Chapter 10

THOR'S AWAKENING

"There's a hole in the bottom of the sea, And we'll put Bannister in that hole! In that hole--in--that--hole-- Oh, we'll put Bannister in that hole!"

"In the famous words of the late Mike Murphy," said T. Haviland Hicks, Jr., "the celebrated Yale and Penn track trainer, 'you can beat a team that can't be beat, but--you can't beat a team that won't be beat!' Latham must be in the latter class."

It was the Bannister-Latham game, and the first half had just ended. Captain Butch Brewster's followers had trailed dejectedly from Bannister Field to the Gym, where Head Coach Corridan was flaying them with a tongue as keen as the two-edged sword that drove Adam and Eve from the Garden of Eden. A cold, bleak November afternoon, a leaden sky lowered overhead, and a chill wind swept athwart the field; in the concrete stands, the loyal "rooters" of the Gold and Green, or of the Gold and Blue, shivered, stamped, and swung their arms, waiting for the excitement of the scrimmage again to warm them. Yet, the Bannister cohorts seemed silent and discouraged, while the Latham supporters went wild, singing, cheering, howling. A look at the score-board explained this:

END OF FIRST HALF: SCORE: Bannister ........ 0 Latham ........... 3

The statement of T. Haviland Hicks, Jr., swathed in a gold and green blanket and humped on the Bannister bench, to shivering little Theophilus Opperdyke, the Phillyloo Bird, Shad Weatherby, and several more collegians who had joined him when the half ended, was singularly appropriate. In Latham's light, fast eleven, trained to the minute, coached to a shifty, tricky style of play with numberless deceptive fakes from which they worked the forward pass successfully, Bannister seemed to have encountered, as Mike Murphy phrased it, "A team that won't be beat!" According to the advance dope of the sporting writers, who, in football, are usually as good prophets as the Weather Bureau, Bannister was booked to come out the winner by at least five touchdowns to none. But here a half was gone, and Latham led by three points, scored on a rather lucky field-goal!

The psychology of football is inexplicable. Yale, beaten by Virginia, Brown, and Wash-Jeff, with the Blue's best gridiron star ineligible to play, a team that seemed at odds with itself and the 'Varsity, mismanaged, poorly coached, journeys to Princeton to battle with old Nassau; the Tiger, Its tail as yet untwisted, presents its best eleven for several seasons, a great favorite in the odds, and yet the final score is Yale, 14; Princeton, 7! A strange fear of the Bulldog, bred of many bitter defeats, of similar occasions when a feeble Yale team aroused itself and trampled an invincible Orange and Black eleven, when the Blue fought old Nassau with a team that "wouldn't" be beat, gave victory to the poorer aggregation. So many things unforeseen often enter into a football contest, shifting the balance of power from the stronger to the weaker team. One eleven gets the jump on the other, the favorite weirdly goes to pieces--team dissension may exist, a dozen other causes--but, boiled down, Mike Murphy's statement was most appropriate now.

Latham simply _would not_ be beat! The sporting pages had said: "Latham simply can't beat Bannister!" Here the team, that could not be beaten was being defeated, and the team that would not be defeated was, so far, the victor. Perhaps the threatened dropping of Thor from the Gold and Green squad shook somewhat Captain Butch's players; more likely, the Latham aggregation got the jump on Bannister, opening up a bewildering attack of criss-crosses, line plunges, cross-bucks, and tandems, from all of which the forward pass frequently developed; they literally overwhelmed a supposedly unbeatable team. And once they got the edge, it was hard for Bannister to regain poise and to smother the fast plays that swept through or around the bewildered eleven.

"We have _got_ to beat 'em!" growled Shad, "Mike Murphy or not. Why, if little old Latham cleans us up, smash go our chances of the State Championship! Oh, look at Thor--the big mountain of muscle. Why doesn't he wake up, and go push that team off the field?"

