VIII.
On Yale Field the shadows of a sullen afternoon had long since crept across the matted grass from the west stand to the east. For three torturing periods the Harvard attack had spent itself in futile hammering of the line; time and time again a sterling defense, exalted to the supreme effort by sheer consciousness of the Yale game, had delayed a fifth successive victory for Yale; but now, at last, when muscles lagged and brains dulled under the strain, when the result hung on the final spark of courage, the final coördination of savage strength and calculating energy, the big blue eleven drove smoothly play by play across the chalk lines, on and through and around their ancient rivals, irresistibly to the goal. It was the beginning of the last period, and the big score board still showed the score, Harvard 0, Yale 0; but when the Yale cohorts rose massed against the somber stands, and chanted the sonorous cadence of "Boola," it was because they knew that the end was near.
Over on the Harvard side, Hector Blanding, wrapped in a fur overcoat, paced moodily up and down. For three weeks he had poured every atom of his vitality into the training of three young men, only to see them discarded at the last moment in favor of the original backfield, which was sure to play the best Prince had taught it, and never fully understood how wretchedly it played. And it was Prince—Prince, who had summoned Hector from Olympus to Cambridge for just one purpose, and seen the papers turn from disconsolate reports of disaster to hopeful news of Blanding's men and Blanding's methods—it was Prince who had wavered, steeled himself to confidence in his original plan, and made his own choice of backs.
"I'm sorry—sorrier than I can tell you," he had said at the last, nerveracking conference. "If they only had experience, Bull—if they weren't so hysterical. I can't doubt your nerve, old man, but oh! how I do doubt your judgment. I'm sorry."
The whistle shrilled. The Yale center, burly, but agile, bent over the ball. The Yale cheering section swung triumphantly into the maddening dirge of the "undertaker" song, and the blue team, answering the call of the clan, surged through a mass of crimson jerseys for seven long yards. It was the same old story—a Harvard eleven fighting to creditable defeat against an opponent bound to glorious victory. In the west stand men said so as they turned coat collars against the gathering chill—said so as they watched Yale plow through right wing for six yards and a first down. First down on the seventeen-yard line, and fourteen minutes to play. Well, at least they could lose like gentlemen.
Hector, finding himself shoulder to shoulder with Head Coach Prince, stared at him bitterly.
"Well," he challenged.
"Well?"
"Foster's about used up. Who'll go in?"
"Sanborn. Great Scott! We held 'em that time!"
"Prince," implored Hector, as they hurried after the play, "this is the last ditch! For gad's sake, listen to reason, can't you? Look at your team! It's licked—it's put up a good fight, but it's cracked now. They'll score that touchdown in five plays, or less. You'll have to send in two or three men before it's' over—take Grant—and Jordan. I'll guarantee those men, Prince!"
"No." He turned to the bench. "Sanborn—where is he?"
"Prince! Look at the face of him Look at Grant—can't you see what I've done to him, Prince?"
The head coach carried his eyes down the long line of red-blanketed figures in the straw. Somewhere near the middle he saw Sanborn, black, heavy, stolid one of the old régime. Farther along was Grant, a hundred and sixty pounds of acutely nervous energy. His face was drawn and pale; he leaned forward on his arms, every nerve riveted to the tragedy that confronted him.
Hector laughed shortly.
"And you pretend to be a judge of men!"
The head coach nodded slowly. It had been a losing campaign since the first—and Yale had knifed the line once more. It was all over; Yale was bound to score, and after that it was a matter of playing through intervening minutes until the merciful call of time. These lighter men might possibly avert defeat for a few seconds—there was always a chance, and, besides, he owed something to Blanding. Prince wet his lips.
"Let's put in Grant"
A tremendous roar drowned his words. Directly before the goal posts both teams clawed and pummeled in a desperate melee. Some one shrieked agonizedly: "Ball, ball!" Unexpectedly a ball of new leather bobbled out of the press, and rolled to one side, and a Harvard end, scrambling toward it, gathered it in just as it crossed the line. The whistle blew warningly.
"Time! Time out for Harvard!"
"Harvard's ball!"
"It's Foster! Foster's hurt!"
"Long cheer for Foster!"
Three white-faced youngsters struggled out of blanket and sweater, and leaped to Blanding's gesture. Watching them, he grinned. There had ended the first lesson he had taught them.
"You three," said Hector, "you're going in now. You're going against a good team—not a wonderful team, but good—don't forget that! Prichard, use your head on those forward passes! Grant, you're going to get the jump on 'em and run 'em off their feet. I've seen you—you can do it. Two yards won't do, three won't do—you're out there to make five—and ten. Now—over in the Yale gym they walked past Frank Hinkey's picture before the game— you know what that means. Out here they haven't any picture, and you've got Blanding! Get in there and take your heart with you!"
