CHAPTER XX

PHIL GETS A TELEGRAM

The music stopped with a discord. A strange spell seemed thrown over the dancers. Some, who had come to a stop, now tried to move, and found that their feet were fast to the floor. It was an effort to lift them. The surface that had seemed well waxed was now as sticky as if glue had been poured over it. To walk was almost impossible; to dance, out of the question.

"Maybe it's only in a few places, and we can scrape it off," suggested Will Foster, a chum of Gerhart. "Let's try."

He endeavored, with his knife, to remove some of the sticky stuff, but he might as well have tried to dig up a board in the floor.

"What is it?" asked Gerhart's partner.

"I don't know," he answered ruefully. "Something very sticky has gotten on the floor."

"Maybe some of the waiters spilled ice cream or coffee, or some candy got there," she suggested.

"This is stickier than any of those things," spoke Gerhart. "I--I guess some one has played a trick on us."

"A trick?"

"Yes; the sophomores. I should have been more on the lookout, but I didn't think they could get in. I told the men at the door not to let any one in who didn't have a freshman pin. But--well, we'll wait a bit and see if it dries up," he concluded.

But the stuff on the floor didn't dry up. Instead, it became more sticky. The ballroom was like one big sheet of adhesive flypaper, and the dancers, walking about, felt their shoes pull up with queer little noises every time they took a step. They tried to dance once more, but it was a miserable failure. One might as well have tried to waltz or two-step on the sands of the seashore.

Then from a window there sounded the old song: "Clarence McFadden, He Wanted to Waltz." The chagrined dancers turned to the casement, to behold a circle of mocking faces. Gerhart looked, too.

"The sophs!" he cried, as he caught sight of Tom, Phil, Sid, Dutch Housenlager and several others.

"At your service!" cried Phil. "Guess you'll have to dance to slow music to-night!" And then, to show that it was in revenge for the fire scare, the sophomores sang: "Scotland's Burning."

"It worked to perfection, Dutch. However did you manage it?" asked Tom, as the sophomores, having satisfied themselves that the freshman dance had been spoiled, walked back to college.

"Easy," answered the fun-loving student. "I mixed up a sticky preparation of glue, varnish, gum and so on, made it into a powder, and put it in alcohol. Then I sneaked in past the doorkeeper I had bribed, and sprinkled the stuff all over the floor. There was no color to it, and they didn't notice it. The alcohol kept it from sticking until after the march, and then, when the alcohol evaporated, it left the gum ready to do its work."

"And it did it," commented Sid.

It certainly did, for the disconcerted freshman and the pretty girls soon left the hall. It was impossible to dance on the floor until the sticky stuff had been scraped off.

"It was rather a brutal trick, after all," said Tom to Phil a little later, when the three were in their room. "It would have been all right on the freshies alone, but the girls--they had to suffer, too."

"Of course," said Sid. "Why not? _Secundum naturam_, you know, according to the course of nature it had to be. The good with the bad. The freshies brought it on themselves, eh, Phil?"

"Oh, I suppose so," replied the quarter-back, who was busy with paper and pencil. "Still, it was a bit rough on the lassies. There were some pretty ones----"

"Oh, you fellows and the girls!" exclaimed Sid in disgust. "You make me sick!"

"That's all right," went on Tom easily. "You'll get yours some day, and then we'll see----"

"Hello, where'd that picture come from?" asked Sid, pointing to another photograph on the wall beside those of Ruth and Madge. Tom blushed a bit, and did not answer. Phil looked up and exclaimed:

"Why, it's another picture of my sister! She must have had some new ones taken. Where did it come from?"

"She gave it to me," explained Tom, and his shoelace seemed suddenly to have come unfastened, so it was necessary to stoop over to tie it.

"Hum!" murmured Phil, with a queer look at his chum's red face. "She didn't say anything to me about it. But if you're going to add to our collection, Tom, I guess it's up to me to get another one, too."

"Whose will you get now?" asked Sid. "Haven't you got enough girls' faces stuck up around here? Do you want another?"

"Not another," spoke Phil slowly, "but another of the same one. Miss Tyler promised me one of her new photographs."

"She did?" cried Tom, and he turned quickly.

"Yes; have you any objections?" and Phil gazed straight at Tom.

"No--oh, no. Of course not," he added hastily, "only I didn't know---- What are you doing?" he asked rather suddenly, changing the subject, as he saw Phil's paper and pencil.

"I'm working on a new football play," replied Phil, and he, too, seemed glad that the subject was changed.

"That's more like it," commented Sid. "Now you're talking sense. Let's hear it."

"It's this way," explained Phil, as he showed his chums what he had drawn. "It's a fake tackle run, and a pass to the right half-back. Nothing particularly new about it, as it's often used, but my plan is to work it immediately after we run off a play of left-tackle through right-tackle and right-end. After that play has been pulled off, it will look as if we were trying to repeat it, and we'll catch the other fellows off their guard. In this play, the left-tackle, after the signal, turns back and takes the ball from me. He passes the ball to the right-half, who turns to the left for a run around our left-end. Our full-back charges on the opposing left-tackle, crossing in front of our right-half to better conceal the ball. The left half-back helps the left-tackle to make his quick turn, and then blocks off the opposing right-end, while I help make interference for the right-half, who's got the ball."

"That sounds good," commented Tom. "Go over it again."

Which Phil did, and his two chums both declared it ought to work well. They tried it in practice against the scrub next day, after Coach Lighton and Captain Holly Cross had given their approval to it. The play operated like a charm, and was good for a touch-down. It completely fooled the second eleven.

"It remains to be seen whether it will do the same thing against another team," said the coach. "But we'll try it Saturday against the Dodville Prep School. Now, boys, line up, and we'll run through it again? Also the forward pass and the on-side kick."

The players were in the midst of a scrimmage, and Joe Jackson had just made a fine run, when Wallops was seen coming across the gridiron. The messenger had an envelope in his hand, and at the sight of him Phil Clinton turned pale.

"Get back, Wallops!" cried the coach. "You're in the way."

"I have a telegram for Mr. Clinton," said the messenger.

"Oh, all right. Come on."

Phil's hand were trembling so he could hardly open the message. He read it at a glance. Tom went close to him, and put his hand on his shoulder.

"Is it--is it----" he began.

"Dad says to hold myself in readiness to come at any time," said Phil slowly.

There was silence among the players, all of whom knew of the serious illness of Phil's mother. Coach Lighton went up to the quarter-back and said:

"Well, we won't practice any more to-day. It's too bad, Clinton."

Phil swallowed two or three times. He forced back a mistiness that was gathering like a film over his eyes. He thrust the telegram into his jacket.

"Let's go on with the practice," he said sturdily. "We aren't perfect in that fake tackle run yet, and I want to use it against Dodville."

It was a plucky answer, and many a hardy player on the Randall eleven felt a new liking for the quarter-back as he went to his place behind Snail Looper, who stooped to receive the ball.