In the short intermission both teams took account of stock and heard some vividly suggestive words from the coaches. The problem for Seaton was to keep the score as it was. A successful trick play, the fumble of a punt, a lucky end run by the fleet Hillbury back, might turn the present advantage into ultimate ruin; for from two touchdowns and two goals results a score of twelve points, while the two touchdowns and one goal which Seaton had achieved had yielded but eleven.

“If they get another touchdown, they’ll beat us,” declared Laughlin; “we’ve simply got to hold ’em.” And the others nodded emphatic agreement, and in various forms repeated the sentiment. There was no lack of comprehension of the situation.

The coaches drew the captain into a corner apart.

“I’ll bet you’re going in,” whispered Wolcott to Durand. “These fumbles have sewered Jack, and they’re afraid of a punting game. If you do go in, try to forget where you are and play just as you did last Tuesday on the second. Yell your signals good and loud, and don’t try to be so terribly fast. I’ll risk you for tackling and hugging the ball.”

Durand didn’t answer, but he felt a thrill from crown to toe, a sudden uplift of joy, and as sudden a reaction of doubt and fear.

The coaches turned. “Durand starts at quarter,” said Laughlin. “No fumbling now! If we get the ball, hang to it like death and fight for every inch. Hold ’em on the first down, and we’ve got ’em licked.”

Jackson winced under the pitying glances. He had failed,—failed terribly; but for that blocked kick? the score would now be a precarious tie. Yet it was hard to be cut off from any chance to retrieve himself; to know in advance that his error, though forgiven, would not be forgotten; that whatever befell the team, his own defeat was assured. He turned hard round to wink back the tears that would well into his eyes; but a moment later he was running over the signals with Durand and trying to help him to a knowledge of the weaknesses of the men against him.

Hillbury was already out, the men alert and hopeful, as if the odds were in their favor; for their coaches had laid out a plan which was to lead to victory. A new man was in guard’s place opposite Wolcott; but the Seaton player had less thought for his opponent than for Durand’s experiment, and less for Durand than for the game to be played. He charged fiercely down on Bullard’s kick-off, as if he felt no heaviness in his weary limbs. The Hillbury end got the ball and dashed furiously down on Wolcott’s side; but the Seaton guard caught him squarely and low, and downed him hard. Then Hillbury tried a double pass for an end run, and finally smashed her way through left tackle to a first down. After that Seaton held and Rounds punted. The ball went to the new back, of course; and Durand, though he held the ball, was pulled down before he had run it back across the second chalk-line. Seaton pushed up the field again a dozen yards and was forced to punt, and Hillbury had a chance again on her forty-yard line.

Hillbury tried a single quick dash outside Bent, gaining three yards with apparent ease, then unexpectedly kicked. It was a long sailing punt, that seemed to float on and on with the help of the wind as if it were never to drop. Durand, who was playing well back, whirled suddenly and ran, then turned and gathered the ball in. Squeezing the precious thing tight in the hollow of his arm, he shot forward, sidestepped clear of the Hillbury end, who lunged at him, and tacking in and out of the loose swarm of friend and foe, he threaded his way with erratic, darting, shuttlelike movement beyond the middle of the field. When he went down, every spectator around Mr. Lindsay was on his feet yelling admiration.

“Now’s our chance,” cried the Harvard student jubilantly, as he resumed his seat. “Rip ’em up there, quarter-back; smash ’em through the centre; put another knot in that score!”

But instead the quarter sent Buist at the end. The Hillbury end dodged into the interference and threw the Seaton runner back a yard. Through the centre only two were gained, and Seaton, fearing to lose the ball, punted. Howe got it on his ten-yard line and carried it valiantly back across several white lines.

The Hillbury full drew back to punt. Buist was already scuttling into his back field when Hendry, who saw something in the attitude of the backs to arouse suspicion, exclaimed sharply, “Fake! fake!” But it was too late. While he was speaking the ball was snapped, the Seaton guards ploughed through to block the expected kick, and Joslin with the ball under his arm, and two interferers beside him, darted for the right end. Hendry was boxed; Read got tangled in the interference; Wendt just touched the runner with his finger ends as he flung himself at the fleeting mark; and Joslin, the fastest sprinter, barring one, in both the schools, had almost an open field to the Seaton goal-posts.

The “almost” was the little quarter-back crouching in the distance, his eyes glued upon his fast approaching foe. It was an awful moment; the Seaton sympathizers caught their breaths and sent their hope in a single mighty yearning to the aid of the last defender of their goal. Durand saw nothing but the man charging with the ball, felt no fear of the critical instant, but only intense eagerness to meet the man squarely and get his arms around those flashing legs. Step by step he moved forward, in catlike watch of every movement of his opponent, who was bounding toward him in strong, free leaps. A dozen yards away Joslin swerved suddenly to run around his man. At the moment Durand shot forward to cut the runner’s path. For one critical instant only was the Hillbury man within his reach; but that instant Durand felt in every nerve of his body, and his body acted of its own volition. He did not reason nor question; it was as if some mysterious electric force suddenly caught him with irresistible impulse and launched him against his foe. Down the two went in a whirl of legs; and only when Durand had disentangled himself from the quickly formed heap and scrambled to his feet, did his mind awake to the success of the play.

But the stop to the Hillbury advance was only temporary. Three yards were gained through Bent, and on a second trial three yards more. They had “found” Bent. Laughlin tore off his head-guard and flung it far away to the side-lines, hoping to see better where to strike. He played still farther out to support the weak side. Again the Hillbury charge went crashing through the Seaton tackle. When the players extricated themselves from the mÊlÉe, one big form still lay outstretched upon the ground. It was Laughlin!

