Center Rush Rowland

by Ralph Henry Barbour

  CHAPTER XII

  IN THE LINE-UP

  Country Day School came Saturday and put up a good fight, but wasdefeated by the score of 7 to 3. Ira witnessed that contest from thebench and found more interest in it than in the Mapleton battle becausehe wanted very much to have Parkinson win. He felt certain that adefeat would make much more difficult the already discouraging taskahead of captain and coach. Then, too, there was a personal side toit. He was, to a limited extent, a member of that brown-legged team,and, naturally enough, he preferred to be associated with success. Buthe just couldn't get up any real excitement, even when, in the thirdperiod, Country Day scored that field-goal and took the lead, or when,ten minutes later, Parkinson, with Dannis back to yelp and drive,marched from the enemy's forty-yard line to her nine and then tossed aforward-pass over to Ray White. Of course, now that he knew what it wasall about--or some of it!--and realised how hard the brown team wasworking on that thirty-yard march, he found more interest, but, unlikesome of the others around him, he was able to sit quietly on the benchwithout squirming, didn't make funny noises in his throat when Wellsfumbled a pass and, in brief, kept his heart beating away at its normalspeed. But he _was_ glad when it was over and Parkinson had won, and hesaid as much to Logan, a substitute end, with whom he walked back tothe gymnasium.

  "I'm glad we won it," he said in a quietly satisfied tone. "Aren't you?"

  Logan turned and viewed him quizzically. "Are you really?" he asked."Just like that, eh? Well, if I were you I'd try to restrain myenthusiasm, Rowland. Over-excitement is bad for the heart!"

  "Over-exci--Oh, well, I guess I haven't been here long enough to getvery excited about it. I was just thinking that maybe the school wouldbe pleased and be more--feel better disposed toward the team."

  "The school!" scoffed Logan. "Who cares what the school does? We playour own game." With which somewhat cryptic remark he kicked open thedoor and hurried in to get undressed before the showers were alloccupied.

  The next Monday Ira was taken from the seclusion of the fourth squadand handed over to the none too tender mercies of a large, red-facedyouth of nineteen named Neely. Dave Neely looked Ira up and downalmost, as Ira felt, compassionately. "Oh, all right," said Neely asthough disclaiming further responsibility, "get in with that gangthere and see what you can do. You can't be worse than most of them, Isuppose. What's your name?"

  "Rowland."

  "What makes you think you want to play guard, Rowland?"

  "Nothing. I mean, I don't want to play guard, especially."

  "You don't!" growled Neely. "Then what are you doing here?"

  "Coach Driscoll told me to report to you. He didn't tell me what I wasto do. But I'd just as lief be guard as anything."

  "Suffering cats!" groaned Neely. "And this is what happens to apeace-loving citizen like me! Have you ever played guard?"

  "No." Ira shook his head, smiling a little in sympathy with Neely'soutraged feelings. "I haven't played anywhere. I'm just beginning."

  "Fine! I can see that you're going to be a huge success. Well, allright." Neely waved a hand weariedly. "Cut across to that gang and dowhat you see them do. Only for the love of Mike, try to do it better!"

  The "gang" alluded to consisted of some ten or a dozen boys who weredivided into two lines. They faced each other and, when one of theirnumber stooped down and trickled a ball back between his wide-spreadlegs immediately crashed together and lunged and pushed and shoved andgave a good imitation of a small riot. Most of the linesmen were olderthan Ira, and several of them were larger. He couldn't find a place tostation himself and was still hesitating when Neely arrived, almost onhis heels.

  "Move up one, Buffum, and let this man in there. You're a guard,Rowland. The other side has the ball. Now get through."

  The man nearly opposite Ira grunted and trickled the pigskin away. Irawas watching him intently and would have continued to watch had notthe youth in front of him plunged into him and sent him reeling back.Dave Neely's face became apoplectic. "Didn't you see you were in thegentleman's way, Rowland?" he demanded with heavy sarcasm. "Why didn'tyou lie down and let him go over you?"

  Ira regarded him doubtfully. "Should I have stopped him!" he asked.

  A roar of laughter arose from the panting players and Neely'scountenance became even redder. "Should you have--Oh, no! Oh, dear,no! Not if it's too much trouble, Rowland! This is just a little lightexercise, you know. Nothing of consequence. We're just whiling away anidle hour. Why, you--you--Look here, don't you know anything about theduties of a linesman?"

