Peeble sent the backs at the line again. But the Independents were encouraged by their momentary success and the gain was short. Peeble was evidently at a loss, for he twice changed his signals and then consulted Devens.

“You’re delaying the game,” cautioned Duffield.

“Hinkley back!” called the Second’s quarter, and the team arranged itself to protect the kicker.

“It’s a fake!” cried Rob. “Look out for a forward pass!”

The ball went back to Peeble and he bounded to the side and poised himself for the throw. Then Brimmer squirmed through outside Devens and hurled himself on Peeble just as the latter sent the ball away. The pass was spoiled, Evan tipping it and then falling on it with half the Second Team writhing about him.

It was now the Independents’ time to show what they could do at offense and Evan went at it hammer and tongs. The team, even in one short week, had learned speed, and the way the plays were pulled off was a veritable revelation to the Second. The backs were “knifed” through the Second’s line time and again for gains of two and three yards, being stopped only when the secondary defence was reached. Rob distinguished himself that day as a line-plunging back. He went in low and hard and at top speed, and tore and squirmed and fought his way through, keeping his feet astonishingly. On the third down, time and again, it was Rob who took the ball and made the required distance, often with barely an inch to spare. Had the Independents possessed at that time any semblance of real team-play and rallied around the runner as they should have Rob’s gains would have been considerably lengthened. But, even as it was, the ball was soon past the middle of the field and Devens and Peeble were imploring their men to hold, to “get low,” to “break this up!” Almost down to their opponent’s forty yard-line the Independents met a reverse. Lyman, right half-back, fumbled and the Second got the ball.

Peeble sent his backs at the Independents’ line again, but now the latter had tasted battle, had got over any stage-fright they may have had at first and were fast learning what to do and how to do it. Two tries netted the Second but eight yards and Hinkley punted. Lyman, playing back with Evan, fumbled his catch but recovered it again, eluded a Second Team end and reeled off twelve or fourteen yards before he was brought down. There remained but a bare two minutes of playing time and Rob, after he had torn off three yards and Shaler, full-back, had gained two more, punted the ball down to the Second’s thirty-five. The Second sent Hinkley back again and returned the punt on the first down, relying, evidently, on another fumble in the Independents’ back-field. But it was Evan who made the catch this time and who dodged at least half a dozen of the enemy and brought the ball almost to the middle of the gridiron. Then time was called by Warne who was combining the offices of time-keeper and linesman, and the teams trotted off.

Duffield followed his charges over to a sheltered position behind the old grandstand and saw them well wrapped in their blankets. Then one by one he drew the players aside and pointed out their mistakes. When it came Evan’s turn he said:

“You did pretty well, Kingsford, all things considered. But you slowed up a little toward the end. That’s what you’ve got to guard against. I want you to drive the team just as hard in the last two minutes as in the first, harder if it can be done. Remember that the other team is as tired as you are, and perhaps a lot tireder. If they’re big and heavy, with a little too much flesh, they’re bound to be feeling it more than you. That’s the time to snap it along, Kingsford. Now another thing: You’ve got to use your wits. I know we’re hard up for plays as yet, but you can make what we have got go better if you study things a bit. Watch how each play works. If you send a back outside of end and find later that that end is playing wide and looking for another play of the same sort, why, jab a runner inside of him. Or if you find he is running in fast on plays directed at his end, take the ball yourself and try a wide end run. Don’t get into a rut with your plays; keep them guessing every minute. That was a good run you made after your catch. With a little interference you might have got by. Try it again when you get a chance and don’t let them crowd you too near the side-line. In the next half I want you to cut out the punting unless the other fellows have shoved you inside your twenty yards. You needn’t be afraid of a field-goal, I guess. When you do call for a punt see that your men are in their places and on their toes before you signal for the pass. If you get inside their twenty yards, Kingsford, hammer Langton and Shaler at their right guard. That chap’s soft and I think he will quit after you’ve roughed it up with him a few times. But leave him pretty generally alone until you’re where you can take it out of him. If you use him up early in the half Devens will put in a substitute, and I’ll bet the sub would be a harder proposition than the present chap. That’s all; except this: fast, fast, fast!”

Duffield slapped him on the shoulder and sent him back to the others. Then Warne announced that time was up and Duffield followed the men onto the field again. He had made no changes as yet in the line-up, for all the fellows had weathered the first half in good shape and he wanted them all to have a good taste of experience. By this time news of what was going on had reached the School and there was quite an audience strung along the side-lines, an audience palpably in sympathy with the Independents.

