"I can’t stand this!" muttered Zeb to himself. "Even if Fardale loses, that duffer has covered himself all over with glory this day. I’ve got to have a smoke to steady my nerves. Guess I’ll sneak off to the old barn and smoke there."
So this envious fellow, with his heart full of jealous hatred, actually left the field and slipped away toward the old barn, into which he disappeared.
But, although Merriwell had stopped Rogers’ run, Rivermouth could not be held there. Resuming her battering-ram style of playing, she hammered into Fardale’s line for repeated gains, carrying the ball nearer and nearer to the goal of the visitors.
Not till the ball was down within one yard of Fardale’s line did the cadets check the advance.
In these savage onslaughts Rivermouth had stretched Fardale players on the field repeatedly. Twice Douglass had seemed knocked out, but both times he revived and insisted on staying in the fight. Buckhart was bleeding and dirty, but still as stubborn as a mule. One of Kent’s eyes was nearly closed, and that bothered him not a little. Burrows limped, telling that he had been hurt, and, taken altogether, Fardale seemed nearly used up.
Still, into these fellows Frank Merriwell had somehow instilled the dogged spirit of Yale—a spirit that fights hardest in the last ditch, when the battle seems most hopeless.
This was exactly what happened now. With the ball only one yard from Fardale’s line, the cadets braced up and refused to let Rivermouth make another inch.
Frank Merriwell’s heart swelled with pride as he saw those dirty, battered, bloody boys stand there like the eternal hills and hurl Rivermouth back repeatedly. He was proud of them then, and he would remain proud of them, even though they lost the game. They had made a most heroic fight and were deserving of all credit, whatever the result.
CHAPTER X.
VICTORY AND RETRIBUTION.
And there Fardale held the enemy until it secured the ball on downs, which was something quite unexpected by Rivermouth.