“No, a forward’s no good, but—Signals! Come on now, Yardley! One more punch! Signals! 31—51—27——”
“Signals!” cried Lippman wildly, questioningly.
“Shut up!” hissed Toby. “Change signals! 61—54—27—9! 61—54——”
Forward plunged the backs, away sped Toby, scuttling along the back of the short line, the ball snuggled in his elbow. Cries and grunts and the rasping of canvas-clad bodies filled the air. Then a shriek from an excited, despairing high school spectator: “There he goes! Get him, you mutts!”
The play had been close to the left-hand corner of the field and the onlookers had crowded there, along the side-line for a short distance, but principally back of the goal-line. At the other side of the goal, save for a sprinkling of High School girls and their escorts, the field was clear. Toward this side of the gridiron sped Toby. Only Lovett, throwing his opponent in as he plunged through, went with him. But the right end was sufficient. A Greenburg back met him and the two sprawled to the turf together, and Toby, turning on his heel, headed swiftly in. A yard or two short of the line he dodged the only remaining opposition, a despairing High School quarter, and circled back toward the goal. But now there were plenty to challenge. A High School player clutched at him and missed and then Toby found himself in a struggling sea of angry mill operatives. Farquhar tried to reach him, but was pushed aside, and a dozen hands fought for the ball. Toby clung to it as tightly as he could and sought to fight his way forward, but the crowd was ugly. Some one struck him on the mouth and, as his head went back, the ball was dislodged. The yells about him merged in a laugh of triumph and, shoved aside, he sank to the ground, while the mill crowd went piling off toward the entrance, the ball in their possession. None tried to stop them.
The officials allowed the touchdown, but Captain Beech, helping a battered Toby to his feet, declined the privilege of trying goal with another ball. “Had enough, thanks,” he said coldly. Then, to an apologetic and regretful Greenburg Captain: “This is the last game you fellows will get with us, Townsend. Come on, Yardley! Never mind the cheer!”
Toby was not the only one of the visiting team who had sustained a memento of that closing minute. Three other fellows who had sought to reach him had been punched, or kicked, and, including such slighter injuries as had fallen to the Yardley Second during the game, it was a somewhat messed up aggregation that journeyed back to Wissining that afternoon. The last they saw of the mill hands they were having a remarkable football game with the stolen ball in the road outside the field, too busy to more than hoot at the visitors as they passed.
“I’d like to fetch a couple of dozen more fellows down here and wipe the ground up with them,” muttered Beech. “Bet you that’s our last game with Greenburg for awhile, Toby.”
Toby didn’t offer to accept the wager, which was fortunate for his modest resources since, a few days later, the Yardley faculty, having probed the incident, struck Greenburg High School from the list of approved opponents.