CHAPTER XXV—TO THE VICTORS

“Whoopee! Red Head! My ankle is as good as new, and I am going to be in the big game. Now let the Breslins beware!”

“Are you sure, Judith, it is entirely well? You know ankles have a way of kinking up unexpectedly,” Jane warned.

“To tell the truth, Janey, I have been petting it a bit. I have not been sick since I had the mumps, and it was adorable to have the girls holding my hands, and looking into my eyes. I really think it is a lot nicer to have a ‘busted’ ankle than two trustworthy pedals. Except, of course, when we have the Breslins to whitewash. Then, I like to take a shot at the fun.”

“You are an incorrigible fraud, Judy, but I am glad to have you with us to-day. I may not look it, but I am very human, almost to the point of being stage struck before a crowd. Now, when I jump there in center I rather feel as if I am going up to the gallery, and I want to stay and watch the game, from a point of vantage. But, I’ll follow the ball and do my best,” with an appropriate sigh.

“We are not worried about your nerves, Jane. You may have a set, but they are beautifully padded—as the health books require. Just look at that” (bending Jane’s arm up muscle tight). “Why, I believe you could take up boxing, and make a wonderful record at the biff, bang, biff. Think I would like that sport myself,” and without warning, Judith undertook a “biff, bang, biff” that sent things flying about the room.

“Now sit down like a nice little girl and I will tell you the most delectable news,” coaxed Jane. “I have had an interview with the Weatherbee!”

“Oh, lovely! Who’s going to be expelled?”

“Not quite that bad. But rather serious, Judy, I won’t keep you on tenderhooks. Dolorez Vincez is a professional woman athlete! She taught at Blindwood!”

“She did! She did!” and Judith fairly exhaled surprise. “The detestable thing! To come down on us like that, and try to bamboosle us out of the game! Oh, now I know why I suddenly developed a liking for boxing,” and out went the windmill arms again.

“Be serious, Judith! Mrs. Weatherbee advised me to talk to you——”

“Mrs. Weatherbee is a brilliant woman——”

“All right, Judith,” with an injured air. “If I must talk through a wall of nonsense, I may as well desist.”

“Oh, Janey, dear, I am all ears. I want to know every last word. How did the Weatherbee find her out?”

Jane reviewed the case as she had received the information, and presently the athletic phase being disposed of, she reached the beauty parlor episode. Judith gasped, and all but gagged during the recital of this exciting news. Her exclamations apropos of the possibilities in hair changes knew no bounds, as the freshmen might say, and when it was finally brought out that Dolorez’ hair had undergone the operation of a change from black to yellow, and back again via peroxide R.R. Judith turned a well-balanced somersault, to prove there was absolutely nothing further the matter with her ankle.

“I saw one of the pledge cards,” Judith recalled, when Jane remarked it was queer so much could have been planned without the facts reaching the ears of herself or Judith. “I saw a typewritten page, and I guessed from the errors that Marian had something to do with it. She cannot type any more than she can knit.”

“And here is where you come in Judy. You and I are to do all we can to undo that canvass,” referring to the work of Dolorez in soliciting customers for the beauty parlor. “You see, some of the new girls may think it perfectly all right to do as they see fit with their own money, in their own time, and outside of school grounds. They do not know the penalty of commercializing the college. Now, we will have to work quietly, and wisely. We must make it known in some way, that the faculty will not allow any of the girls to frequent that shop. Of course, when the promoters find that out, likely they will pull up stakes and not open up the beauty parlor.”

“Then I cannot be made over! Oh, Jane! Be kind! Think what I shall miss. All my life I have dreamed of waking up red headed, and now, just when the possibility creeps to my pillow——”

“Judy Stearns, come into the gym and work that off. I see no other help for such a condition as that you are suffering from. We will never beat the Breslins, while your mind wanders to beauty regions. Come along. I am going to limber you up myself,” and thus ended the chums’ conference.

A few hours later, with Team One in the place of honor on the best car within commandeering distance, it seemed all Wellington was on the road to Breslin.

It was late in November, and the afternoon was perfect in its riotous beauty. Enough wind, plenty of sunshine, a cyclone of late oak leaves, and crisp, dry frosty air!

In the same picture, carloads of happy, healthy girls, cheering and yelling their class and college cries, laughing and singing intermittently to the tune of chugging motors.

Rooting for Wellington all the way over the hills, and then through the winding roads out to the second school for girls, Breslin, there to meet and presumably vanquish the lusty foe at basketball.

