Brimfield showed better work in the second half and twice got the ball inside the visitor's twenty-yard line, once in the third period and again shortly before the final whistle blew. The first opportunity to score was lost when Carmine called for line-plunges to get the pigskin across and Howard, who was playing in St. Clair's position because of a slight injury to the regular left half, fumbled for a four-yard loss. Chambers rallied and took the ball away a minute later. In the fourth period dazzling runs outside of tackles by Tim Otis and hard line-plugging by Rollins and Howard took the ball from Brimfield's thirty-five to the enemy's twenty-five. There a forward pass grounded—Chambers had a remarkable defence against that play—and, on third down, Rollins slid off left tackle for enough to reach the twenty. But with only one down remaining and time nearly up, a try-at-goal was the only course left, and Rollins, standing squarely on the thirty-yard line, drop-kicked a scanty victory.
In some ways that contest was disappointing, in others encouraging. Team-play was more in evidence than in any previous game and the maroon-and-grey backfield had performed prodigiously. And the plays had, as a general thing, gone off like clock-work. But there were weak places in the line still. Pryme, at right guard, had proved an easy victim for the enemy and the same was true, in a lesser degree, of Harry Walton, on the other side of centre. And Crewe, at right tackle, had allowed himself to be boxed time after time. It might be said for Crewe, however, that today he was playing opposite an opponent who was more than clever. But the way in which Chambers had torn holes in Brimfield's first defence promised poorly for next Saturday and the spectators went away from the field feeling a bit less sanguine than a week before. "No team that is weak at both guard positions can hope to win," was the general verdict, and it was fully realised that Claflin's backs were better than Chambers's. For a day or two there was much talk of a petition to the faculty asking for the reinstatement of Tom Hall, but it progressed no further than talk. Josh, it was known, was not the kind to reverse his decision for any reason they could present.
And yet, although the weekly faculty conference on Monday night had no written petition to consider, the subject of Tom's reinstatement did come before it and in a totally unprecedented manner.
CHAPTER XVIII
"GOOD-BYE, TIMMY!"
Tim found a dejected and most unsatisfactory chum when he got back to the room after the Chambers game that Saturday afternoon. All of Tim's demands for an explanation of the whole puzzling affair met only with evasion. Don was not only uncommunicative, but a trifle short-tempered, a condition quite unusual for him. All Tim could get from him was that he "felt perfectly punk" and wasn't going to try to change Mr. Robey's decision.
"I'm through," he said. "I don't blame Robey a bit. I'm no use on the team as I am. He'd be foolish to bother with me."
"Well, all I can say," returned Tim, with a sigh of exasperation, "is that the whole thing is mighty funny. I guess there's more to it than you're telling. You look like thirty cents, all right enough, but I'll wager anything you like that you could go out there and play just as good a game as ever on Monday if Robey would let you and you cared to try. Now couldn't you!"