“To-morrow night,” said Winton, “we must have enough fellows out here to make up a scrub team for a practice game. You’ll need all that kind of work you can get if you’re going to play next Saturday.”
Hayden and Barker left the field together. “Peace has spread itself like oil upon the troubled waters,” observed Berlin, with a faint smile. “Too bad you had to give in, but I suppose it was the only thing you could do.”
His companion’s dark eyes flashed him a look. “If you fancy I’ve given in you don’t know me. I’ve never yet been downed, Barker.”
“But you had to give up your plan for bringing Eliot to time.”
“That’s all right. A good general who sees one of his movements blocked changes promptly to another style of campaign.”
“Then you’ve another scheme in view?”
“I always believe in keeping a few cards up my sleeve.”
Bern betrayed no disposition to show these cards even to his friend, and Barker refrained from asking questions he felt might not be answered, being confident that in good time Hayden would let him into the secret.
To every one else, as the days slipped by and Bern made no move, it seemed that something like a truce had been mutually agreed upon. To be sure, it might be an armed truce in which both parties were patiently waiting the time when the certain course of events would again bring open warfare; for never in all that time did the two bitter enemies betray, even by a look, that either recognized the existence of the other. In football practice, when necessary, they worked together harmoniously enough for the accomplishment of the plays in which they were involved. It frequently happened that Stone, breaking through the line of the scrub, became a part of the interference which assisted Hayden in advancing the ball, and always he was an effective part of it. Both Winton and Eliot arrived at the conviction that one of the team’s best ground gaining plays would be that in which Stone and Piper opened a hole between the opposing guard and tackle to let Hayden through.
On Thursday the coach requested that the gate of the field should be closed and guarded to keep out the throng of spectators who were eager to watch the practice, and that night, having strengthened the scrub, he kept the regular team working constantly on the defensive; for he claimed that a good defensive game was fully as essential as an offensive one.