Kapenhysen fell back for a punt, but the ball went to Capes instead and he reeled off fifteen yards before he was captured. Then Loring punted from close up to the line and the ball was Forest Hill’s on her twenty yards. She was playing on the defensive now, had abandoned all hope of adding to her score and was eager only to keep her opponent from crossing her goal-line again. She kicked on first down and the punt went high in the air and fell out of bounds at the twenty-seven yards. There remained six minutes of playing time and Loring settled down to smashing football. Connor was sent in at right half in place of Dyer and Norton took Dickenson’s place at right end. It was hard going at first and the white lines passed slowly underfoot. But after a few terrific plunges at the right side of the Forest Hill line something weakened there and Connor and Capes went through for gains of three and four yards. On her ten yards Forest Hill called time for an injured player and put in a new man at right tackle. That wrought an improvement, but Kapenhysen got by the newcomer for a couple of yards and made it first down. There remained some eight yards to go for a score and Loring and Colton put their heads together. The ball was well over toward the side-line and it was advisable to work it back toward the center of the field. There were two ways to do this. One was to bring off a play toward the left of the line and the center of the field and the other was to send a play at the other end in the hope of gaining and then being pushed over the side-line. Colton and Loring decided on the latter.
The ball was passed to Loring and the other backs started toward the left of the line. Loring made the motion of passing the ball to right half and right half appeared to have caught it and doubled his arms about it. Meanwhile left half had dropped to his knees and Loring had kept the ball, hiding it as well as possible from the opponents. As the fake attack reached the end of the line to the left, the left half-back arose and ran hard for the right end of the line, taking the ball from Loring at a hand-pass. The trick worked even better than expected, for Forest Hill had been drawn away from the side-line and Capes reeled off the remaining eight yards without going out of bounds and was only tackled as he went over the goal-line. A punt-out was necessary and this was a failure. But the score stood 11—10 in Yardley’s favor and she had pulled herself out of a bad hole. The whistle sounded a minute later and the game was at an end.
Over on the stands Yardley Hall shouted long and blissfully in honor of the team.
[CHAPTER X]
DROPPED!
On the Monday following the Forest Hill game the final cut in the football squad was announced. For two weeks the process of elimination had been going forward quietly and mercilessly until of the original seventy-odd candidates who had started the season only forty-two remained. To-day after practice a list was posted on the bulletin board in the gymnasium. It contained two columns of names headed respectively “First Eleven” and “Second Eleven.” In the first column there were sixteen names, in the second fourteen; twelve unfortunates had been dropped.
Dan, coming up from the locker room, sought the notice with anxious heart. He was almost certain that Payson was going to retain him on the second squad, but there was always the chance—“Second Eleven,” he read, “Coke, Connor, Eisner, Flagg, Fogg—” and so on down to “Roeder, Sommers, Trapper.” His heart sank as he reread the list. Nowhere was his name written. Three times he went over the list, hoping each time to find that he had blundered. Then he read the first team names; it was just possible, he told himself, that Payson had got his name there by mistake. But he hadn’t. Dan was dropped from the squad.