“No, he followed me after I left you to say that that paper you handed me was his.”
“The one Squires found? Well, why didn’t he say so when—”
“I asked him that and he said he was afraid the fellows would make fun of him.”
“And I guess they would have. Is the play really any good, Coach?”
“Tell you more in a day or two, after we’ve tried it out. It looks promising, though. I sat up with it until after midnight and I think we’ve got a pretty smooth-running play. By the way, get this back to Todd, will you? There’s some sort of a letter on the other side. Not valuable, probably, but he may want it. He left it on the table. I’m certain to forget it, myself.”
“Yes, sir.” Lowell accepted the folded sheet and dropped it in an inside pocket. “I’ll see him in math class. That all? Then I’ll beat it.”
Jim went out for practice that afternoon determined to make good. He had thought a great deal about what Mr. Cade had said the evening before and as a result the task ahead of him seemed now vastly more important and much more worth-while. He had taken the coach’s praise with a generous pinch of salt, but it had encouraged him nevertheless. To-day he showed up a great deal better than he had at any time since his misunderstanding with Clem, and those who played opposite him on the second team had their hands more than full. Both he and Sam Tennyson were relieved before the last period of the scrimmage game was over and sent off behind the north stand by Mr. Cade.
“I want you fellows to take a ball,” said the coach, “and practice some long passes. Start in at about twenty yards and increase the distance gradually. I want you, Tennyson, to get the overhand spiral throw down pat. You know how it should be made. Go ahead and learn to make it. Take plenty of time and try for accuracy and precision first. Speed and distance can come later. You, Todd, practice catching. I’ve seen you make several very good catches of a passed ball. See if you can’t do still better. Learn to take them high and make them sure. Put in about twenty minutes of it, but quit before that if your arms get tired. Go ahead.”
Sam Tennyson, who was a tall and fairly heavy youth with light-brown hair and a pair of sharp dark eyes, accompanied Jim in silence after he had obtained a ball. The full-back was a quiet chap at best, and just now he had less to say than usual. About all he did say as they made their way around the empty stand was: “Something up, Slim. Johnny’s got a hunch.”
Wednesday again the pair went through the passing practice and spent nearly a half-hour at it this time. Tennyson, who had not been called on before for the trick, progressed more slowly than did Jim. He got along well enough until he tried to speed the throw. Then the ball’s flight became erratic and Jim had to run three, four or five yards out of position to get it. But Tennyson had a long arm and plenty of strength and, throwing slowly, could make the oval travel a remarkable distance. The work went on each day, sometimes before scrimmage, sometimes after. On Friday, since there was only one scrimmage period, and the first-string players were dismissed a half-hour earlier than usual, Mr. Cade himself took Jim and Sam Tennyson in charge, leaving the argument between the substitutes and the second to Mr. Lake and Mr. Myers. When he had watched two throws he stopped the performance and coached Sam in holding the ball and in spinning it as it was shot away. “Now,” he said, “go back another five yards, Todd. What do you make that distance?”