"You're up against a great Princeton team—the greatest I remember. You can't win. You never had a chance to win. But, Yale, you're going to do something to make us proud of you. You're going to hold that score where it is! Do you hear me? All you've got left is your nerve and the chance to show that you can die game. That's all you're going to do; but, by heaven, you're going to do that! You're going to die game, Yale! Every mother's son of you! And when the game's over we're going to be prouder of your second half than the whole blooming Princeton bunch over their first. There's your chance. Make us rise up and yell for you. Will you, Yale?"
He passed from man to man, advising, exhorting, or storming, until he came to Stover.
"Dink," he said, putting out his hand and changing his tone suddenly, "I haven't a word to say to you. Play the game as you've been doing—only play it out."
Stover felt a sudden rush of shame; all the fatigue left him as if by magic.
"If Charlie'll only give me a few chances at the center. I know I could gain there," he said eagerly.
"You'll get a chance later on, perhaps, but you've quite enough to do now."
The second view of the arena was clear to him, even to insignificant details. He thought the cheer leaders, laboring muscularly with their long megaphones, strangely out of place—especially a short, fat little fellow in a white voluminous sweater. He saw in the crowd a face or two that he recognized—Bob Story in a group of pretty girls, all superhumanly glum and cast down. Then he had shed his sweater and was out on the field, back under the goal-posts, ready for the bruising second half to begin.
"All ready, Yale!"
"All ready."