Books: The New Boy at Hilltop
R >>
Ralph Henry Barbour >> The New Boy at Hilltop
Pages:
1 |
2 |
3 |
4 |
5 |
6 |
7 |
8 |
9 |
10 | 11 |
12
When, in the beginning of the seventh inning, Durham took the field and
Willings went to bat, Captain Don Satterlee came up the bank and threw
himself on the grass by his father's side. He looked rather worried and
very warm.
"Well, my boy," said Mr. Satterlee, "I guess you're in for a licking this
time, eh?"
"I'm afraid so," was the morose reply. "We can't seem to find their pitcher
for a cent." He turned to his brother. "I'll put you in for the ninth, if
you like," he said.
"Oh, don't trouble yourself," answered the other. "You've got along without
me so far and I guess you can finish."
"Well, you needn't be so huffy," answered the elder. "You can play or not,
just as you like. But you don't have to be ugly about it."
"I'm not," muttered Satterlee, 2d.
"Sounds mighty like it. Want to play?"
The other hesitated, swallowed once or twice and kicked the turf with his
heel.
"Of course he wants to play, Don," said Tom Pierson. "Give him a chance,
like a good chap."
"Well, I've offered him a chance, haven't I?" asked Don ungraciously. "I
guess it doesn't make much difference who plays this game." He scowled at
Willings who had been thrown out easily at first and was now discouragedly
walking back to the bench. "You can take Williams's place when the ninth
begins," he added, turning to his brother. The latter nodded silently. A
slightly built, sandy-haired man, with bright blue eyes and a look of
authority, approached the group and Don, with a muttered apology, joined
him.
"That's our coach," explained Tom to Mrs. Satterlee. "He's instructor in
Greek and German, and he's a peach! The fellows call him 'Curly' on account
of his hair. He pitched for us last year and he won the game, too! I guess
he and Don are trying to find some way out of the hole they're in. If
anyone can do it he can, can't he?"
Thus appealed to, Satterlee, 2d, came out of his reverie.
"Yes, I guess so. I wish he was pitching, that's all I wish! I'll bet
Carpenter wouldn't make any more of those hits of his!"
Willard's third out came and once more the teams changed places. The sun
was getting low and the shadows on the terrace were lengthening. Durham
started out with a batting streak and almost before anyone knew it the
bases were full with but one out. Then, just when things were at their
gloomiest, a short hit to second baseman resulted in a double play, and
once more Willard's found cause for delight and acclaim.
The eighth inning opened with Don Satterlee at bat. Luck seemed for a
moment to have made up its mind to favor the home team. An in-shoot caught
the batsman on the thigh and he limped to first. Meyer--"Chick" Meyer, as
Tom triumphantly explained--sent him to second and gained first for
himself, owing to an error. Then came an out. Beeton followed with a
scratch hit just back of shortstop and the bases were full. Up on the
terrace the cheering was continuous. Williams was struck out. Then came
Willings with a short hit past third and Don scored. And the bases were
still full. But the next man flied out to left fielder and the cheering
died away. But 2 to 4 was better than 1 to 4, and the supporters of the
home team derived what comfort they could from the fact.
In the last of the eighth, the doughty Carpenter started things going by
taking first on balls. It was apparent that "Willings had given it to him"
rather than risk a long hit. The next man was less fortunate and was thrown
out after a neat sacrifice which put Carpenter on second. Then a pop-fly
was muffed by Willings and there were men on first and second. But after
that Willings, as though to atone for an inexcusable error, settled down to
work and struck out the next two Durhamites, and the red flags were
suddenly crazy.
Satterlee, 2d, peeled off his sweater and trotted down to the bench. The
ninth inning opened inauspiciously for the home nine. Willard's shortstop
fell victim to the rival pitcher's curves and third baseman took his place.
With two strikes called on him he found something he liked and let go at
it. When the tumult was over he was sitting on second base. Don Satterlee
stepped up to the plate and the cheerers demanded a home-run. But the best
the red's captain could do was a clean drive into right field that was good
for one base for himself and a tally for the man on second. That made the
score 3 to 4. It seemed that at last fortune was to favor the red. The
cheering went on and on. Meyer sent the captain to second but was thrown
out at first. Another tally would tie the score, but the players who were
coming to bat were the weakest hitters, and Willard's hopes began to
dwindle. But one can never tell what will happen in baseball, and when
Fearing lined out a swift ball over second baseman's head and Don Satterlee
romped home, the wearers of the red shrieked in mingled delight and
surprise. The score was tied. But there was more to come. Beeton waited,
refusing all sorts of tempting bait, and during that waiting Fearing stole
second. With three balls and two strikes called on him, Beeton let the next
one go by, and----
"Four balls!" decided the umpire.