Devens had made but one change in his team, and Duffield and his charges were relieved to observe that the new man was not a right guard. He was a full-back, by name Putnam, and his one forte was kicking.

“That means that they’ll try for a field-goal if we give them the chance,” whispered Rob to Evan as they took their places.

“Then they mustn’t have the chance,” answered Evan. “Anyhow, they’ve weakened their back-field, for Deering is a good man.”

Then Duffield blew his whistle, the Second’s center kicked off and the second half began. For the first six or eight minutes it was virtually a repetition of the preceding period. The ball changed hands a little more often, perhaps, for each team played together rather better and each rush line was stiffer. The half was more than half gone when the spectators got their first taste of excitement. The Second worked a pretty forward pass, quarter to left end, and left end went dodging and scampering over four white lines before he was laid low. That brought the pigskin to the Independents’ eighteen yard-line. A fake plunge at center with the runner cutting past tackle gained five yards and a mass-play on the right side of the line gained two more. Then Putnam was sent back and the Independents set their teeth and crouched low to get through and block at any cost.

Back went the ball and Putnam, rather nervous because he had not been used much as yet, dropped it in front of him and swung his long leg back. Toe and ball met, but Kasker and Jelly were through and it was Jelly’s ample form that got between ball and cross-bar. There was a loud thump, a mingling of cries alarmed and triumphant and a wild scurry for the elusive oval. Up the field it bounded and trickled, and player after player hurled himself upon it only to have it slip from his grasp and begin a new series of gymnastics. It was the Second Team’s left guard who finally captured it and by that time it was back past the thirty yard-line. The audience yelled approval and Rob thumped Jelly on the back and called encouragement. The catastrophe had unsettled the Second and in three downs the ball changed hands again.

“How much time is there?” called Evan.

“Almost six minutes,” answered Malcolm from the side-line.

Then Evan snapped out his signals, Rob fell back as though for a punt and Evan skirted the Second’s left end for a good twelve yards. Three plunges at the left of the opposing line gave them their distance again and the ball was just short of the fifty-five yard streak. Then came some pretty playing on the part of the Independents, while the spectators ran along the side-lines and cheered madly. Shaler, who had been used very little so far in the half was given the ball time after time and went fighting through for a yard, two yards, three, sometimes even four. Three times the Independents made their distance on line attack. Then the measuring tape showed that they had failed, and, to Evan’s despair, the ball went to the Second. On the threshold of the enemy’s goal luck had turned her back!

But if luck can turn once it can turn again, and it did. After one ineffectual plunge at right tackle Peeble sent Putnam back. Again the Second’s line failed to hold, and Putnam, with another blocked kick threatening him, swung hurriedly and the pigskin went hurtling out of bounds at the forty yards. Evan took up the fight again, sending Lyman outside of left tackle for a short gain and then winning the distance in two plunges at the tackle-guard hole on the left. The thirty yard mark passed under foot. The Second was getting slow now and Evan, with no mercy for his own tired men, sent his plays faster and faster. Gus Devens began to put in substitutes: a new man at left end, a new man at left guard, a new man at center. But Corbett, at right guard, remained and Evan sighed with relief. Nothing about Corbett suggested the quitter to Evan, nor did the fellow seem soft, but Evan relied on Duffield’s judgment. It was second down now and eight to go, and the ball was still a good five yards from the twenty yard-line. Evan pulled Rob aside and whispered to him. Rob nodded, glancing at the cross-bar of the goal. Then he went back, patted the ground and held his arms out. The team formed for defence of kicker. Back went the ball, but not to Rob, although that youth seemed to catch it and swing his leg at it. It went to Evan, and Evan doubled himself over it an instant and then, straightening up and dodging his way behind the battling lines, he found an opening and went spinning through and would have had a clear field to the goal-line had not Putnam redeemed himself and brought him down some fifteen yards short of the last mark. Pandemonium reigned along the side-lines. Duffield, inscrutable and impartial, allowed himself the ghost of a smile as he waved to Malcolm and announced “First down!”

Then, fighting like heroes, Rob and Shaler hurled themselves upon the Second’s right guard and Duffield’s prediction came true. Corbett gave, slowly at first, until, although the Second’s back-field rallied behind him, he was worse than useless and Devens, crying for time, sent him staggering off and put a new man in his place. The ball was inside the five yards then and the spectators were imploring a touchdown.

They got it.

Evan sent Rob again at the same place, and, although the new man was fresh and strong, and although the Second expected the play, the Independents went through. There was a wavering, indecisive moment, and then the defending line buckled inwards and the foe came swaying, falling through for a touchdown and the winning score.