Chapter 2

"I was afraid of that," quarterback Rigsbee mumbled. "But we scored on the Varsity anyhow. They can't take that away from us! Never mind that, guys--we'll do it all over again!"

Cut here Alf's optimism encountered its first snag. The Varsity, now desperate, crashed through the Seconds' line to throw Mack for a four yard loss. In four downs the Seconds had advanced the ball only to the nine yard line where it went over. The Varsity tried a running play which failed to gain and then kicked out of danger. On an exchange of punts, the Varsity gained twenty yards and put the ball in play on their twenty-nine yard line.

"Here we go!" they announced.

"Yes--_backward_!" shouted quarterback Rigsbee as the Seconds' line charged fast and forced a two yard loss.

"Get in there!" ordered the Coach. "You've got to work for your yardage tonight. I haven't picked out any bed of roses for you Varsity men. If you're going to stand a chance against Pomeroy you've got to do better than this!"

"Don't let them shake Frank Meade loose!" pleaded Alf of his determined Seconds. "Frank depends on Dave's clearing the way for him. Stop Dave and you stop Frank most of the time!"

"I'll take care of Dave!" volunteered Mack, eyeing his rival for right halfback. "The coach thinks he's better than I am. All right--this is a swell time for him to prove it!"

On the first play with Dave running as interference, Grinnell's star blocking halfback collided with the fellow who thought he was just as good and Mack's ambitious effort to break up the formation ended in a nose dive as Frank, carrying the ball, raced down the field for thirty-seven yards and a first down on the Seconds' thirty-four yard line.

"I thought you said you'd take care of Dave," chided quarterback Rigsbee as a dejected Mack picked himself up.

"He won't block me out again!" was all Mack would say as he took his place behind the line.

"Dave's a tough man to stop," rejoined Alf. "You pick him off right along and you _are_ good!"

The Varsity was laughing now. Frank's long run had pepped Grinnell's first stringers up. Quarterback Bert Henley said something in Frank Meade's car. Frank nodded. It was to be one of Coach Edward's new plays ... two laterals behind the line with Frank on the ball carrying end.

"Watch this one!" warned Alf Rigsbee as he saw the shift. His Seconds were all eyes and they needed to be for the passes which followed left them momentarily dazed. The pigskin changed hands with bewildering speed behind the line and Frank finally emerged with Dave running interference, dashing around right end. Most of the Seconds had been pulled in on the play but Mack, studying the shift closely, hazily recalled that this was another of the plays he had seen diagrammed.

"Frank around right end!" he exclaimed, "that play looked like a nifty when they ran through it last night. But I'll nail Frank this time!"

Racing to his left, Mack rapidly loomed in front of the fast traveling Frank who was shielded by his interferer, Dave, running a step ahead and in front of him. Dave, seeing Mack coming, prepared for the impact. Mack, eyes only for Frank, charged savagely, intending to brush Dave aside and keep on going until he had brought Frank to the ground with a diving tackle. What actually happened was extremely jolting to Mack. He hit Dave but did not tumble him. Instead it was he who rebounded and Dave continued on. Mack, rolling over, painfully, saw Dave go on down the field to bowl quarterback Alf Rigsbee, playing safety, out of the way and leave Frank with a clear path to the goal line.

"Great work!" Mack heard Coach Edward complimenting Dave. "That's what I call 'interference'!"

The Varsity lined up in front of the Seconds' goal line with Dave holding the ball while Frank place-kicked the point after touchdown. A chagrined Mack Carver could only turn to Alf and declare: "The score should have been a tie if that touchdown of ours hadn't been disallowed."

Alf shrugged his shoulders, expressively. "What do we care?" was his answer. "It's only practice!"

To Mack, however, his entire efforts seemed to have been punctured like a toy balloon. He had tried to put more fight in his play. He had tried, moreover, to show the coach that Dave was not so hot as a blocking back. But he had actually only served to further demonstrate Dave's great ability to dump would-be tacklers. This scrimmage had been more than practice to him--it had been a final testing of abilities he had claimed to have which he apparently did not possess. The coach would probably discount the runs he had made while impersonating Pomeroy's star back, Dizzy Fox. He had already discredited the touchdown scored on a trumped up play, despite its perfect execution. In fact, every way you looked at it, this fellow Mack Carver appeared as a complete wash-out. He even marvelled now that he had had the audacity to visit Coach Edward and ask why he wasn't a regular on the Varsity. How foolish of him to have imagined that the Coach was holding his relationship to Carl Carver against him! He really owed the coach an apology!