Satterlee, 2d, felt rather limp when he faced the pitcher. His heart was
pounding somewhere up near his mouth and it made him feel uncomfortable.
Down on second Fearing was watching him anxiously. On first Beeton was
dancing back and forth, while behind him Brother Don coaching hoarsely and
throwing doubtful glances in the direction of the plate.
"He thinks I can't hit," thought Satterlee, 2d, bitterly. "He's telling
himself that if he'd left Williams in we might have tallied again."
Satterlee, 2d, smarting under his brother's contempt, felt his nerves
steady and when the second delivery came he was able to judge it and let it
go by. That made a ball and a strike. Then came another ball. They had told
him to wait for a good one, and he was going to do it. And presently the
good one came. The pitcher had put himself in a hole; there were three
balls against him and only one strike. So now he sent a swift straight one
for a corner of the plate and Satterlee, 2d, watched it come and then swung
to meet it. And in another moment he was streaking for his base, while out
back of shortstop the left fielder was running in as fast as he might. And
while he ran Fearing and Beeton were flying around the bases. The ball came
to earth, was gathered up on its first bound and sped toward the plate. But
it reached the catcher too late, for Fearing and Beeton had tallied. And
down at second a small youth was picking himself out of the dust. But
Satterlee never got any farther, for the next man struck out. No one seemed
to care, however, except Satterlee, for the score had changed to 6-4, and
the 6 was Willard's!
But there was still a half inning to play and Durham had not lost hope. Her
center fielder opened up with a hit and a moment later stole second. Then
came a mishap. Willings struck the batsman and, although Fearing claimed
that the batsman had not tried to avoid the ball, he was given his base.
Things looked bad. There on second and first were Durham runners and here,
stepping up to the plate with his bat grasped firmly in his hands, was
Carpenter, and there was none out. A two-base hit would surely tie the
score, while one of the home-runs of which Carpenter was believed to be
capable--such a one as he made in the first game of the series--would send
Willard's into mourning.
The terrace was almost deserted, for the spectators were lined along the
path to first base and beyond. Don was crying encouragement to his players,
but from the way in which he moved restively about it could be seen that he
was far from easy in his mind. As for Satterlee, 2d--well, he was out in
center field, hoping for a chance to aid in warding off the defeat that
seemed inevitable, but fearing that his usefulness was over. Willings
turned and motioned the fielders back, and in obedience Satterlee, 2d,
crept farther out toward the edge of the field. But presently, when a ball
had been delivered to the batsman, Satterlee, 2d, quite unconsciously,
moved eagerly, anxiously in again, step by step. Then came a strike and
Carpenter tapped the plate with the end of his bat and waited calmly.
Another ball. Then a second strike. And for a brief moment Willard's
shouted hoarsely. And then----
Then there was a sharp sound of bat meeting ball and Carpenter was on his
way to first. The ball was a low fly to short center field and it was
evident that it would land just a little way back of second base. Neither
Carpenter nor the runners on first and second dreamed for a moment that it
could be caught. The latter players raced for home as fast as their legs
would take them.
Meanwhile in from center sped Satterlee, 2d. He could run hard when he
tried and that's what he did now. He was almost too late--but not quite.
His hands found the ball a bare six inches above the turf. Coming fast as
he was he had crossed second base before he could pull himself up.
From all sides came wild shouts, instructions, commands, entreaties, a
confused medley of sounds. But Satterlee, 2d, needed no coaching. The
runner from second had crossed the plate and the one from first was
rounding third at a desperate pace, head down and arms and legs twinkling
through the dust of his flight. Now each turned and raced frantically back,
dismay written on their perspiring faces. But Satterlee, 2d, like an
immovable Fate, stood in the path. The runner from first slowed down
indecisively, feinted to the left and tried to slip by on the other side.
But the small youth with the ball was ready for him and had tagged him
before he had passed. Then Satterlee, 2d, stepped nimbly to second base,
tapped it with his foot a moment before the other runner hurled himself
upon it, tossed the ball nonchalantly toward the pitcher's box and walked
toward the bench. The game was over.
