"Don't mention it!" says "Butter Fingers," breaking in modestly. "The thanks are on my side. I didn't have much practice this week and picking up the kid just put me back in trim!"
FOR THE GLORY OF THE COACH
"There's no use talking, Mooney. You've broken training rules and you're through. That's final."
For a pulsating moment Elliott University's star fullback stood facing the great John Brown, acknowledged dean of all football coaches,—facing him as though he had not heard aright. There was stunned surprise evident in the attitudes of his team-mates, too. No one had imagined that John Brown would have the nerve to cross Mooney beyond the giving of a reprimand. Not and hold the reputation which he had slaved so hard to preserve in turning out a winning eleven for decadent Elliott his first year there. The great John Brown might better have remained in permanent retirement, resting on his richly deserved laurels, than risk his halo of "wizard" and "miracle man of the gridiron" by failure to restore Elliott's former football supremacy. The press had been free to predict, when Coach Brown had finally consented to do what he could for Elliott, that this task would prove his Waterloo. "Coach Severely Handicapped by Material and Facilities," one headline read, while another had it, "Sun Now Hardly Destined to Set on Triumph for John Brown," the articles going on to decry the lamentable conditions surrounding Elliott's effort to attain a higher athletic grade. The task was regarded as beyond that of even a miracle man and John Brown was credited with having accepted the crudest of tests.
And now, after Elliott had risen toward glory by defeating Hale, first of the Big Three, thus repudiating in part the commonly accepted opinion that the University could not hope to win any of her big contests that year—now, when all eyes were upon John Brown as never before; when it seemed as though this wily old fox, in some uncanny manner, had juggled another victorious eleven out of athletic chaos,—the coach was cutting off his nose to spite his face by dismissing Tim Mooney from the team!
Why it had been Mooney who, almost single-handed, had accounted for Hate's defeat. The backfield had been built around him; his experience had been relied upon as a stabilizer for the entire eleven which was comprised mostly of green, untried material. Removing Mooney from the team was like jerking the center pole out from under a tent and expecting the tent to remain standing upright. At least that is the way members of the eleven felt about it.
And the reason Coach Brown was kicking Mooney off the team was because he had stayed out past midnight on several occasions with his co-ed sweetheart, Ruth Chesterton. One of John Brown's rules was that every football man must be in bed by ten and those acquainted with his usually strict disciplinary measures had become accustomed to obeying. But Mooney's case had somehow been regarded as different. Folks had come to consider him, because of his outstanding athletic prowess, a law unto himself. In fact, Tim had become obsessed with the same impression.
"You—you're not joking?" he asked, still unable to believe John Brown's stern edict.
"Joking!" blazed the coach, "What would I be joking about? I warned you what would happen ... and the same thing's going to happen to anyone else who wilfully violates rules. You're through, Mooney, and you're through for good. Turn in your togs at the clubhouse!"