  "I'm afraid not, but if you'll tell me----"

  "Oh, I'll tell you! Listen now. That brown oblate spheroid, or whateverthe scientific name of it is, is a football. Those fellows in front ofyou are attacking. When you see that football snapped you want to getthrough and go after it. You have other duties, but that's enough fornow. Get through! Get through! Try it now."

  Away trickled the ball, the lines crashed together and--Ira was lyingon the ground four yards behind the opposing line with the ballsnuggled to his chest! Neely stared a moment. Then, seeing the grins onthe faces of the others, he chuckled. "All right, Rowland," he called."Let him up. You needn't bother to fall on the ball just now, but that_is_ the way I want you to get through. That was all right. Now, then,Tooker, what happened to you?"

  Tooker looked puzzled and shook his head vaguely. "I guess he caught menapping," he replied.

  "You _guess_ he did! You _know_ he did! Try it again."

  Ira didn't get by the next time, for his opponent was prepared, but hegave Tooker all the work he could stand, and Neely grunted approval.They kept at it for some twenty minutes longer, one side playing ondefence and then the other. Ira discovered things from watching therest and Neely instructed between each charge. After that they had tenminutes with the machine, a wooden platform having a padded rail onone side and four small and absolutely inadequate iron wheels beneath.Having loaded the platform with half the squad, Neely set the rest atpushing it ahead with their shoulders set against the rail. It waspunishing work for the chargers, only partly compensated for when itbecame their part to ride and watch the others push.

  Work with the linesmen continued for a week without much variety.Always the afternoon started with tackling practice on the dummy andended with a jog around the field. Ira made progress and Neely nolonger viewed him with an air of patient fortitude. In fact, Neely wasrather pleased with him and more than once said so. Almost anyone saveIra would have been all perked up by that commendation, and would havehad hard work concealing the fact. But Ira only looked mildly gratifiedand said simply that he was "glad if he was any use, thanks!"

  The Cumner High School game went to Parkinson, 18 to 7, and wasquite an exciting event if only because of the numerous fumbles andmisplays which were about evenly divided between the contending teams.Cumner was light and fast and Parkinson heavier and decidedly slower.A wet field aided the home team by handicapping Cumner's speedybackfield. All three of Parkinson's touchdowns resulted from steadyline-plunging--diversified by fumbles of the wet ball--and Cumnerscored by the overhead route, tossing a long forward-pass acrossthe line in the third quarter. Cumner kicked her goal, while Cole,of Parkinson, missed each attempt. The brown team suffered severalinjuries that afternoon, for a slippery field invariably takes its tollof the players. Donovan, left guard, sprained his knee badly, French, atackle, pulled a tendon in his leg and Cole, first-string right half,got a nasty bruise on his head. Cumner, too, sustained injuries, butnone were serious.

  Ira went back with Gene Goodloe to Williams that evening after alecture in the auditorium and found Lyons and several football fellowspresent. He had entertained the notion that the afternoon's victorywas something to be mildly proud of, but after listening, in silencefor the most part, to the conversation he saw that he had been far toooptimistic. Parkinson had committed every sin in the football category.Everyone agreed on that. The line had been slow and had played toohigh, the backfield had lacked punch and the
ends--well, the least saidof the ends the better! Everyone was inclined to be very gloomy, andthe injury to Donovan didn't seem to cheer them up any! Ira went homeat ten o'clock realising that football was not merely the pastime hehad believed it to be, but something terribly earnest and important, alittle more important, evidently, than mid-year examinations or--or apresidential election! He shook his head and sighed as he climbed thestairs at Maggy's. It was beyond his comprehension, he concluded.

  They put him in a line-up one afternoon the next week and he struggledfor some ten or twelve minutes in a perfectly hopeless effort tooutplay Brackett, of the first squad. Perhaps he shouldn't haveexpected to get the best of a veteran like Brackett, but he was, at allevents, rather disappointed when he was taken out and sent hobblingoff to the showers. He hobbled because someone had ruthlessly stampedon his foot and he had a suspicion that one or two of his toes werecrushed and broken beyond repair. Also, his head was still ringing fromthe hearty impact of someone's shoe. He was relieved to find that,although red and swollen, the toes were apparently intact, while, asfor his head, that responded to cold water and rest.

  "Football," said Ira to himself as he limped down the steps on his wayto the town, "is a funny sort of game. You work like the dickens fivedays a week so you'll be able to 'play' on the sixth. Only I don't callit playing exactly, at that. Well, if I don't get killed I suppose I'llmanage to get through the season. Unless, that is, they realise, as Ido, that I'm no earthly use to them. I sort of hope they'll let me gobefore I break something worse than a couple of toes!"