Thor, the Prodigious Prodigy, his vast hulk unprotected from the cold wind by a football blanket, squatted on the ground, on the side-line, apparently in a trance. Ever since the night before, when his father's letter had dealt such a knock-out blow to his hopes of fulfilling the promise to his dying mother, had rudely side-tracked him from the climb to his goal, the blond giant had maintained that dumb apathy. If anything, it seemed that the cruel blow of fate had only served to make Thor more stolid and impassive than ever, and Theophilus wondered if the Colossus had really grasped the import of the tragic letter as yet. The news had spread over the college and campus, and the students were sincerely sorry for Thor. But to offer him sympathy was about as difficult as consoling a Polar bear with the toothache.

Coach Corridan, carrying out his plot, had decided not to start Thor in the first half of the game. So the Norwegian Hercules, having received no orders to the contrary, however, donned togs and appeared on the side-line, where he had sat, paying not the slightest heed to the scrimmage and seemingly unaware that the Gold and Green was facing defeat and the loss of the Championship, for a game lost would put the team out of the running. All big John Thorwald knew was, in a few weeks he must leave old Bannister, must give up, for a time, his college course. Just when the grim battle was won, he must leave, to work. Not that the Viking cared about toil. It was the delay that chafed even his stolid self. He was stunned at having to wait, maybe two years, before starting again.

And yet, as he squatted on the side-line, oblivious to everything but his bitter reflections, the Theophilus-quoted words of Shakespeare persisted in intruding on his thoughts:

"This thou perceivest, which makes thy love more strong-- To love that well, which thou must leave ere long."

Try as he would, he could not fight away the keen realization that books and study were not all he would regret to leave. He was forced to acknowledge that his mind kept wandering to other things. He found himself pondering on the parting with Theophilus Opperdyke, with that crazy Hicks; he wondered if he, out in the world again, toiling his lonely way, would miss the glad fellowship of these care-free youths that he had watched, but never shared, if he would ever think of the weeks at old Bannister. Somehow, he felt that he would often vision the Quad at night, brightly lighted, dormitories' lights agleam, students crossing and recrossing, shouting at studious comrades. He would hear again the melodious banjo-twanging, the gleeful saengerfests, the happy skylarking of the boys. He had never entered into all this, and yet he knew he would miss it all; why, he would even miss the daily scrimmage on Bannister Field; the noisy shower-room, with its clouds of steam, and white forms flitting ghostlike. He would miss the classrooms; in brief, _everything_!

John Thorwald was awakening! Even had this blow not befallen him, the huge, slow-minded Norwegian, in time, with Theophilus Opperdyke's missionary work, would have gradually come to understand things better--at least, to know he was wrong in his ideas, which is the beginning of wisdom. Already, he had ceased to condemn all this as foolishness, to rail at the youths for wasting time and money. Already something stirred within him, and yet, stolid as he was, bashful among the collegians, he was apparently the same. But the sudden shock Head Coach Corridan spoke of had come. His father's letter telling of his loss and that Thor must leave Bannister had awakened him to the startling knowledge that he did care for something more than study, that all the things that had puzzled him, that he had sneered at, meant something to his existence, that he dreaded leaving other things than his books.

"I--I don't understand things," thought Thorwald. "But--if I could only stay, I'd want to learn. I'd try to get this 'college' spirit! Oh, I've been all wrong, but if I could only stay--"

As if in answer to his unspoken thought, the big Freshman beheld marching toward him Theophilus Opperdyke, his spectacles off, and his face aglow, T. Haviland Hicks, Jr., evidently in the throes of emotional insanity; a Senior whom he knew as Parson Palmetter; Registrar Worthington, and Doctor Alford, the kindly, beloved Prexy of old Bannister. The last named placed his hand on the puzzled behemoth's ponderous shoulder.

"Thorwald," he said kindly, "Hicks, Opperdyke and Brewster, last night, came to my study and acquainted me with your misfortune. They told me of your life-history, of your splendid purpose to gain knowledge, to make something of yourself, for your dying mother's sake. Old Bannister needs men like you, Thorwald. Perhaps you do not understand campus ways and tradition yet, perhaps you are not in sympathy with everything here; but once a love for your Alma Mater is awakened, you will be a power for good for your college.

