The Winning Touchdown: A Story of College Football

by Lester Chadwick

  CHAPTER XIX

  SUSPICIONS

  "Has anyone seen my hammer?"

  "Where the mischief did I put those nails?"

  "Hey, Tom, give us a hand setting this joist, will you?"

  "I say, Phil, should this two-by-four go in with the big side out, orthe narrow?"

  "Simpson, look out, or you'll saw my finger. You're too close to me."

  "Wow! Ouch!" and Holly Cross dropped the hatchet he was using in placeof a hammer, and held his thumb in his mouth. "Jerusalem crickets!" hecried. "I'll never be able to practice football if I keep on this way!"

  There was a riot of sounds: hammering, planing, and chiseling, andsawing; and, mingled with them, the clatter of the lads' voices, inentreaties, commands, appeals for help, asking for advice, or, asHolly's was, raised in agony over some misdirected blow.

  Work on rebuilding the grandstand was in full swing. On examination ofthe wrecked structure after the storm, it was found that nearly all thematerial in it could be used over again. All the new lumber that wouldbe needed would be some heavy joists, to take the place of those brokenin the collapse.

  They were quite expensive to buy, but a lumber dealer who heard of theboys' plight agreed to let them have the timber, and to wait as long asthey liked for his pay. He even furnished a couple of men to raise theheavy pieces into place, and the boys voted him a first-class "sport,"and sent him a season complimentary ticket to all the games.

  It was not as easy as it sounds, nor as simple as the boys had expected,to rebuild the structure, but they went at it with hearty good will, anda determination, in the path of which nothing could stand. The severaljanitors gave them all the aid they could, but the boys did most of thework, after they were told just how to do it.

  Frank Simpson was of great help, for he was probably the strongest andbiggest lad in college, and the way he could shoulder a beam, and walkoff with it to where it was needed in the work was something to look atand admire.

  "But you fellows needn't stop work to watch Frank," said Tom Parsons,who, because of his knowledge of carpentry, and because he had proposedthe scheme, was, by common consent, made a sort of foreman. "Get busy,and do some of the lifting yourselves," he advised.

  "I say, Tom," demanded Sid, "what makes these boards split every time Itry to nail them on these four-by-fours? I must be a hoodoo, for I'vesplit half a dozen."

  "Those aren't four-by-fours," declared Tom. "They're two-by-fours, orscantling, and there are a lot of reasons why you split the boards."

  "Give me one, and I'll be satisfied."

  "Well, you're using cut nails, and you ought to use wire ones there, asthe boards are old and dry. Then you have to nail so close to the edgethat they split easier than they would if you could put the nails nearerthe middle. But use wire nails."

  "You mean those round ones?"

  "Yes. The cut nails are those black, square-headed ones, and when you douse them, drive 'em with the widest part of the end at right angles tothe grain of the wood."

  "What's that, a lesson in geometry, young gentlemen?" asked a voice, andthe students turned quickly, to observe President Churchill observingthem with an amused smile.

  "No, sir," answered Sid. "Tom was telling me how to drive nails."

  "Ah, yes, a very useful accomplishment, I believe," remarked the doctor."Though I never could do it without hitting my thumb. A very usefulaccomplishment, very."

  He looked at the grandstand, which was nearing completion, and, as hepassed on, with a book of Sanskrit under his arm, he remarked:

  "You are doing very well, young gentlemen--very well. Randall has reasonto be proud of her resourceful students."

  "Prexy looks worried," remarked Sid, as the good doctor passed on out ofhearing.

  "Yes, I shouldn't wonder but what that legal business is bothering him,"admitted Tom. "It's a blamed shame it had to happen, but it's just likethe Langridge breed to want to stir up trouble. Now, Sid, put plenty ofnails in when you fasten two scantling together, and use the big cutones. We don't want this stand to come down with a lot of pretty girlson it."

  "I should say not!" and Sid plied his hammer with renewed energy, asthough to prevent any such catastrophe.