“We approach the conflict with optimism,” said Jane grandly, at the risk of a buffeting shower of “whacks” for attempting anything as vague as mere optimism.

Always a red letter day at Wellington, the meeting with the Breslins on this particular occasion possessed the additional interest of being the deciding game in a school championship.

“I saw the great, big, strong right forward of the Breslin to-day, Jane,” Drusilla Landers remarked apprehensively, “and I fear we have a real foe to fight in her muscle and stride. She is so tall, and so long, and so——”

“She would have to be something else besides tall and long to outdo our windmill,” said Jane, referring to Drusilla’s particular arm sweep. “I am counting on your arms to toss that ball into the basket more times than the Breslins can count.”

“Oh, woe is me! I may wave—not too near a face, or I may wag not too near a line, but to shoot baskets with my windmills—Jane dear, help me out and make it dribbles. I adore dribbles.” Drusilla was now bouncing up and down with the auto motion, “doing the short hills” in the famous on high record of the well-tried Wellington seven passenger.

“Our chauffeur, one Thomas, has little regard for basketball conditions,” Judith remarked. “Just then he registered a bumper on my pet ankle.”

“But Tom is out to get there,” Jane insisted. “He knows we play at three thirty, and I have promised he can see the game.”

“What! A man see us play!” screamed Clarisse Bradley.

“Pray why not?” asked Jane. “Are we not good enough players?”

“Oh, yes, but——”

“But the bloomers, and things, eh, Clare?” joked Norma Travers. “To my overstrained mind, it seems really pathetic that we can or have to call in the very chauffeur to view the exhibition—I mean the game,” she corrected archly.

“Yes, indeed. I think we should have a real public game, with everyone invited,” Jane declared. “Here we are! Now everyone must take care of her own traps. We don’t want the Breslins criticising our personal deportment, or our practical application of domestic science.”

Tumbling out of the cars the Wellingtons and their guests were met and welcomed by the Breslins at the great gate, with its inviting arch leading into the beautiful grounds surrounding the exclusive school, variously designated as seminary and college.

That a conflict was imminent between the guests and their hosts seemed difficult to realize, such giggling, chattering and such volumes of sounds, without words, as were charged and surcharged, through the atmosphere.

“Some day our psychologists will investigate the mysteries of school girl noise,” predicted Mrs. Weatherbee to Miss Rutledge, “and I expect the finding will be of immense interest to those who have to listen to the noise and keep out of the fun.”

“All here?” called Jane.

“Here! here!” came the response. Then the choristers, or glee club, or cheering squad, any of which would have denied the accusation, took up that old nonsense:

“We’re here, because we’re here, because we hate to go away: Oh, Breslin fine, and Wellington, get ready for the fray!”

“A wonderful picture,” commented the local scribe, a promising young woman, who did the press work for the schools, and incidentally gained a broader education outside, than was allowed inside the big stone walls.

“Yes, I like the big red ties,” assisted Miss Talmadge, to whom the press girl had attached herself. Isobel Talmadge knew everybody, and always said things good enough to print.

“And the hunters’ green of our girls,” said Constance Lipton loyally, “makes such a refreshing change from the inevitable blue or khaki. I think our girls’ suits practically attractive.”

That also was sure to get in the paper.

“And have you noticed, Miss Nevins,” Dorothy Blyden ventured, “what a pretty contrast the Gray Bees make?” The Gray Bees were the Breslins, of course, and good little Dorothy felt obliged to see that something nice be said about them.

“A pretty gym,” the scribe condescended to note. “My, how prettily the colors are blended! I suppose every class in both schools is represented in those flags and pennants?”

“Yes, we sent ours over,” confessed Constance. “We knew we would have a big audience! Here they come. Now for the cheering squad!”

The formalities of cheers inspired the teams to such activity as only a call to arms might be hoped to accomplish. Every girl glowed with interest and enthusiasm as they lined up, tossing up the ball, getting acquainted with it, as they usually did before a game, and making use of the same opportunity to get acquainted with the personnel of the teams. Each girl made double use of every moment, until the whistle blew.

As the game started, interest compelled the closest attention. The first half occupying twenty minutes of time, was played off without anything more startling than a couple of disastrous fumbles being made by each side. Every one hated to see the ball thus “abused,” such skill as was demanded by the promised excellence of both teams seemed to indicate the very cleanest, cleverest play.

