Out of the corner of his eye, as he dribbled the ball, he saw an Elkana boy sweeping toward him. It must be now or never. With a quick lunge ahead, he diverted the other's straight line of charge; then, stepping backward abruptly, he found himself clear for the moment. The ball bounded from the floor and plumped upon the open palm of his right hand.
But something stayed the left hand from clapping upon that side of the leather, preliminary to the try for goal. Instead, turning a little, he swung his right arm in a circle, shouted a warning to Sheffield, now temporarily free of heckling guards, and shot the ball to him.
"It's playing the game," he said to himself in a half-whisper. Just the same, it hurt, even more than he cared to admit, to make that sacrifice.
The Lakeville captain seemed to catch the ball exactly in position for looping it toward the basket. In the twinkling of an eye, Sheffield had tossed it upward, using the same overhand shot Bunny had partially begun.
Up and up sped the ball, with ten open-mouthed players following its course with twenty popping eyes; up and up, till it seemed it would never stop, and then, after a languid pause in mid-air, down and down, going faster every instant, till it plopped squarely within the metal rim of the basket and swished on into the hanging net.
The goal was scored. Lakeville now led, 18-17.
In the midst of a scrimmage, directly after the next toss-up, a sudden crack from the timekeeper's pistol signaled the end of the game. Lakeville had won. The road to the championship would be easy traveling now.
Sheffield took his honors without any display of emotion; he was that sort of winner. To the four substitutes who had made possible the victory, he merely said, "Good work, fellows!" But Bunny guessed he meant a good deal more than the words expressed.
"Why didn't you try for that last basket yourself?" he asked Bunny, as they piled downstairs to the dressing room. "You could have scored."
"Yes, I think I could," Bunny admitted honestly. "I was afraid of you, too, after you had missed those others, but—"