THE GIRL AND THE GAME
in the dressing-room after the game. We all got rubbed down for the last time. Nobody said much except one of the coachers. Most of us smoked. Shorty stood on a stool, naked, getting rubbed down, and puffing on his first cigarette since August. A couple of tears dropped down from his cheeks on to the wrist of the rubber. Maybe you think it's funny, but we didn't. It was all so different from the way we thought we were going to break training.
"Cap, we'll do 'em next year," said the head coach.
Cap only sniffled, and— But never mind all this. It's all over now, and the fellows downstairs are cheering themselves up with songs and things, and cursing me between times, I suppose. And I'm all alone in my room, with my right ankle bound up, and sometimes it throbs like the dickens, and I'm glad of it.
Jack, the trainer, was with me for a while, but he went down to the dinner again. He said I could come, but I wouldn't. I deserve to be left alone. I lost the game for the col-
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