The Harvard forwards, worn and battered, and desperately grateful for the respite, lined up ten blessed yards from the goal, and waited for the punt that would once more prolong the catastrophe. The quarter back, glancing from Grant to Prichard to Jordan, clapped his hands smartly.
"Signal! Twenty-two—two—twenty-two—four!"
It wasn't a kick—it wasn't the conservative defensive play that Prince was forever teaching—it was Grant's signal, and his stomach seemed to drop out of his body, and his tongue turn to ashes in his mouth. In utter defiance of training, common sense, orders, he allowed his eyes to stray to the side lines, where Blanding stood. The words rang in his ears: "Out here they haven't any picture, and you've got Blanding!" And Blanding was the only man in the world who knew how Eddie Grant could play football! Grant stiffened.
"Twenty-two—two—twenty-two—four! Twenty-two—two"
Grant huddled the ball close in to his chest, and struck the line with every ounce of energy in back and shoulders and legs. A solid wall of flesh met him, a wall that crumbled ludicrously to let him through, and then he crashed impotently to ground under a powerful Yale tackle.
"Good work, Bill!" bawled a hoarse voice above him.
"Up quick, there! Lively!"
"First down for Harvard—move those lines!"
"Signal! Signal!"
The man Jordan, slight, but dynamically nervous, edged a step nearer. Over on the Yale bench an old player pointed excitedly.
"Look! Look there! Isn't that right half a pocket edition of Bull Blanding? Ever see anything like it? Look at his back! Look at how he swings his arms! And"
The eulogy was cut short by a siren scream from across the way. The young man Jordan, whose plastic imagination had been kneaded and fed and coached for three solid weeks into a half-serious, half-childish belief that he actually was a pocket edition of Bull Blanding, sprinted around left end in the manner of a small cyclone, squirmed away from one tackle, repelled another with a straight-arm jab, and was driven out of bounds, fighting every step of the way, on the thirty-five-yard line.
Harvard hearts went out to Jordan in a vast roar. Down on the side lines Hector pounded the head coach in the ribs.
"Blanding!" he yelled, above the din. "Man, I've given you three Blandings!"
Prichard, sighting a perilous opening between guard and tackle, disregarded the signal for another end run, and sped through to midfield.
"Three Blandings—am I right? Am I?"
Yale's captain, still calm and confident, rallied his men. He was a veteran; in many games he had seen the last effort of a maimed and beaten team.
"Stop 'em, Yale! Stop this play! Hold 'em!"
A red-headed guard broke through and spilled Grant before he had fairly started. A great, joyful cry went up on the left—Yale was cheering.
"That's the way—hold 'em, Yale!"
"Stop this one now!"
"Get on side, there!"
It was Grant's ball again. A compelling power forced his eyes from their duty; and far across the storm-swept area he saw Hector Blanding, who believed he couldn't be stopped.
"Bull!" he said to himself. "Bull—Blanding! Bull—Grant!"
The half back met the rush of bodies as a swimmer rises against a mighty wave. He fought with the utter certainty of strength—one short, mad struggle, and he was over and beyond Yale's giant center trio, running clear. The secondary defense shook him with the savageness of the tackle, but he rose, laughing.
"You won't get me next time, old boy!"
"Try it," snapped the Yale captain.
"Signal! Wake up, there!"
Grant's eyes narrowed at the serial number. Jordan dropped back almost imperceptibly. Prichard held his ground.
"Steady, you bull moose!" said Grant evenly. "Get it over!"
"Signal!" said Prichard sharply.
His own word was the signal. As the ball came low and hard to Jordan, Prichard smashed into the line, the defense piling around him. Yale's star end, drawn in on the play, checked himself in the nick of time, and dove at Jordan, who carried the ball. He was a fraction of a second too late, for Grant, sweeping wide, took a short pass from Jordan, and headed down the field, running alone. The stands rose, gasping; Yale's captain, playing back, came up watchfully, measured his distance accurately, and rolled his man over and over with a wolfish tackle.
"Get up, get up!"
"Watch your end this time!"
"Look out for another trick—look out!"
"Don't let 'em cross the forty-yard line, Yale!"
It was Jordan, with the image of Hector Blanding in his brain, and Blanding's sarcasm in his ear; and Jordan drew in his head like a turtle, and made two yards.
"That's the way, Yak!"
"Signal!" bellowed a Yale warrior in the old schoolboy stratagem.
"Right through you!" said Jordan fiercely. Blanding had once said that in a Princeton game, and made five yards—Jordan made ten, and remembered them all his life. The unholy joy of combat was in him at last, and as he rioted through the line, he cursed picturesquely, and used his shoulders.
