“That’s Nick,” said Smythe. “We’re all here now.”
Next moment another young man was at his elbow. A voice had interrupted them apologetically. They turned and saw that it was the Rainhurst captain, and with a slow whimsical smile Rouse held out his hand.
“I say, is this true? One of your chaps has just been telling me. Do you mean to say you’ve come here absolutely on your own? Has your footer been stopped? Don’t they know anything at all about it at the school?”
Rouse began to explain. Half-way through the other stopped him.
“Well, all I can say is that if you fellows have gone to all this sweat just to save this match being scratched then you deserve to win it—and,” he added thoughtfully, “I’m only sorry you won’t.”
Rouse laid a hand upon his arm.
“I wonder if you could show me where I could get a rub down? I don’t know whether you’ve ever ridden from Harley on a punctured bike, but I have—and only just.”
As he followed the other away down the gravel path he looked round at the record crowd that, the cheering over, was now lining up along the touch-lines. His eyes passed thoughtfully over those members of the home side who were already taking casual place kicks on the field, and then came back and settled in turn upon certain of his own team who were coming slowly towards him from the changing-room. And in those few moments a strange solemnity obsessed him. He found himself remembering all that this lean year had meant to Harley. This was their first school match, and it would be their only one. The season would stand alone in history, and it was all on his account. He wondered whatever they could see in him, or what sympathy he had aroused in them that could warrant such devotion to one man. He was suddenly conscious of the weight of responsibility that was his. He, who had meant the season to be so famous in the annals of the school, had been the sole cause of the miserable fiasco that it had become. And it seemed to him that if only the school side could play such a game to-day as would be worth the fellows having come to see, it might make some amends. As a team nothing out of the way could be expected of them. They were only a scratch Fifteen, and they had not yet had one single practice game together. No one could foretell their capability. But he was their captain, and it was possible that by setting the example he might get each man on the side to play the game of his life. In the eyes of the Head he was yesterday’s captain, and Christopher Woolf Roe was to-day’s.
Well, when the story of this one match came to be written it should, if he could by one day’s captaincy ordain it, stand out as the greatest in the school’s long history. That would be some slight consolation to all those who had missed the game that was so near their hearts throughout this miserable term.
He changed and came out into the open and found his team, and all the while he could not find a word to say to anyone. Yet as they stood waiting silently for him to lead them out, he turned to them with a sudden spontaneity.