"You're cowards, every one of you," burst forth Mignon, her dark face distorted with rage, "and if——"
"T-r-r-ill!" The referee's whistle was summoning them to the game.
Mignon ran to her station resolved on vengeance. Four girls followed her to their places divided between two fears. Awe of Miss Archer and the disaster that would surely overtake them if they persisted in their former tactics acted as a spur to their sleeping consciences. Fear of Mignon became a secondary emotion. They vowed within themselves to play fairly and they kept their vow.
The second half of the game opened very well for Marjorie's team. She passed the ball to Susan Atwell, who scored, thereby winning a salvo of hearty applause from the gallery. The watchful spectators had not been blind to the unfair methods of the grays. Two goals followed in their favor. So far the grays had done nothing. Unnerved by Marjorie's just censure and the fear of exposure, they paid little heed to Mignon's glowering glances and frantic signals. They played in a half-hearted, diffident fashion, quite the opposite of their whirlwind sweep during the first half. The black and scarlet girls soon brought the score up to 14 to 10 in their favor, and from that moment on had things decidedly their own way. Time after time Mignon cut in desperately for the basket to receive a pass, but on each occasion her team-mates made a wild throw. Marjorie's team, however, played with perfect unity, working in several successful signal plays. Try as she might, the French girl could do nothing to arouse her players. Their passing became so delinquent that once or twice it brought derisive groans from the male spectators in the gallery. As the second half neared its end, Muriel Harding made a sensational throw to basket that aroused the gallery to wild enthusiasm. It also served to take the faint remaining spirit from the disheartened grays, and the game wound up with a score of 30 to 12 in favor of the black and scarlet girls. They had won a complete and sweeping victory over their unworthy opponents.
It was a proud moment for Marjorie Dean, as she stood surrounded by a flock of jubilant boys and girls, who had rent the gallery air with appreciative howls, then hustled from their places aloft to offer their congratulations to the victors.
"I'm so glad you won, Marjorie," cried Ellen Seymour. Lowering her voice, she added: "I could see a few things. I'm not the only one. But what happened to them? They actually played fairly in the second half—all except Mignon. But she couldn't do much by herself."
Marjorie smiled faintly. "We must have discouraged them, I suppose. We never before worked together so well as we played in that second half. Wasn't that a wonderful throw to basket that Muriel made?"
"Splendid," agreed Ellen warmly. "I predict an easy victory for the sophomores on Thanksgiving Day."
Marjorie breathed relief. "Are you coming to see us play, or are you going away for Thanksgiving?" was her tactful question.
Ellen plunged into a voluble recital of her Thanksgiving plans, quite forgetting her curiosity over the sudden change of tactics of the defeated grays. Several girls joined in the conversation, and thus the talk drifted away from the subject Marjorie wished most to avoid.