But he never reached the bench that day. On the way around the field he
caught once a fleeting vision of Brother Don's red, grinning countenance
beaming commendation, and once a glimpse of the smiling faces of his father
and mother. He strove to wave a hand toward the latter, but as it almost
cost him his position on the shoulders of the shrieking fellows beneath, he
gave it up. Social amenities might wait; at present he was tasting the joys
of a victorious Caesar.
THE DUB
"BRIGGS, Bayard Newlyn, Hammondsport, Ill., I L, H 24."
That's the way the catalogue put it. Mostly, though, he was called "Bi"
Briggs. He was six feet and one inch tall and weighed one hundred and
ninety-four pounds, and was built by an all-wise Providence to play guard.
Graduate coaches used to get together on the side line and figure out what
we'd do to Yale if we had eleven men like Bi.
Then after they'd watched Bi play a while they'd want to kick him.
He got started all wrong, Bi did. He came to college from a Western
university and entered the junior class. That was his first mistake. A
fellow can't butt in at the beginning of the third year and expect to trot
even with fellows who have been there two years. It takes a chap one year
to get shaken down and another year to get set up. By the time Bi was
writing his "life" he had just about learned the rules.
His second mistake was in joining the first society that saw his name in
the catalogue. It was a poor frat, and it queered Bi right away. I guess he
made other mistakes, too, but those were enough.
In his junior year Bi was let alone. He was taking about every course any
of us had ever heard of--and several we hadn't--and had no time for
football. We got licked for keeps that fall, and after the _Crimson_ and
the _Bulletin_ and the _Graduates' Magazine_ and the newspapers had shown
us just what ailed our system of coaching, we started to reorganize things.
We hadn't reorganized for two years, and it was about time. The new coach
was a chap who hadn't made the Varsity when he was in college, but who was
supposed to have football down to a fine point; to hear the fellows tell
about the new coach made you feel real sorry for Walter Camp. Well, he
started in by kidnaping every man in college who weighed over a hundred and
sixty-five. Bi didn't escape. Bi had played one year in the freshwater
college at left tackle and knew a touchdown from a nose-guard, and that was
about all. Bi was for refusing to have anything to do with football at
first; said he was head-over-ears in study and hadn't the time. But they
told him all about his Duty to his College and Every Man into the Breach,
and he relented. Bi was terribly good-natured. That was the main trouble
with him.
The fellows who did football for the papers fell in love with him on the
spot. He was a good-looker, with sort of curly brown hair, nice eyes, a
romantic nose, and cheeks like a pair of twenty-four-dollar American
Beauties, and his pictures looked fine and dandy in the papers. "Bayard
Briggs, Harvard's new candidate for guard, of whom the coaches expect great
things." That's the way they put it. And they weren't far wrong. The
coaches did expect great things from Bi; so did the rest of us. When they
took Bi from the second and put him in at right guard on the Varsity we all
approved.
But there was trouble right away. Bi didn't seem to fit. They swapped him
over to left guard, then they tried him at right tackle, then at right
guard again. Then they placed him gently but firmly back on the second. And
Bi was quite happy and contented and disinterested during it all. _He_
didn't mind when six coaches gathered about him and demanded to know what
was the matter with him. He just shook his head and assured them
good-naturedly that he didn't know; and intimated by his manner that he
didn't care. When he came back to the second he seemed rather glad; I think
he felt as though he had got back home after a hard trip. He stayed right
with us all the rest of the season.
I think the trouble was that Bi never got it fully into his fool head that
it wasn't just fun--like puss-in-the-corner or blind-man's-buff. If you
talked to him about Retrieving Last Year's Overwhelming Defeat he'd smile
pleasantly and come back with some silly remark about Political Economy or
Government or other poppycock. I fancy Bi's father had told him that he was
coming to college to study, and Bi believed him.
Of course, he didn't go to New Haven with us, He didn't have time. I wished
afterwards that I hadn't had time myself. Yale trimmed us 23 to 6.
The papers threshed it all out again, and all the old grads who weren't too
weak to hold pens wrote to the _Bulletin_ and explained where the trouble
lay. It looked for a while like another reorganization, but Cooper, the new
captain, was different. He didn't get hysterical. Along about Christmas
time, after everyone had got tired of guessing, he announced his new coach.