"Hey, Mack!" said a voice, and Grinnell's substitute back, momentarily lost in a solemn revery, realized that Dave Morgan was at his elbow. "Listen, old man," Dave was saying. "I didn't hurt you, did I?"

"No," Mack replied. "But you sure took me out of those plays. It was swell interfering."

Dave nodded. "You came at me like the charge of the Light Brigade," he grinned, "only you hit me too high ... gave me a chance to get under you and I hoisted you out of the way. Next time try the shoulder and the half roll--like this ...!" And Dave put his words into action, sending Mack spinning as he did so.

"Much obliged!" was Mack's comment, when he had recovered his balance.

"Don't mention it!" said Dave, and was off to join his Varsity mates as the two elevens lined up again for kick-off.

Mack, standing staring after the fellow who had beaten him out for the team, could scarcely control his feelings. He had carried a chip on his shoulder all season; hadn't mixed with the fellows the way he might have; had taken the game and its incidents too seriously, and here was a guy--his rival--who was sport enough to take him aside and tip him off as to how he might be stopped!

"I'll try it next chance I get," Mack decided, "and if it works...!"

Varsity kicked off to the Seconds who lost the ball on downs after putting on another advance--this one for forty yards. Mack was responsible for half of the yardage gained but the Varsity was now getting on to the Pomeroy plays and developing an effective defense to cope with them. Taking the ball on its twenty-three yard stripe, the Varsity started a slashing drive, mixing straight line plays and end runs. Finally, with the Seconds' defense stiffening, quarterback Bert Henley called upon Coach Edward's new play--the lateral opening out into the forward pass.

"Now!" thought Mack, as he analyzed what was coming.

Dave Morgan, intended as Frank's screen on the pass, lateralled to Frank and stationed himself in front as interferer. Frank, who had started to run wide, faded back for the throw. Coming in fast, Mack, following instructions, tore into Dave, hitting him low. Frank's interference disappeared suddenly and completely in a jolting somersault and Mack, with a half roll, was upon his feet and diving back after the man with the ball. Frank tried to elude him and to forward pass at the last instant but Mack had covered him too fast. He was tackled before he could get the ball away for a loss of twelve yards.

"Great stuff!" congratulated a winded Dave who had staggered to his feet. "That's getting past interference!"

"Now aren't you sorry you wised me up?" smiled Mack, appreciatively. "You could have had things all your own way."

"But it wouldn't have been any fun," was Dave's reply. "Now I've got to _work_!"

And Dave's prediction proved correct. A friendly feud developed between Mack and himself. It was no longer possible for Dave to block Mack out of the play and keep going himself. Invariably the two went down and out together. Occasionally Mack would so batter his interference as to reach the man with the ball himself. If he did not, he so thoroughly removed the interference that he forced the ball carrier in the open and made him comparatively easy prey for fellow Seconds to bring down.

"Dave, you've done wonders for me," Mack said, gratefully, at the end of a gruelling practice. "I don't know how to thank you."

"Don't try," Dave answered. "I've been watching you for some time. I knew you were just missing out. You ought to make it tough for anybody from now on!"

That any fellow player would have been so unselfish as to help a rival overcome a fault in charging interference and thus jeopardize his own position on the team was almost beyond Mack's comprehension. Long after the practice session was over he puzzled Dave's great kindness and wondered, too, whether Coach Edward had finally been impressed with the way he had played.

"After I got the hang of it, I made even Dave look bad," Mack told himself. "I certainly didn't intend to do this ... but every time I broke up the interference and nabbed Frank it counted in my favor and against Dave. Coach doesn't know, of course, who's responsible for my improvement. I only wish it was earlier in the season. I might be able to get somewhere." But this thought brought a feeling of remorse since Mack's advancement would ordinarily have to be at Dave's expense.

