"Tomorrow we play Latham College. It is the last game before the big games
for The State Intercollegiate Football Championship. Saturday after this,
we play Hamilton, and the following week Ballard, the Champions! The eleven
I send in against those teams must be a solid unit, one in spirit and
purpose—every member of the Gold and Green team must be welded with his
team-mates, and they must forget everything but that their Alma Mater must
win the Championship! With no thought of self-glory, no other purpose in
playing than a love for old Bannister, every fellow must go into those
games to fight for his Alma Mater! Now, as for Thor, I need not tell you
that he is not in sympathy with our ambition; he simply does not understand
campus tradition and spirit. He is as yet not possessed of an Alma Mater;
he plays football only because of gratitude to Mr. Thomas Haviland Hicks,
Sr., and he hates to lose the time from his studies for the practice.
The football squad knows that his presence is a veritable wet blanket on
enthusiasm and the team's fighting spirit."
It was true. That intangible shadow of something wrong, brooding over
training-table, shower-room, and Bannister Field, that self-evident
truth which almost every collegian had for days confessed to himself yet
hesitated to voice, had been given definite form by Coach Corridan talking
to the eleven. The good that Thorwald might do for the team by his superb
prowess and massive bulk was more than offset and nullified by his
attitude.
To the blond Colossus, daily practice was unutterable mental torture. His
mind was on his studies, to which his bulldog purpose shackled him; he
begrudged the time spent on Bannister Field; he was stolid, silent, aloof.
He scarcely ever spoke, except when addressed. He reported for practice at
the last second, went through the scrimmage like a great, dumb, driven ox,
doing as he was ordered; and when the squad was dismissed he hurried to his
room. He was among the squad, but not of them; he neither understood nor
cared about their love for old Bannister, their vast desire to win for
their Alma Mater; he played football because he was grateful to Hicks, Sr.,
for helping him to get started toward his goal, but as Coach Corridan now
told the 'Varsity, he killed the squad's enthusiasm,
"All of this cannot fail to damage the esprit de corps, the morale, of
the eleven," declared Coach Corridan, having outlined Thor's attitude. "I
know that every member of the squad, if Thor played the game because of
college spirit, for love of old Bannister, would rejoice at his prowess.
But as it is they are justly resentful that he is not in the spirit of the
game. What we may gain by his playing, we lose because the others cannot do
their best with his example to hurt their fighting spirit. I do not want,
nor will I have on my eleven, any player who plays for other reasons than a
love for his Alma Mater, be he a Hogan, Brickley, Thorpe, or Mahan. I have
waited, hoping Thorwald would be awakened, as Hicks explained, but now I
must act. Tomorrow's game with Latham must see Thor awakened, or I must,
for the sake of the eleven, drop him from the squad for the rest of the
season.
"Yet I beg of you, in case the plan I shall propose fails, remember Hicks'
appeal! Do not condemn or ostracize John Thorwald in any degree. He has
three more seasons of football, so let us keep on trying to make him
understand campus life, college tradition. Be his friends, help him all you
can, and sooner or later he will awaken. Something may suddenly shock him
to a true understanding of what old Bannister means to a fellow. Or perhaps
the awakening will be slow, but it must come. And Bannister can win without
Thor, don't forget that! We'll make one final effort to awaken Thor, and
if it fails, just forget him, boys, so far as football goes, and watch the
Gold and Green win that championship."
"What is your scheme, Coach?" questioned Captain Butch Brewster, his honest
countenance showing how heavily the responsibility of team-leader weighed
upon him. "You are right; as Thor is now, he is a handicap to the eleven,
but—"
"My idea is this," explained the Slave-Driver earnestly. "Select some
student to go to Thorwald and try to show him that unless he gets into the
game and plays for old Bannister, he will be dropped from the squad. If
possible, let the fellow make him understand that, in his case, it will be
a shame and a dishonor. Now, Butch, you and Hicks can probably approach
Thor, or perhaps you know of someone who—"
T. Haviland Hicks, Jr.'s, cherubic countenance showed the light of dawning
inspiration, and Coach Corridan paused, as the sunny youth exhibited a
desire to say something, with him not by any means a phenomenal
happening; given the floor, the blithesome youth burst forth excitedly:
"Theophilus—Theophilus Opperdyke is the one! He has more influence over
Thor than any other student, and the big fellow likes the little boner.
Thor will at least listen to Theophilus, which Is more than any of us can
gain from him."
After the meeting had adjourned, and the last inspection had been made in
the other dorms, the Seniors being exempt, several members of the Gold and
Green team—Captain Butch, Beef, Pudge, Monty, Roddy, and Bunch, together
with little Theophilus Opperdyke, dragged from his studies—foregathered in
the cozy room of T. Haviland Hicks, Jr.; those who had heard the
coach's talk were still stunned at the ban likely to be placed on the
Brobdingnagian Thor. On the campus outside Creighton Hall, a horde of
Bannister youths, incited by Tug Cardiff, who gave them no reason for his
act, were making a strenuous effort to awaken the Prodigious Prodigy,
evidently depending on noise to achieve that end, for a vast sound-wave
rolled up to Hicks' windows—"Rah! Rah! Rah! Thor! Thor! Thor!
He's—all—right!"
"Listen!" exploded T. Haviland Hicks, Jr., indignantly. "You and I,
Theophilus, would give a Rajah's ransom just to hear the fellows whoop it
up for us like that, and it has no more effect on that sodden hulk of a
Thor than bombarding an English super-dreadnaught with Roman candles!
Howsomever, Coach Corridan exploded a shrapnel bomb on old Bannister's
eleven tonight."