A little of the confidence had oozed from the big blue team as they felt the new power behind the Harvard attack, and respected it. They crouched lower, leg to leg.
"Don't let 'em make another first down, fellows!"
"On your toes, everybody!"
"Bull!" said Grant to himself. "Bull—Grant!" He could hear Hector's cutting tones in practice: "Very ladylike, Grant"—then, with a sudden change of manner: "Take your heart with you, boy!"
The world went black and vivid, flashing crimson—there was cold water on his face, and he was snorting and choking. Grim, terrible creatures, streaked with dirt, surrounded him—they dragged him to his feet, which were strangely useless.
"Feel better, old man?"
"All right now?"
"Bully!" said Grant. He shook his hips, and tried a tentative jogging step or two. "Let me go! I'm all right. Signal! Hurry up, will you? Hurry up!"
That time it was Prichard, who was supposed to lack nerve. In his haste, he fumbled—and a brawny guard was bearing threateningly down on him. Instinct said to fall on the ball, to take the loss of distance and play safe: but an icy reflex at the back of his head warned him with startling distinctness to use his wits. He jumped aside, avoiding the guard by inches; he had the ball, and he sent it in a long overhand spiral to an end waiting on Yale's twenty-yard line.
The west stand was a crazy, reeling mob, drunk with the ecstasy of a victory five doleful years in the making; and on the east, the bleachers rose, uncovered, and began the hymn that Yale men hold in reserve for the very last.
The quarter back, acting captain now, danced along the line, hysterically hammering his men with his open hand.
"Put it over, everybody into it—it's a cinch!"
"Touchdown! Get the jump!"
"This is the big one!"
"Everybody hold hard—all together!"
"Smash it!"
Jordan, darting a glance to the side lines, saw Blanding.
"Shut up!" he screamed. "What d'you think this is—a sewing circle? Play ball! Signal!"
With the whole team raging behind him, Grant—Bull Grant—jammed through for two yards. Jordan followed with three. Grant slid past tackle for three more. They had come into their own, and they knew it. They saw nothing, heard nothing, sensed nothing but the white mark which they must cross—which they were inevitably sure to cross.
"Hurry up! Hurry up!"
"Hold that line, Harvard!"
The signal was Grant's.
"Two yards isn't enough," his memory told him, as he bored his way through the weakening resistance. "Two yards isn't enough!" He ripped away from the Yale quarter back, and fell struggling under the feet of a dozen men.
Canvas rasped his face—he shoved it away, and laughed scornfully.
"A yard to go," said the little referee, bounding backward from the scrimmage.
Pale-lipped, with teeth bared beast-like, the blue team braced once more.
"Fight 'em, Yale!"
"They can't put it over—they never could!"
"You'll stop 'em now, you blue bulldogs!"
"Signal!"
"No!" shouted Grant. "Change signals!"
The men stood up, wondering. Grant, bringing the four heads together, spoke in the tense monotone of Blanding.
"Give it to Prichard—Prichard's the man! Here's where we need nerve! Prichard right through that red-headed lad—he's all in! Hurry up! We'll make it this time!"
The quarter back dashed the perspiration from his forehead. His acting captaincy was gone before Blanding's men, just as Prince's leadership had fallen before Blanding. He obeyed mechanically.
"Twelve—twenty-five—five! Twelve—twenty-five"
The college senior who was playing his first and last game for Harvard dug his cleats into the turf, and plunged forward. At a single stride he was prisoned by sweating forms—he was dragged down, and trampled on—he wrenched and tugged blindly, saying in his soul: "I failed—I failed they've held us!"
Then a great load was lifted from him, and Grant was hauling him by the heels.
"Touchdown, you fool! Quit your kicking—you're five yards to the good now!"
There were still four minutes to play, and Jordan, catching the kick-off, dodged fifty yards through the open field in a more spectacular run than Blanding ever conceived. Prichard, with Blanding in his heart, skirted the flank on a trick of Blanding's devising for twenty yards more; and Jordan, coached day by day in spite of Prince's remonstrances, kicked a neat field goal. That made it ten to nothing, and when the whistle blew, the insane horde that poured out of the Harvard stands made first for the three backs, and for a man who, on account of his tortoise-rimmed glasses, looked more like a professor of archæology than a trainer of men. And as they whirled him under the goal posts in the dizzy maze of the snake dance, the band somehow got to the head of the line, and the words of the march came up to Eleanor Redway with new significance:
"Look where the crimson banners fly,
Hark to the sound of marching feet;
There is a host approaching nigh—
Harvard is marching up the street."