“Oh, shucks! Fourth down!” wailed Brad. “Why the dickens didn’t they try for a goal? What’s this? Another end-around? No, it’s Wells outside tackle. Watch it! By Jove, he’s done it! How much did we need? Four? Then we’ve got it! Got to measure it, eh? Who’s that down? One of our fellows? No, he’s a Blue-leg.”
“Kenwood left tackle,” said Ritter from further along. “How much time is there, Brad?”
“I don’t know. About a minute, I think. We’ve got it! First down! We’ll do it yet!”
The linemen were trotting off, trailing the chain, and the referee had waved his arm toward the Kenwood goal. The Parkinson cheer leaders were dancing along the side line and a mighty volume of triumph rolled across the field.
Parkinson went back at the centre and was stopped short, Wells squirmed outside tackle for two yards, Cole smashed at the right guard and went spinning through for another two. Now the pigskin lay almost on the twenty-five-yard line. The timekeeper was edging nearer and nearer. Ira viewed him anxiously and chewed harder on that straw. A sudden lull in the wind allowed Dannis’ voice to reach them:
“Come on now, Parkinson! Let’s have it! Signals! Lyons back!”
“It’s a place kick!” exclaimed Brad. “Go to it, Fred! Hold that line, Parkinson!”
Dannis was on one knee and patting the turf. Fred was walking back slowly. Then he stopped, studied the distance and shortened it a stride. Dannis crept further back and leaned an elbow on the ground. From the blue team came hoarse commands, implorations:
“Get through, Kenwood! Block this kick! Block this kick!”
A moment of silence, a brown streak from between Conlon’s legs, the ball settles in Dannis’ hands. Very carefully he turns it, points it. Fred Lyons steps forward one step and his right foot swings in a long arc. The lines are battling fiercely. Kenwood comes plunging, leaping through, arms upstretched. But the ball is sailing well above the eager fingers. Now the wind has it and it veers to the right, still rising, turning lazily over in its flight, sailing nearer and nearer the further upright——