His name was Hecker, and he had graduated so far back that the _Crimson_
had to look up its old files to find out who he was. He had played right
half two years, it seemed, but hadn't made any special hit, and Yale had
won each year. The _Herald_ said he was a successful lawyer in Tonawanda,
New York. He didn't show up for spring practice; couldn't leave his work,
Cooper explained. Bi didn't come out either. He couldn't leave _his_ work.
At the end of the year he graduated _summa cum laude_, or something like
that, and the _Crimson_ said he was coming back to the Law School and would
be eligible for the team. Just as though it mattered.
We showed up a week before college began and had practice twice a day. At
the end of that week we knew a whole lot about Hecker. He was about
thirty-six, kind of thin, wore glasses, and was a terror for work. When we
crawled back to showers after practice we'd call him every name we could
think of. And half an hour later, if we met him crossing the Square, we'd
be haughty and stuck-up for a week if he remembered our names. He was a
little bit of all right, was Hecker. He was one of the quiet kind. He'd
always say "please," and if you didn't please mighty quick you'd be sitting
on the bench all nicely snuggled up in a blanket before you knew what had
struck you. That's the sort of Indian Hecker was, and we loved him.
Ten days after college opened we had one hundred and twenty men on the
field. If Hecker heard of a likely chap and thought well of his looks, it
was all up with Mr. Chap. He was out on the gridiron biting holes in the
sod before he knew it. That's what happened to Bi. One day Bi wasn't there
and the next day he was.
We had two or three weeding-outs, and it got along toward the middle of
October, and Bi was still with us. We were shy on plunging halfs that fall
and so I got my chance at last. I had to fight hard, though, for I was up
against Murray, last year's first sub. Then a provisional Varsity was
formed and the Second Team began doing business with Bi at right guard
again. The left guard on the Varsity was Bannen--"Slugger" Bannen. He
didn't weigh within seven pounds of Bi, but he had springs inside of him
and could get the jump on a flea. He was called "Slugger" because he looked
like a prizefighter, but he was a gentle, harmless chap, and one of the
Earnest Workers in the Christian Association. He could stick his fist
through an oak panel same as you or I would put our fingers through a sheet
of paper. And he did pretty much as he pleased with Bi. I'll bet, though,
that Bi could have walked all over "Slugger" if he'd really tried. But he
was like an automobile and didn't know his own strength.
We disposed of the usual ruck of small teams, and by the first of November
it was mighty plain that we had the best Eleven in years. But we didn't
talk that way, and the general impression was that we had another one of
the Beaten But Not Humiliated sort.
A week before we went to Philadelphia I had a streak of good luck and
squeezed Murray out for keeps. Penn had a dandy team that year and we had
to work like anything to bring the ball home. It was nip and tuck to the
end of the first half, neither side scoring. Then we went back and began
kicking, and Cooper had the better of the other chap ten yards on a punt.
Finally we got down to their twenty yards, and Saunders and I pulled in
eight more of it. Then we took our tackles back and hammered out the only
score. But that didn't send our stock up much, because folks didn't know
how good Penn was. But the Eli's coaches who saw the game weren't fooled a
little bit; only, as we hadn't played anything but the common or garden
variety of football, they didn't get much to help them. We went back to
Cambridge and began to learn the higher branches.
We were coming fast now, so fast that Hecker got scary and laid half the
team off for a day at a time. And that's how Bi got his chance again, and
threw it away just as he had last year. He played hard, but--oh, I don't
know. Some fellow wrote once that unless you had football instinct you'd
never make a real top-notcher. I think maybe that's so. Maybe Bi didn't
have football instinct. Though I'll bet if some one had hammered it into
his head that it was business and not a parlor entertainment, he'd have
buckled down and done something. It wasn't that he was afraid of
punishment; he'd take any amount and come back smiling. I came out of the
Locker Building late that evening and Hecker and Cooper were just ahead of
me.
"What's the matter with this man"--Hecker glanced at his notebook--"this
man Briggs?" he asked.
"Briggs?" answered Cooper. "He's a dub; that's all--just a dub."
That described him pretty well, I thought. By dub we didn't mean just a man
who couldn't play the game; we meant a man who knew how to play and
wouldn't; a chap who couldn't be made to understand. Bi was a dub of the
first water.
