[CHAPTER XXII]
NORDHAM SPRINGS SOME SURPRISES
The next afternoon when Dan reported for practice he found that a few moments of passing and a half-hour of signal work was all that was required. Saturday’s contest had been a hard one and there were lots of lame muscles and stiff joints among the fellows who had participated. Even on Tuesday the practice was still short and there was no line-up. On Wednesday occurred the first scrimmage and then several surprises were sprung. Dan was at left end, Hill was back at center, Little was tried in Folwell’s place at tackle, King, of the Second Team, was at quarter and Gerard was at full. Gerard was a second-string man and his presence in the line-up merely signified that Kapenhysen was still feeling the results of the Brewer game. Dan didn’t dare believe that his elevation to the First Team was anything more than temporary pending Williams’ recovery. He played the best game he knew, however, in the hope of “making good,” and in spite of King’s mistakes, for the Second Team quarter was oppressed by the unexpected honor of being made varsity substitute, managed to play a brilliant game. But on the whole things went badly. In spite of the easy work of the last two days many of the fellows played a lifeless game that wrought Payson to heights of disgust. His comments were more caustic than usual and the tempers of his charges shorter, and the result was that when practice was over the entente cordiale between coach and players was somewhat strained. Andy Ryan, quick to note discord, hovered around like an anxious, clucking mother-hen. At supper appetites were erratic and dispositions more so. Plainly a slump was threatening, a slump the more dangerous for being so long delayed. With only two days of practice before the Nordham game the outlook didn’t please Payson at all. He had planned to rest the fellows the first part of the week and to drive them hard Thursday and Friday. Andy had agreed with him. But now it seemed that they had made a mistake; to have worked the team on Tuesday and Wednesday and given them light practice Thursday and Friday would have been more advisable. Payson had three new plays to teach and he had been counting on to-morrow and the next day; now he seriously doubted if it would be wise to attempt it. He and Andy got together in his room that evening and faced the problem.
“There’s no use in forcing them, sir,” declared the trainer. “It’s a critical time and we’ve got to humor ’em along the rest of the week. If we don’t they’ll go up in the air like a lot of crazy balloons, sir. Colton’s all on edge, and there’s others no better off. Take my advice, sir, and humor ’em.”
“That’s all well enough,” grumbled Payson, “but there’s a lot of work to do, Andy. You know that as well as I do. The team’s a week behind this year, for some reason. You can’t do anything the last week but polish up. And there are new plays to learn, man!”
“Give ’em a blackboard talk, sir, to-morrow instead of a scrimmage. Maybe they could walk through the plays afterwards in the gym.”
“Yes, they might do that. And how about Friday?”
“We’ll wait and see, sir. But we’ll have to lay Colton and Hadlock off for a couple of days, I’m thinking.”
“How about Loring?”