The trainers came hurrying in with water-pail and sponge and liniment. The fallen man was got upon his feet, his face mopped, his condition eagerly inquired for. A bruise at the edge of his hair above his eye showed the mark of a heavy boot.

“Dizzy?” asked the trainer, anxiously.

“A little,” responded the player; “but it doesn’t amount to anything. I can go back now.”

“You’d better take your head-guard again,” urged the trainer.

But Laughlin tore himself away from the solicitous group. “I’m all right,” he declared savagely. “Play the game!”

The lines formed again amid tremendous applause from the Seaton side, as the injured man went bravely back into the fray.

The Hillbury quarter, shrewdly guessing on the probabilities, drove his heaviest back against the Seaton captain. For the first time in the game a hole was found at right guard, and when Milliken and Buist stemmed the charge, the ball lay six yards down the field. The next attack was at Bent, the third through Laughlin. The fourth in the same place stretched the Seaton captain again upon the ground.

“Dave, you’re hurt! You oughtn’t to go on,” pleaded Wolcott, taking Laughlin’s head in his lap. The captain’s eyes moved uncertainly; he seemed suddenly stripped of his strength. In a moment, however, the old spirit returned, and he rose determined.

“I’m all right,” he insisted. “I’m all right; play the game!”

Laughlin was the captain; his orders were not to be questioned.

A plunge at the Seaton left was squarely met, another on the right penetrated five yards. Laughlin was down again. Time was called, and Collins came running in with his water-pail.

“Tell him to go off,” urged Wolcott. “He doesn’t know what he’s about. It’s cruel to let him stay here!”

The trainer shrugged his shoulders; he was not master on the field. Laughlin lifted himself unsteadily to his feet. The applause on the Seaton side had ceased; instead, ominous shouts of “Take him out! take him out!” were heard along the bank of crimson and gray.

“I’m all right,” persisted the captain; “I can play;” and he started back to his place. Wolcott grasped his arm.

“Dave!” he cried in despair, “you aren’t fit to play. Go off and let us finish the game. You aren’t yourself at all. Do what I say, please!”

But Laughlin snatched his arm away and turned toward the line.

Wolcott threw himself before him. “Answer me one question, and I won’t say another word. Where are you going to college, Harvard or Yale? Just answer me that.”

With stupid eyes Laughlin gazed into his friend’s face. “Harvard or Yale? Harvard or Yale?” he repeated. “It’s one or the other, but I don’t seem to know which—” Then straightening up, he shouted: “We’re wasting time! Set ’em going there! Get into the game!”

But Wolcott’s test question had shown convincingly Laughlin’s incapacity. The coach was allowed to come on the field, and together they labored with the bewildered but stubborn fellow, who, like the famous Spartan captain, refused to retreat while the enemy was still before him.

Only when Poole and Ware were called in, and their personal appeal was added to the pleas of Wolcott and the coach, did the dazed captain give way, and allow his friends to lead him from the field. Wolcott, who had sometimes played on the right side, went over into Laughlin’s place, Butler succeeded Wolcott, and Conley replaced Bent.

“Lindsay will act as captain,” said the coach, as he left the field.

“Hold ’em, fellows, you can do it! Keep watch of that ball!” The new captain took naturally to his duties.

The Hillbury quarter tried the new guard, but Butler was fresh and strong, and determined to prove his value; he charged hard and quick, and the attack was thrown back as a sea wave from a cliff. Joslin was sent at Pope’s end; but Conley went through and shattered the interference, and Pope downed the sprinter before he had reached the line. Then the Hillbury full-back retired for a try at goal, and the Seaton guard on one side and tackle on the other sifted through the line and plunged upon him. The ball went wide; Durand, getting it safely, touched it behind the goal-line, and the team went back to the twenty-five-yard line. A sigh of relief, like the whisper of the wind, soughed audibly along the Seaton benches, as the ball was punted far up the field, and the play started once more in less dangerous territory.

The game was now near its end. The sun was setting; darkness would soon descend upon the field. Hillbury, discouraged at the failure to score when the opportunity had seemed so bright, played with less fire and speed. On the third down, with but a yard to gain, a Seaton linesman scented the play and tackled the runner behind his own line. The ball was in Seaton hands in the middle of the field. Wolcott whispered to Durand, the signals rang out, the quarter-back took the ball, dodged around Hendry, edged by the Hillbury back, and behind Lindsay and Wendt twisted his jerky, slippery course past half-a-dozen frantically grasping Hillburyites to the open field. Here, if his speed had equalled his agility, Durand might have carried the ball directly to a touchdown; but Joslin caught him from behind, and throwing him without mercy, strove to wrench the ball from his hands. Durand clung to it desperately, and Seaton had the ball on the twelve-yard line. From here across the goal-line was but a question of half-a-dozen determined drives.

After this third touchdown there was no more anxiety on the Seaton side. The followers cheered from happiness now, and assurance that the great contest was won—not because the team needed support. It was hearty cheering, but tumultuous and ragged.

Across the field Hillbury, undaunted to the end, with full volume and in splendid unison, sent forth their exhortation. And when, a few minutes later, with the weary lines still struggling in mid-field, the referee’s whistle announced the end, the Hillbury sky-rocket call was still sounding clearly in Seatonian ears.