  But it didn't seem to be their plan to let him go, for two days later,when the first real cut came and the fourth squad ceased to exist, Irawas still kicking his heels on the bench during scrimmage. It seemedto him that Coach Driscoll had let many a better player depart inpeace, and he wondered why he was retained. The second team had beenmade up for nearly a fortnight and Ira had been rather relieved at notbeing relegated to it. If, he argued, they put him on the second hemight prove just good enough to be kept there for the balance of theseason, while, if they kept him out for the first it was very likelythat after awhile they would recognise his deficiencies and let himoff. He was willing to stay there and do what they asked him to do justas long as he was wanted, but he always entertained the hope that somefine day Captain Lyons would gently and kindly inform him that they haddecided to worry along without him.

  He was given instruction in catching punts, something at which hefailed to distinguish himself, and was glad to find that the course wasmerely a sort of "extra" and intended to qualify him for an emergencyrather than to fit him to play in the backfield. Of course, if Driscollhad said: "You go in for Dannis, at quarter, Rowland," he would havenodded and gone, just as he would have done had he been nonchalantlyinformed that he was to play right end or centre. But he did secretlyhope that, failing to drop him, they would let him continue to playin a guard position. Without flattering himself, he felt that hecould play guard fairly well if he wasn't opposed to some wonder likeBrackett or Donovan. Ira's estimate of himself as a football player wasmodest those days, for, although he frequently received commendation,he concluded that folks were just being nice to him and "lettinghim down easy." Once when Fred Lyons said warmly: "Rowland, you'recertainly shaping, old man, wonderfully!" Ira looked mildly gratifiedand said "Thank you" and secretly liked Fred better for being graciousto a "dub" like he.

  After that first cut Ira could count on playing a few minutes everyafternoon. Sometimes he was opposed to the first squad men andsometimes he was lined up with the first against the second team. Whenthe latter event happened he usually gave a fairly good account ofhimself, always, in fact, when he played at left of centre, for thenhe was opposed to a rather light and seedy chap named Faulkner, and hecould do about as he liked with Faulkner. If they played him at rightguard--and they didn't seem to care much which side of the line theyput him--he had his work cut out, for Johns was a hard, fast fellowto stand up to. As the days went by Ira began, rather to his ownsurprise, to look forward to those more or less brief periods of play.After all, there was something exciting about a physical encounter likethat, something very interesting in matching his wit and brawn againstthe wit and brawn of another. Such times as he gave a good account ofhimself, Ira went back to the gymnasium and, later, to his room, inquite a glow of satisfaction. The glow didn't last long, however, andhe always ended by laughing at himself for caring whether he or Johnshad emerged victor in the struggle.

  Parkinson met her first reverse when she went away and playedPhillipsburg Academy. Phillipsburg had won from Kenwood by one scorethe week before and Parkinson was anxious to defeat her. Perhaps FredLyons was more anxious than anyone else, for it seemed to him that avictory over a team which had lately defeated Parkinson's special rivalwould convince the school at large that the brown team was worthy ofsupport. But it was not to be. With Donovan out of the game, the leftside of the Parkinson line was unbelievably weak. Buffum did the besthe could, doubtless, but Buffum was not a Donovan and never would be.Cole was not called on until the beginning of the third quarter, bywhich time Phillipsburg had a lead that Parkinson couldn't wear down.Coach Driscoll thrust a veritable army of substitutes into the frayin the final ten minutes, but all to no purpose. Ira had his baptismby fire that chilly, blowy October afternoon, and did neither betternor worse than the player he succeeded. Phillipsburg already had thegame on ice by a score of 19 to 9, and as she played entirely on thedefensive during most of the final period, Ira had little chance todistinguish himself. He played through six minutes, most of which wasspent by him, or so he thought afterwards, in running up and down thefield. Phillipsburg punted every time she got the ball, with the onethought of keeping the adversary outside her twenty-five-yard line.Parkinson nearly forced another score on her in the last three minuteswhen a forward pass from Wirt went to a Phillipsburg player and he hadalmost a clear field ahead of him. Dannis, however, managed to pull himto earth just short of the ten-yard line and when the home team hadexhausted two downs in a vain attempt to puncture the brown line, hertry-at-goal went a few inches wide of the upright. In the end 19 to 9was the result, and Parkinson went home with trailing banners.