We didn't have much trouble with Dartmouth that year. It was before she got
sassy and rude. Then there were two weeks of hard practice before the Yale
game. We had a new set of signals to learn and about half a dozen new
plays. The weather got nice and cold and Hecker made the most of it. We
didn't have time to feel chilly. One week went by, and then--it was a
Sunday morning, I remember--it came out that Corson, the Varsity right
guard, had been protested by Yale. It seemed that Corson had won a prize of
two dollars and fifty cents about five years before for throwing the hammer
at a picnic back in Pennsylvania. Well, there was a big shindy and the
athletic committee got busy and considered his case. But Hecker didn't wait
for the committee to get through considering. He just turned Corson out and
put in Blake, the first sub. On Tuesday the committee declared Corson
ineligible and Blake sprained his knee in practice! With Corson and Blake
both out of it, Hecker was up against it. He tried shifting "Slugger"
Bannen over to right and putting the full back at left. Jordan, the Yale
left guard, was the best in the world, and we needed a man that could stand
up against him. But "Slugger" was simply at sea on the right side of center
and so had to be put back again. After that the only thing in sight that
looked the least bit like a right guard was Bayard Newlyn Briggs.
They took Bi and put him on the Varsity, and forty-'leven coaches stood
over his defenseless form and hammered football into him for eight solid
hours on Wednesday and Thursday. And Bi took it all like a little woolly
lamb, without a bleat. But it just made you sick to think what was going to
happen to Bi when Jordan got to work on him!
We had our last practice Thursday, and that night we went to the Union and
heard speeches and listened to the new songs. Pretty poor they were too;
but that's got nothing to do with the story. Friday we mooned around until
afternoon and then had a few minutes of signal practice indoors. Bi looked
a little bit worried, I thought. Maybe it was just beginning to dawn on Me
that it wasn't all a lark.
What happened next morning I learned afterwards from Bi. Hecker sent for
him to come to his room, put him in a nice easy-chair, and then sat down in
front of him. And he talked.
"I've sent for you, Mr. Briggs," began Hecker in his quiet way, "because it
has occurred to me that you don't altogether understand what we are going
to do this afternoon."
Bi looked surprised.
"Play Yale, sir?"
"Incidentally; yes. But we are going to do more than play her; we are going
to beat her to a standstill; we are going to give her a drubbing that she
will look back upon for several years with painful emotion. It isn't often
that we have an opportunity to beat Yale, and I propose to make the best of
this one. So kindly disabuse your mind of the idea that we are merely going
out to play a nice, exhilarating game of football. We are going to simply
wipe up the earth with Yale!"
"Indeed?" murmured Bi politely.
"Quite so," answered the coach dryly, "I suppose you know that your
presence on the team is a sheer accident? If you don't, allow me to tell
you candidly that if there had been anyone else in the college to put in
Corson's place, we would never have called on you, Mr. Briggs."
He let that soak in a minute. Then:
"Have you ever heard of this man Jordan who will play opposite you to-day?"
he asked.
"Yes, sir; a very good player, I understand."
"A good player! My dear fellow, he's the best guard on a college team in
twenty years. And you are going to play opposite him. Understand that?"
"Er--certainly," answered Bi, getting a bit uneasy.
"What are you going to do about it?"
"Do? Why, I shall do the best I can, Mr. Hecker. I don't suppose I am any
match for Jordan, but I shall try----"
"Stop that! Don't you dare talk to me of doing the best you can!" said the
coach, shaking a finger under Bi's nose--"for all the world," as Bi told me
afterwards, "as though he was trying to make me mad!" "'Best you can' be
hanged! You've got to do better than you can, a hundred per cent better
than you can, ever did, or ever will again! That's what you've got to do!
You've got to fight from the first whistle to the last without a let-up!
You've got to remember every instant that if you don't, we are going to be
beaten! You've got to make Jordan look like a base imitation before the
first half is over! That's what you've got to do, my boy!"
"But it isn't fair!" protested Bi. "You know yourself that Jordan can
outplay me, sir!"
"I know it? I know nothing of the sort. Look at yourself! Look at your
weight and your build! Look at those arms and legs of yours! Look at those
muscles! And you dare to sit there, like a squeaking kid, and tell me that
Jordan can outplay you! What have you got your strength for? What have we
pounded football into you for?"
Over went his chair and he was shaking his finger within an inch of Bi's
face, his eyes blazing behind his glasses.
"Shall I tell you what's the matter with you, Briggs? Shall I tell you why
we wouldn't have chosen you if there had been anyone else? Because you're a
coward--a rank, measly coward, sir!"
Pages:
1 |
2 |
3 |
4 |
5 |
6 |
7 |
8 |
9 |
10 | 11 |
12