“They are just warming up,” Constance told Miss Nevins adroitly. It would never do to have fumbles reported in the _Bugle_.

“Oh, yes. All the more exciting when they get warmed up,” came the encouraging reply, following a “note” scribbled on the reporter’s pad.

The second half was entered upon with renewed enthusiasm. Spectators leaned forward in their places, and very little conversation broke the spell of eager watching.

“Watch Judith!” Miss Cooper of Wellington remarked to a Breslin fan.

“You mean the standing center?”

“Yes; can’t she throw?”

“But I am interested in the jumping center. She can do all kinds of things.”

“I am wondering why she does not do anything in particular,” came the whisper. “She is one of our stars—Miss Allen.”

“Oh, of course. I know Jane. And don’t you see what she is doing? She is putting out the very finest line of team play I have ever witnessed. You just watch.”

At the moment on the floor Jane was passing that ball with such skill, it never seemed to remain in her own hands long enough for any sort of play. All she did was pass it on. That was perfect team play, but it made very little impression on the spectators.

The game was now tied. Then the ball flew outside the lines. Breslin’s jumping center recovered it and glanced over the situation for the fraction of a second. Her side center was too well guarded to send it to her; with a skilful toss, she aimed for the forward, who grabbed it.

“Now for the basket!” whispered the hopeful Breslins.

“Oh, Jane!” almost prayed the Wellington fans, as the ball was thrown back to center by the confused forward who was unable to pass it to her partner under the basket.

In the center Jane was surrounding her opponent like a veritable troop. The Bee was confused. Moments were counting, and she still held on to the ball.

“One—two and——” rang out in the gym.

Then she tried to throw, but Jane was everywhere. The confusion was obvious, even to the onlookers.

“Oh, for that count!” wailed someone.

“Throw it!” yelled the captain to the confused Bee. She raised the ball as if to comply, then with an astonishing fumble, the ball slipped and rolled to Jane’s feet. Quick as a flash Jane was after it. Then the dribble, and Jane took one bounce, and with one toss of the ball to her forward under the basket, the ball went home to a goal! And the goal was made for Wellington!

“Oh! Oh! ho! ho! Rah! Rah! Rah Wellington! Center! Center! Rah! Rah! Rah!”

The cyclone broke. That strategy on Jane’s part won a victory for which she would have been more content to have had any other of the team, than herself, strike the decisive blow.

“You did it. We knew you would. Good old Jane.”

“Can’t lose her!”

“Brains tell!”

Came the almost indistinguishable tumult of sound.

“Sheer luck,” Jane insisted.

“Luck!” mocked Judith. “Even luck knows where to light. Jane, if we lost I should have drowned myself. I have bet away a whole week’s stamps and fudge, and goodness knows what all. But we won, and I may open up shop again. Just look over there at Marian. Have her friends all deserted her?”

“Oh, call her in,” suggested Jane. “It’s a shame, here in a strange school.”

“Not little Judy,” replied the other. “I may take a chance on betting fudge against Breslins, but I would not be so rash as to take a chance on anything like that. Oh, there she goes with our reporter! What if she gives any news of the Barn Swifts?”

“Oh, she wouldn’t!” but Jane’s voice sounded apprehensive.

“Well, if she does, we will simply—that is, we certainly will,” stuttered Judith, too overcome to talk coherently. She was waving her arms and indicating dire calamity on Marian’s unfortunate head.

“Still, Judy, we should have kept track of that nice little reporter. It would be perfectly awful if Marian gave her any news about Helen’s hidden talent.”

“Oh, Jane, I am absolutely sure she will do just that. I never before saw her so abject to a mere business woman. By the way, dear, where is Helen?”

“Oh, didn’t I tell you? Mrs. Weatherbee asked me if we would not all agree to leave the child pretty much alone for a few days. She thought it would be so much better for her nerves, not to be talked to. I agreed with her, as I have found Helen absolutely impossible lately. She will not come out, and she just sits and hugs her letters.”

“Does she ever show you any of her letters, Jane?”

“No,” faltering. “But why should she?”

“Why should she not? Now, there, I didn’t mean a thing, but we have not yet heard the story of that magic card, you know. What was on that card, Jane?”

“Judy, you little nuisance,” and Jane smiled in mockery. “As if I could tell you anything about that now! Run along, and tell the girls to spread the news about our big dance next Wednesday evening. Remember, it is given in honor of the Breslins.”