"I see now what Coach meant about a fellow's playing wholeheartedly for the team," Mack reflected. "Dave wasn't thinking of himself when he helped me out. If I should develop into the better player, I know he'd take his hat off to me. And here I've been playing for myself right along. Swell guy--this Mack Carver!... So swell he ought to be ducked in Grinnell Lake!"

News travels fast across a college campus. The following morning students were thrown in a turmoil of excitement by word that Coach Edward's office had been rifled during the night and nothing disturbed but the team plays. It was rumored that two detectives had been employed by the college to determine, if possible, the guilty party or parties. Despite an attempt to keep the matter quiet, newspapers got hold the story and, later in the day, papers appeared with streaming headlines:

GRINNELL PLAYS STOLEN FROM COACH'S OFFICE

POMEROY AUTHORITIES INDIGNANTLY DENY ACCUSATIONS OF PART IN ATTEMPT TO SECURE GRINNELL PLAYS AND SIGNALS

The Grinnell _Leader-Tribune_ went so far as to declare, in its news story, that relations between Pomeroy and Grinnell had been strained for the past two years since Grinnell had developed into a school to be feared by the larger college. It seemed that Pomeroy had scheduled Grinnell merely for the purpose of giving her a drubbing and taking it easy between big games and that Grinnell's increased opposition had been embarrassing to Pomeroy students and alumni who rated their eleven far better than the intended victim. Now matters had become so acute, a report was going the rounds that Coach Carl Carver's job at Pomeroy hung upon his winning the Grinnell game, about which there was some doubt owing to Pomeroy's uncertain season. A victory for Grinnell, on the other hand, would be the greatest triumph ever scored by that school since Pomeroy was a nationally known eleven, accustomed to playing the best in the country. "It's a step up or a step down for either coach," the news article concluded, and Mack Carver, Grinnell substitute back, who read the stories with a strange lump in his throat, breathed his thanksgiving that no mention was made of him.

"This is one time when my not being well known as a football player has helped out," he said to himself. "If I'd been prominent on the Grinnell team, I'd have been played up along with my brother. As it is, they'll probably let me alone."

But in this surmise, Mack was wrong. On reporting for football practice that afternoon, he found fellow team members regarding him with traces of suspicion.

"Coach wants to see you in the Field House," Frank informed. "He says not to dress."

Mack stiffened with surprise.

"Okay," he replied, face sobering. "Any idea what it's about?"

"How should I know?" rejoined Grinnell's star back, but Mack fancied he noted an attempt on Frank's part to conceal his real feelings. "Maybe," Frank added, rather lamely, "he's moving you up as a regular!"

"No chance of that," said Mack, grimly. "See you guys later!"

He turned on his heel and strode out of the locker room. On the way to the Field House his thoughts ran together crazily. There could only be one answer to the Coach's request to see him. It must be in connection with the stolen plays!... Mack's mind raced back to the moment in Coach Edward's office when he had been detected examining the plays. He winced. This was probably the meagre clue upon which he was being drawn into the case ... this and the fact that he was a brother of Carl Carver's!

Coach Edward was apparently awaiting Mack's arrival. He was in the company of two strange men when Grinnell's substitute back located him in one of the conference rooms.

"Meet Mr. Pierce and Mr. Greene," the Coach introduced. "Take a chair over here."

Mack sat down, feeling the two men looking him over, shrewdly.

"You've been called," explained Coach Edward at once, "in the hopes that you may help us throw some light on what happened in my office last night."

"I thought so," answered Mack, eyeing his coach squarely.

"Why did you think so?" demanded the man referred to as Pierce. He was solidly built, black moustache and heavy eyebrows. Mack took an instant dislike to his bullying manner.

"The reasons should be obvious," he replied.

"As we understand it," spoke up the man introduced as Greene, "you paid Coach Edward a visit some days ago--at his office."

"I did," acknowledged Mack.

"At that time," continued Mr. Greene, "you took quite an interest in some diagrams of plays which your coach had on his desk."

Mack's face flushed. "I did," he admitted.

