“I wish Brooks would put me in,” he said wistfully. “I guess, though, he won’t while Dutch or Griffin hold out. Gee, I’d like to get in and do something fine, Ned; make a run such as you made or kick a goal like M’Crae did!”
“You’ll get in for a while, anyway,” Ned assured him on Thursday for the twentieth time. “Griffin’s the fellow who’ll come out, though, and not Dutch. You’d have to kill Dutch to make him quit. Of course he might get sick, I suppose.”
“He—he’s looking pretty well, isn’t he?” asked Cal.
“Fine,” laughed Ned. “So you needn’t hope for that, Cal.”
“Oh, I wouldn’t want him to be sick,” said the other hurriedly. “Only—if he was—”
“Just so; you’d get his place. I’m going to tell Dutch to watch out carefully. You may try putting poison in his food.”
Cal laughed apologetically. Then, “I suppose you couldn’t say anything to Brooks, Ned?” he asked. “Just sort of mention my name to him. You see, I sometimes think he forgets about me!”
“No, he doesn’t. Don’t worry, you old chump. You’ll get a show. But you mustn’t expect to make a blooming hero of yourself, ’cause when you play in the line you don’t have much chance at that sort of thing, Cal. You just plug away and do your little best and then after it’s over you read about how wonderful the backs were. Perhaps you might read that ‘Boland at left tackle proved steady and effective, and held his own with his opponent.’ The only way a line player ever breaks into the hero class is when he blocks a kick, I guess. And that’s more luck than science.”