Chapter 18

KICKING THE PIGSKIN

Letters kept coming every week to the Rushton boys from the family at home. Mr. Rushton's, although less frequent than his wife's, were always bright and jolly, and seldom came without enclosing a check, which helped to cover the cost of many a midnight spread in the dormitory, when the boys were supposed to be in bed. Their friends were a unit in declaring that Mr. Rushton was a "real sport."

Those of Mrs. Rushton came oftener, and were full of loving expressions and anxious advice to wear proper clothing and avoid rough sports and be careful about getting their feet wet. Although her chicks were no longer under her maternal wings, she brooded over them every moment, and was counting the days till they returned to her.

She often referred to Uncle Aaron, and the boys were sorry to learn that there was still no trace of the missing watch and papers. He had offered a reward and advertised widely, but had never received even a hint of their whereabouts.

"Old Hi Vickers is a swell detective--I don't think," sighed Teddy, after reading the latest letter.

"I blame myself, partly, for the loss of the watch," remarked Fred regretfully. "I ought to have told somebody right away about those tramps hanging around. Then they might have been rounded up and chased out of town before they had a chance to break into the store."

"You're not to blame for anything," said Teddy bitterly. "I'm the person that caused all the trouble. If I'd only had sense enough not to plug Jed's horse that day, this whole thing wouldn't have happened. If a prize were offered for ivory domes, I'd win it, sure."

"Of all sad words of tongue or pen, The saddest are these--it might have been,"

quoted Tom Eldridge, who usually had something pat in the poetical line for all occasions.

"Lay off on the spouting stuff, Tom," said Ned Wayland, "and you fellows stop your grizzling and come down to the football field. It's a dandy afternoon for practice."

It was a wonderful October day, with a crisp breeze coming from the lake that moderated the warmth of the sun, and the boys were stirred by the thrill of youth and life that ran through every vein.

It was too much for Tom, despite the sarcasm with which his previous effort had been greeted, and he burst out:

"There is that nameless splendor everywhere, That wild exhilaration in the air----"

He dodged a pass that Ned made at him.

"Let me alone," he chortled. "Don't you see that I can't help it?"

"The lyric joys that in me throng, Seek to express themselves in song."

The other lads gave it up.

"A hopeless case," murmured Ned, shaking his head sadly.

"Yes," mourned Fred. "And he used to be such a nice fellow, too, before he went bughouse."

"You rough necks are jealous," grinned Tom. "You'd have tried to discourage Shakespeare, if you'd been living then.

"Lucky for the world, you weren't living then," he went on. "For that matter you're not living now. You're dead ones, but you don't know it."

They were still trying to think up a sufficiently cutting response when they came in sight of the football field.

It was an animated scene. A dozen or more boys in their football togs were running over the field, while many more crowded round the side lines as spectators. There was a dummy, at which some of the players were throwing themselves in turn to get tackling practice. Others were running down under punts, and still others were getting instructions in the forward pass.

The game with the Lake Forest School, one of their principal rivals, was now only two weeks off, and the boys were working for dear life to get into form. They had a good team, although three of their best players of the year before had not returned to school this fall.

Teddy was a little too light for the heavy work required in football, although he would have made a good quarter-back, where quickness is more necessary than weight. But that position was already filled by Billy Burton, who was doing capital work, so that there seemed no opening for Teddy. He consoled himself by the determination to make the shortstop position on the baseball team the following spring.

But Fred was husky enough to fill any position, either in the line or the back field, and he had been picked out by Melvin Granger as a "comer."

Melvin was the captain of the team and played centre. He was always on the lookout for any one who could strengthen the team, and had promptly spotted Fred as first-class material.

"Ever play football?" he had asked him, the day after his arrival at Rally Hall.

"A little," answered Fred modestly. He was averse to boasting and did not add, as he might have done truthfully, that he had been, far and away, the best player in his school league.

"What position have you played?" asked Melvin, interested at once.

"Oh, I've played left end and right tackle at different times, but I've had more experience at fullback than anywhere else."

"Great!" exclaimed Melvin. "Welcome to our fair city. We've got a lot of good players for almost every other position on the team, and, if one gets hurt, we don't have much trouble in finding a substitute from the scrubs, which is almost as good as the regular. But in the fullback job there's only one first-class fellow, and that's Tom Eldridge, who's playing it now. Tom's a dandy, but he might get hurt at any time, and we'd have hard work to find any one who could fill his shoes.

"Of course," he went on, "there isn't any vacancy now, and the boys who have been here longest will be given first chance. But, to hold his position, he'll have to prove that no one of the new fellows is better than he is. You won't mind playing on the scrubs at the start, will you?"

"Not a bit," answered Fred stoutly. "I'll go in there and work my head off just the same as if I were on the regular team."

"That's the talk," cried Melvin. "That's the spirit I like to see. And I can see right now that Tom will have all he wants to do to hold his job."

So Fred had gone in on the scrub. There had not been as much chance for practice as usual, as there had been an unusually large number of rainy days that fall, but already he had loomed up as by far the best player among the substitutes. He was right in line for promotion.

And this afternoon his chance came, sooner than he had expected.

The playing had been unusually spirited, and the scrubs had been giving the regulars all they could do to hold their own. At last, however, the first team had got the ball down within ten feet of their opponents' line, and the ball had been passed to Tom Eldridge for one determined attempt to "get it over."

The scrubs braced savagely, but Tom came plunging in like a locomotive. There was a wild mix-up as his adversaries piled up on him, and when the mass was untangled, Tom lay on the ground with a badly sprained ankle. He tried to rise, but sank back with a groan.

They lifted him up, and he stood on one foot, with his arms on their shoulders. Professor Raymond, who had the oversight of athletic sports, came hurrying up and examined the injury. All were immensely relieved when they learned that there were no bones broken, but became grave again when the professor said that the sprain was a bad one and would probably lay Tom up for a couple of weeks.

"Just before the Lake Forest game, too!" exclaimed Ned Wayland. "I tell you, it's tough."

"We're goners now!" moaned Slim Haley.

"Not by a jugful," put in Tom, between whom and Fred the rivalry had been of the most generous kind. "I never saw the day when I could play better football than Fred Rushton. He'll play the position to the queen's taste."

"Nonsense," said Fred. "You can put it all over me, Tom. I'm awfully sorry you got hurt."

Professor Raymond insisted that Tom should be carried at once to the school, where he could have his injured ankle attended to properly. The boys cheered the lad as he was taken away, and then Granger turned to Fred.

"You take his place, Fred," he said, "and show these fellows from Missouri what you can do."

And Fred showed them. He was a little nervous at first as he felt all eyes following him, but, in the excitement of the game, this wore off, and he played like a fiend. He was here, there and everywhere, dodging, twisting, running like a deer, bucking the line with a force that would not be denied. Twice he carried the ball over the line for a touchdown, and before his onslaughts the scrubs crumpled up like paper. It was some of the finest playing that Rally Hall had ever seen, and when the game was ended, he was greeted with a tempest of cheers. He had "made good" beyond a doubt.

"Fred, you played like a wild man!" said Melvin, as they were walking back to the Hall after the game. "You're all to the mustard. Keep it up and we'll lick Lake Forest out of their boots!"