"What was the big idea?" boomed Pierce. "You knew your coach would tell you all he wanted you to know about any plays he had. Why take the first chance you got to look them over?"

Mack turned to Coach Edward who sat back, having left the questioning to the two strange gentlemen.

"Listen here, Coach! Who are these men? Am I being cross-examined? You don't think that _I_...?"

"These men are detectives as you've probably supposed," said Coach Edward. "I haven't accused you of anything. The case has been turned over to them. They have been acquainted with all known facts ... and you simply are being asked to contribute what you know."

Mack stirred uneasily. "I don't know anything!" he replied, frowning his defiance.

"Didn't you even know that a key to Coach Edward's office was found to be missing from his desk shortly after you left?" pressed Detective Pierce.

"No," said Mack, his temper slowly rising.

"But you're willing to admit that a knowledge of Grinnell plays and signals would be highly valuable to your brother, aren't you?"

Mack glared. "I suppose they would ... but if you think my brother would take any underhanded advantage...!"

"We're not thinking," interrupted Detective Greene, smoothly. "We're just talking out loud. I believe you've been peeved at your Coach for some time ... even accused him of not giving you the breaks you deserved!"

"That's right," said Mack, after a moment's hesitation. "And I want to apologize for that."

"You do, eh?... What for?"

"Because I discovered last night I was wrong."

"Last _night_?"

"I mean--yesterday afternoon ... in scrimmage. I thought I was better than I really was. I'm sorry I ever said anything, Coach."

Coach Edward nodded, exchanging glances with the two detectives.

"Trying to make things right now, aren't you?" taunted Detective Greene. "But you can't explain away that crack you took at Coach Edward just as you were leaving."

"What crack was that?"

"'Here's hoping you get trimmed by Pomeroy!'" Mack flinched. He had been sincerely trying to straighten matters up but the detectives did not appear to be giving him credit.

"I was sore when I left," said Grinnell's substitute back. "I shouldn't have said that. I didn't really mean it."

"You didn't mean it, eh?... Isn't it a fact, when you left Coach Edward's office you were practically positive you wouldn't get a chance to play against Pomeroy?"

He hesitated. "Yes, sir," he finally granted.

"And," persisted Detective Pierce, "isn't it a fact, if you couldn't get a chance to play, you would rather have seen your brother's team win?"

"No!" cried Mack, rising from his chair.

"Just a minute, son!" snapped Detective Pierce, pushing Mack down. "Wasn't that remark you made, leaving Coach Edward's office, actually a threat?"

Mack stared at the burly figure in front of him in amazement. This interview was taking on the proportions of a third degree.

"A threat?" Mack repeated, somewhat bewildered.

"A threat that, if the coach didn't put you in the game against Pomeroy--you'd do all you could to help Pomeroy win!"

"That's a lie!" branded Mack. "I didn't have any such idea in mind. You can't prove a thing. I never saw the key. I haven't been near Coach Edward's office since. I haven't been in touch with my brother. You can't make me out a thief. I went straight to the Coach with my grievance and got it out of my system. I've apologized--whether he wants to accept it or not. I'd intended going to him and apologizing today ... until this came up. It's unfortunate ... but I didn't have anything to do with it!"

Mack's outburst sounded incoherent as it poured from his lips but he was greatly up-wrought. To think of such suspicions having centered upon him! He could understand how he had been responsible for part of his dilemma but the rest seemed far-fetched, absurd.

"I think, officer, the boy's been questioned enough," said Coach Edward.

"Not quite!" rejoined Detective Pierce. "This young man also mentioned in your presence the rumor that you were out after his brother's job. Isn't that so, Mr. Carver?"

"Yes," glowered Mack, now strictly on the defensive.

"He had that very much on his mind. It's human then to believe that he would be interested in his brother's holding his job. Am I right?... Isn't that the way you feel about it, Mr. Carver?"

"Naturally," conceded Mack, with a feeling of being cornered. "But I wouldn't let even that stand in the way of playing my hardest for Grinnell if I got the chance in the Pomeroy game!"

"On the other hand, if you should sympathize too much with your brother, you might fumble at the right time or make a poor play which would help Pomeroy out?"

"No, no!" Mack fairly shouted. "I'm not that sort. I won't answer another question!"

