"You funked, I saw you funk, you miserable shivery little coward!" he cried, shaking his fist in his face. "You jump in there now and cripple a few of those fellows or I'll massacre you!"
He added a few words which shall remain sacred between them and shoved him into place. The old fear awoke triumphant in Piggy. He rushed in like a demon, whirling over the field, upsetting play after play, making tackles that brought Flea Obie and Wash Simmons to their feet rubbing their sides. Nothing could stop him, for at last he was panic-stricken, utterly and horribly afraid.
The two teams, evenly matched, fought each other to a standstill. The first half closed without any perceptible advantage. The second half continued the deadlock, the precious minutes slipping away. Such a struggle had never been known in a House contest. Several eyes were closed, several bandages had appeared. The frenzy of battle had taken possession of the descendants of Goth and Viking. Challenges to future encounters were flung recklessly and recklessly accepted. After each mêlée little clusters of battling boyhood were disentangled with difficulty, while Bat Finney, the umpire, joyfully proclaimed:
"No roughing it, fellows—remember, this is a gentleman's game."
The dusk began to cloud the field and the players, one of those tragic, melancholy mists that come only at the close of a desperate second half. Two minutes only to play and the ball in the Kennedy's possession, exactly at midfield, without a score.
"6-5-8-15-2-3!" shrieked Fire Crackers, grimy and unrecognisable.
The team, converging swiftly for a revolving mass play on tackle, strove wearily to make headway against the reeling Dickinsons, who, too fagged to upset the play, could only hold, surging and twisting. Piggy, scrambling and pushing, head down in the mêlée, whirled and spun with the revolving mass. Then his feet tripped and he went underneath, shielding his head from the vortex of legs that swirled above him. Suddenly, lying free, a scant five yards in front of him, he perceived, to his horror, the precious ball! With a lurch, he freed himself from the mass, scrambled to his feet, picked up the ball and set out, break-a-neck, for the far-away goal. Five yards behind was Hickey, the fleet quarter, bounding after him.
In a twinkling the whole scene had changed into the extraordinary spectacle of a stern chase, two figures well in front, striving for the mastery of the fates, and behind the futile, scrambling, exulting, or desperate mass of players, sweeping helplessly on the tracks of destiny.
Forty yards to the interminable goal! Piggy remembered with dread the stories of Hickey's fleetness. He glanced back. His pursuer had not gained an inch. On the contrary, his freckled face was distorted, his arms were churning, his teeth were horribly displayed, biting at the stinging air, with the agony of the effort to increase his speed. So he was beating out Hickey, the famous Hickey! Then the touchdown was a fact! Above the uproar he heard a strident shriek:
"Piggy, oh, you damned Piggy!"