  Tom went on with what he was doing, on another part of the stand, untilhe was called by Frank Simpson, who wanted his opinion on a certainpoint.

  "I think if we run these cross-pieces the other way," suggested the bigCalifornian, "it will brace the stand better."

  "So do I," agreed Tom, after an examination. "Go ahead, do it that way,Frank. Want any help getting that beam up?"

  "No, I can do it alone." Which the strong lad did, to Tom's admiration.

  And thus the building work went on. True, not every joint was as even asregular carpenters would have made them, and a number of boards weresawed very crookedly, but this did not interfere with the strength ofthe stand, and little was cared for looks in the emergency.

  President Churchill was not taking any chances, however, and he privatelysent for an architect friend of his, who examined the rebuilt structure,and assured the worried doctor that it was perfectly safe.

  Record time was made with the task, for three hundred willing lads canaccomplish wonders, even if they lack the training of a trade. As thedate for the Canton game approached, it was seen that the stand would bevery nearly finished on time. It was necessary to stop work sometimes toget in football practice, but the boys were developing unused muscles,and hardening others by their labors, so that they were in fine physicaltrim.

  "It's the best thing that could have happened," said Holly Cross toCaptain Woodhouse, at the close of work one afternoon. "We'll wipe theground up with Canton."

  "Well, we ought to," declared Dan.

  "Don't be so sure," retorted Mr. Lighton; "they have a pretty goodteam."

  "Ours is improving," asserted Kindlings, proudly, and, in a measure,this was so, though there were still some weak places in the line.

  It was within two days of the Canton game, and the boys were workingeagerly to get the stand in shape. They had put in several nights on it,laboring in shifts, by the light of some flaming arc lamps rigged up bythe college electrician.

  Tom, in virtue of his position as foreman, was going about and doing asmuch as he could, when, as he passed near Phil, who was nailing downsome of the seats, the quarter-back called to his chum:

  "I say, Tom, when you have a chance just take a stroll over where thatLenton chap is working."

  "You mean Henry Lenton--the freshman?"

  "Yes, the chap who flocks by himself so much, and always seems to betinkering with something in his room. See what he's doing?"

  "Why; is he doing it wrong?"

  "No, but you remember the queer key we found in our door that night?"

  "Sure."

  "Well, just think of that when you see what Lenton is doing."

  Wondering what motive Phil could have, Tom did stroll over to where,down in the front part of the stand, the odd student was screwing somehinges on the doors of a row of boxes, the seats in which sold forhigher prices than the ordinary ones. Lenton was a strange lad. He wasbright in his studies, and his taste ran to matters scientific. He waseager in the physics and chemistry classes, and had made a number ofingenious machines and pieces of apparatus to illustrate the forces ofnature.

  As Tom approached he heard the shrill scraping of a file, and at oncewhat Phil had said about the key came into his mind.

  "I wonder what Lenton is filing?" thought the end. Not wishing to seemto sneak up on him, yet desiring to solve the mystery, if there was one,Tom called:

  "What's the matter? Don't those hinges fit, Lenton?"

  "Some of them do, and others don't," was the reply. "Or, rather, thehinges are all right, but the hasps that hold the doors shut aren'ttrue. I have to file some."

  "Oh," said Tom, and then he noticed that the lad had rigged up a small,portable iron vise on the rail near which he was working. The vise helda piece of metal, and this the
lad was industriously filing.

  As Tom noticed the manner in which Lenton handled the tools, workingwith files of several different sizes, the same suspicions that Phil hadentertained came into his own mind. As for the files, Tom knew that nonehad been bought for use on the stand.

  "Where did you get 'em?" he asked, picking up one.

  "Oh, they're mine," answered Lenton. "I've got quite a few tools in myroom," and then he drew the file back and forth over the metal, makingsuch a noise that conversation was difficult. Tom watched him a fewminutes, and then turned away.

  "Phil was right," the end murmured. "There is something expert in theway he uses a file, and perhaps he did make the false key. We'll have todo some investigating."