"You're quite right, Mack," sided Coach Edward, evidently disturbed by the turn the cross-examination had taken. "Gentlemen, I don't think anything is to be gained by detaining Mr. Carver longer."

Detectives Pierce and Greene looked consultingly at one another.

"I'm not satisfied that the boy's telling all he knows," declared Pierce. "Since I'm in charge of this case, I must ask that he be suspended from the team until this matter is solved."

"Please," begged Coach Edward, as Mack looked his concern. "Not that. It will mean unfavorable publicity--ill feeling between the two schools."

"We can't help that," said Detective Pierce, bluntly. "You've reported that your office has been entered. We've been assigned to the case. You've told us everything you knew about events leading up to last night and it's our job to run the clues down. Greene and I feel that this young man should be held as a material witness. Naturally it won't look right for you to keep a man on the team who's under suspicion."

"I quite agree with you there."

"Then suspend him at once."

"I dislike doing this very much."

"You haven't any choice, Mr. Edward."

"But I don't feel you've lined up sufficient evidence to warrant such action. I'll confess thinking first of Mack when I discovered what had been done ... but it was only because of certain incidents. Listening to this cross-examination today, I'm not convinced that he is any way connected. Rather, I believe that the circumstances surrounding him have been unfortunate. I'd much prefer to drop the whole matter than..."

"You can't drop it!" bellowed Detective Pierce. "It's in the papers. We're not going to have it said that we were hushed up. Whoever broke into your office must have been working for Pomeroy because the plays and signals wouldn't have done anyone else any good. When this young man decides to talk we'll find out something. You wait and see."

Mack Carver laughed, grimly. The situation, serious as it was, now struck him funny. Two small town detectives with an inflated sense of their own importance. Coach Edward, because of his desire to win the Pomeroy game had magnified the happening until it had developed beyond his control. There was going to be some fireworks now despite anything that he could do.

"It's all right, Coach," said Mack, sympathetically. "Go ahead and suspend me. You probably wouldn't have played me anyway--so it's no loss to the team. Besides--these men can't prove anything on me if they spend the rest of their lives."

"Mack," addressed Coach Edward, with obvious sincerity. "I hope you'll believe me when I say that I'm deeply sorry this thing has occurred. You've made your mistakes in judgment ... and I've made mine. I've a feeling now that you're being done an injustice but there's little I can do about it for the time being...!"

"What are you trying to hand the boy?" cut off Detective Pierce. "Is he suspended or isn't he?"

"He's suspended," said the Coach, simply.

"Very well!" snapped Detective Pierce. "Come on, Greene. I've got another angle for us to follow up. As for you, son--you stay put where we can call you!"

"I will," Mack promised, and stepped into the hall.

Outside the cool November air felt bracing to his feverish temples. He inhaled it to the depth of his lungs as he strode from the Field House, across the gridiron where Darby, assistant coach, was putting the squad through its paces.

"Hi, Mack!" yelled Frank as the substitute back was discovered. "Where you going?... Wait a minute!"

The team members looked Mack's way, apparently much interested.

"They're probably curious to know what's happened," thought Mack, a peculiar sort of numbness taking possession of him ... a numbness which was making him insensible to bitterness and disappointment. But Mack had no desire to mix with his fellows and hurried his footsteps toward the exit gate.

"Hold on, Carver!" Assistant Coach Darby shouted after him.

Mack came to a stop and looked back, wonderingly. Darby hurried, over, followed by Varsity team members.

"What's the matter?" asked Mack, almost defiantly. "What do you want?"

"Better get into your duds," said Darby. "We may need you."

"Not me," Mack rejoined, incredulously.

"Yes, you!" replied Frank, coming up and tapping him on the shoulder. "Dave's just been carried off the field with a dislocated knee. It's doubtful if he'll be able to play Saturday."

Mack stood for a moment, shocked at the news. The field seemed to spin around in a circle ... then the peculiar numbness returned.

"Too late," he heard himself saying. "You'll have to use someone else. I'm no longer on the team. I've been suspended."

And, with that, he continued on out through the exit gate, not so much as glancing back over his shoulder.