"Now I at once took up the matter with Mr. Palmetter, President of The Students' Aid Bureau. This year, for the first time in our history, we have dispensed with janitors and sweeps in the dormitories, and with dining-hall waiters, so that needy and deserving students may work their way through Bannister. Owing to the fact that Mr. Deane, a Senior, has given up his dormitory, Creighton Hall, as he has funds for the year and needs the time to study, we can offer you board and tuition, in exchange for your work in the dormitory, and waiting on tables in the dining-hall. Since your first term bills, until January first, are paid, if you will start to work at once, we will credit any work done this term on books and incidentals for next term. By this means--"

"Why, you don't--you _can't_ mean--" rumbled Thor, who had just dimly grasped the greatest point in Prexy's speech. "Why, then I won't have to leave Bannister--I won't have to quit my studies! Oh, thank you, sir; thank you! I will work _so_ hard. I am not afraid of work; I love it--a chance to toil and earn my education, that's what I want! Thank you!"

"And in addition," said the Registrar, "Mr. Palmetter reports that he can secure you, downtown, a number of furnaces to tend this winter, which you can do early in the morning and at night; this will bring you an income for living expenses, and in the spring something else will offer itself. It means every moment of your time will be crowded, but Bannister needs workers--"

Something stirred in John Thorwald. His heart had been touched at last. He thought of T. Haviland Hicks, Jr., Butch, and little Theophilus worried at his having to leave college, going to Doctor Alford; of Prexy, the Registrar, and Parson Palmetter, working to keep Thor at old Bannister. He recalled how sympathetic all the youths had been, how they admired his purpose and determination; and he had rewarded their friendliness with cold aloofness. He felt a thrill as he visioned himself working for his education, rising in the cold dawn, tending furnaces, working in the dorm., waiting on tables--studying. With what fierce joy he would assail his tasks, glad that he could stay! He knew the students would rejoice, that they would not look down on him; instead, they would respect and admire him, toiling to grow and develop, to attain his goal!

"Go to it, Thor!" urged T. Haviland Hicks, Jr. "We all want you to stay, old man; we'll give you a lift with your studies. Old Bannister _wants_ you, _needs_ you, so _stick_!"

"Stay, please!" quavered little Theophilus. "You don't want to leave your Alma Mater; stay, Thorwald, and--you'll understand things soon,"

"Report at the Registrar's office at seven tonight, Thorwald," said Prexy, and then, because he understood boys and campus problems, "and to show your gratitude, you might go out there and spank that team which is trying to lick old Bannister."

John Thorwald, when Doctor Alford and the Registrar had gone, arose and stood gazing across Bannister Field. He saw not the white-lined gridiron, the gaunt goal-posts, the concrete stands filled with spectators, or the gay banners and pennants. He saw the buildings and campus of old Bannister, the stately old elms bordering the walks; he beheld the Gym., the four dormitories--Bannister, Nordyke, Smithson, and Creighton--the white Chapel, the ivy-covered Library, the Administration and Recitation Halls; he glimpsed the Memorial Arch over the entrance driveway, and big Alumni Hall. All at once, like an inundating wave, the great realization flashed on Thor that he did not have to leave it all! Often again would he hear the skylarking youths, the gay songs, the banjo-strumming; often would he see the brightly lighted Quad., would gaze out on the campus! It was still his--the work, the study, and, if he tried, even the glad comradeship of the fellows, the bigger things of college life, which as yet he did not understand.

The big slow-minded youth could not awaken, at once, to a full knowledge and understanding of campus life and tradition, to a knowledge of college spirit; but, thanks to the belief that he had to leave it all, he had awakened to the startling fact that already he loved old Bannister. And now, joyous that he could stay, John Thorwald suddenly felt a strong desire to do something, not for himself, but for these splendid fellows who had worried for his sake, had worked to keep him at college. And just then he remembered the somewhat unclassical, yet well meant, words of dear old Doctor Alford, "And to show your gratitude, you might go out there and spank that team, which is trying to lick old Bannister."

