Left Guard Gilbert

by Ralph Henry Barbour

There was a long silence. Then Mr. Robey's voice came to him as cold as ice. "Very well, Gilbert, clean your locker out and hand in your things to the trainer. Walton!"

"Yes, sir?"

"Go in at left guard on the first squad." Mr. Robey turned again to Don. "Gilbert," he said very quietly, "I don't understand you. You are perfectly able to play, and you know it. The only explanation that occurs to me is that you're in a funk. If that's so it is a fortunate thing for all of us that we've discovered it now instead of later. There's no place on this team, my boy, for a quitter."

Coach and players turned away, leaving Don standing alone there before the bench. Miserably he groped his way to it and sat down with hanging head. His eyes were wet and he was horribly afraid that someone would see it. A hand fell on his shoulder and he glanced up into Tim's troubled face.

"I heard, Don," said Tim. "I'm frightfully sorry, old man. Are you sure you can't do it!"

Don shook his head silently. Tim sighed.

"Gee, it's rotten, ain't it? Maybe he didn't mean what he said, though. Maybe, if you're all right Monday, he'll give you another chance. I'm—I'm beastly sorry, Don!"

The hand on his shoulder pressed reassuringly and drew away and Tim hurried out to his place. Presently Don took a deep breath, got to his feet and, trying his hardest to look unconcerned but making sorry work of it, skirted the stand and retraced his steps to the gymnasium. His one desire was to get out of sight before any of the fellows found him, and so he pulled off his togs as quickly as he might, got into his other clothes, made a bundle of his suit and stockings and shoes and left them in the rubbing-room where Danny could not fail to find them and then hurried out of the building and through the deserted yard to Billings and the sunlit silence and emptiness of his room.

There was very little consolation in the knowledge that he had done only what was right. Martyrdom has its drawbacks. He had lost his position with the team and had been publicly branded a quitter. The fact that his conscience was not only clear but even approving didn't help much. Being thought a quitter, a coward, hurt badly. If he could have got at Harry Walton any time during the ensuing half-hour it would have gone hard with that youth. After a time, though, he got command of his feelings again and, since there was nothing better to do, he seated himself at the window and watched as much of the football game as was visible from there. Once or twice he was able to forget his trouble for a brief moment.

Chambers put up a good game that day and it was all the home team could do to finally win out by the score of 3 to 0. For two periods Chambers had Brimfield virtually on the run, and only a fine fighting spirit that flashed into evidence under the shadow of her goal saved the latter from defeat. As it was, luck took a hand in matters when a poor pass from centre killed Chambers's chance of scoring by a field-goal in the second quarter.