John Thorwald for the first time looked at the score-board; he saw, in big white letters:

BANNISTER .......... 0 LATHAM ............. 3

From the Gym. the Gold and Green players--grim, determined, and yet worried by the team that "won't be beat!"--were jogging, followed by Head Coach Patrick Henry Corridan. The Latham eleven was on the field, the Gold and Blue rooters rioted in the stands. From the Bannister cohorts came a thunderous appeal:

"Hold 'em, boys--hold 'em, boys--hold--hold--_hold_! Don't let 'em beat the Green and the Gold!"

A sudden fury swayed the Prodigious Prodigy; it was his college, his eleven, and those Blue and Gold youths were actually beating old Bannister! The Bannister boys had admired him, some of them had helped him in his studies, three had told Doctor Alford of him, had made it possible for him to stay, to keep on toward his goal. _They_ would be sorrow-stricken if Latham won! A feeling of indignation came to Thor. How dare those fellows think they could beat old Bannister! Why, _he_ would go out there and show them a few things!

Head Coach Corridan, let it be chronicled, was paralyzed when he ducked under the side-line rope--stretched to hold the spectators back--to collide with an immovable body, John Thorwald, and to behold an eager light on that behemoth's stolid face. Grasping the Slave-Driver in a grip that hurt, Thor boomed:

"Mr. Corridan, let me play, _please_! Send me out this half. We can win. We've _got_ to win! I want to do something for old Bannister. Why, if we lose today, we lose the Championship! I don't understand things yet, but I do love the college. I want to fight for Bannister. _Please_ let me play!"

The astonished coach and the equally dazed Gold and Green eleven, with the bewildered collegians who heard Thor's earnest appeal, were silent a few moments, unable to grasp the truth. Then Captain Brewster, his face aglow, seized the big Freshman's arm excitedly.

"_Sure_ you'll play, Thor!" he shouted. "Fullback, old man! Come on, team. Thor's awake! He wants to fight for his Alma Mater; he wants Bannister to win! Oh, watch us shove Latham off the field--everybody together now--the yell, for Thor!"

"Right here," grinned an excitedly happy T. Haviland Hicks, Jr., when the yell was given, "is where a team that won't be beat gets licked by a chap what can lick 'em!"

What took place when the blond Prodigious Prodigy lumbered on Bannister Field at the start of the last half of the Bannister-Latham game can be imagined by the final score-board figures:

BANNISTER ......... 27 LATHAM ............. 3

It can best be described with the aid of Scoop Sawyer's account in the next _Bannister Weekly:_

--At the start of the second half, however, the Latham cohorts were given a shock when they beheld a colossal being almost as big as the entire Gold and Blue eleven, go in at fullback for Bannister. And the Latham eleven received a series of shocks when Thor began intruding that massive body of his into their territory. Tennyson's saying, "The old order changeth, yielding place to new" was aptly illustrated in the second half; for Bannister's bugler quit sounding "Retreat!" and blew "Charge!" Four touchdowns and three goals from touchdowns, in one half, is usually considered a fair day's work for an entire team. Even Yale or Harvard; but when one player corrals four touchdowns in a half--he is going some! Well, Thor went some! Most of the half he furnished free transportation for two-thirds of the Latham team, carrying them on his back, legs, and neck, as he strode down the field; a writ of habeas corpus could not have stopped the blond Colossus. Anyone would have stood more show to stop an Alpine avalanche than to slow up Thor, and the stretcher was constantly in evidence, for Latham knockouts.

The game turned into a Thor's Personally Conducted Tour. Thorwald, escorted by the Gold and Green team, made four quick tours to the Latham goal-line. It was simply a matter of giving the ball to the Prodigious Prodigy, then waving the linesmen to move down twenty yards or more toward Latham's line. Thor was simply unstoppable, and more beneficial even than his phenomenal playing was his encouragement to the team. He kept urging them to action, his foghorn growl of, "Come on, boys!" was a slogan of victory! Judging by Thor's awakening, and his work of the Latham game, Bannister's hopes of The State Intercollegiate Football Championship are as roseate as the blush on a maiden's cheek at her first kiss, and--

That night, in the cozy room of T. Haviland Hicks, Jr., John Thorwald, supremely happy yet withal as uncomfortable as a whale on the Sahara Desert, overflowed an easy-chair. The room was filled, or what space Thor left, with the Bannister eleven, second-team players, Coach Corridan, and several students; on the campus a riotous crowd of Bannister youths "raised merry Heck," as Hicks phrased it, and their cheer floated up to the windows:

"Rah! Rah! Rah! Thor! Thor! Thor! He's--all--right!"

"Come, fellows," spoke T. Haviland Hicks, Jr.

"Let's sing to the captain, good old Butch! Let 'er go!"

"Here's to good Butch Brewster! Drink it down! Here's to good Butch Brewster! Drink It down! Here's to good Butch Brewster-- He plays football like he _uster--_ Drink it down! Drink it down--down--down--down!"

A strange sound startled the joyous youths; it was a rumbling noise, like distant thunder, and at first they could not place it. Then, as It continued, they located the disturbance as coming from the prodigious body of Thor, and at last the wonderful phenomenon dawned on them.

"Thor is singing college songs!" quavered little Theophilus Opperdyke, so happy that his big-rimmed spectacles rode the end of his nose. "Oh, Hicks--Butch--Thor is awake at last! He is trying to get college spirit, to understand campus life--"

T. Haviland Hicks, Jr., suddenly realized that what he had so ardently longed for had come to pass; aided by Theophilus' missionary work and by the sudden shock of Thorwald, Sr.'s, letter. Thor was awakened, had come to know that he loved old Bannister. His awakening, as shown in the football game, had been splendid. How he had towered over the scrimmage, in every play, urging his team to fight, himself doing prodigies for old Bannister. Thor, who had been so silent and aloof! Then the sunny-souled youth remembered.

"Oh, I told you I'd awaken Thor, Butch!" he began, but that behemoth quelled him with an ominous look.

"_You_!" he growled, with pretended wrath, "_you_! It was Theophilus Opperdyke who did the most of it, and Thorwald's father did the rest! Don't you rob Theophilus of his glory, you feeble-imitation-of-some-thing-human!"

T. Haviland Hicks, Jr., grinned _à la_ Cheshire cat. The happy-go-lucky Senior was vastly glad that Thor had awakened, that now he would try to grasp the real meaning of college existence. He felt that the young Hercules, from now on, would slowly and surely develop to a splendid college man, that he would do big things for his Alma Mater. And the generous Hicks gave Theophilus all the credit, and impressed on that happy Human Encyclopedia the fact that he had done a great deed for old Bannister. Just so, Thor was awakened.

"Oh, I say, Deke Radford, Coach, and Butch," Hicks chortled, getting the attention of that triumvirate as well as that of the others in the room, "remember up in Camp Bannister, in the sleep-shack, when Coach Corridan outlined a smashing full-back he wanted?"

"Sure!" smiled Deke. "What of it, Hicks?"

Then T, Haviland Hicks, Jr., that care-free, lovable, irrepressible youth, whose chance to swagger before this same trio had been postponed so long and seemingly lost forever, satiated his fun-loving soul and reaped his reward. Calling their attention to Thor, the Prodigious Prodigy, and asking them to remember his playing against Latham that day, the sunny Senior strutted before them vaingloriously.

"Oh, I told you just to leave it to Hicks!" he declared, grinning happily. "I promised to round up an unstoppable fullback, a Gargantuan Hercules, and I did! Just think of what he will do to Hamilton and Ballard in the big games! As I have often told you, _always_--leave It to Hicks!"