CHAPTER VI
METHUSELAH HAS A SORE THROAT
Football practice was hard and steady the next week, for Maitland had trounced Ferry Hill 17 to 0, and as Maitland was only a high school, albeit a rather large one, the disgrace rankled. Jack Rogers wasn't the sort of chap to wear his heart on his sleeve, and so far as his countenance went none would have guessed him to be badly discouraged. But he was, and Roy, for one, knew it. And I think Jack knew that he knew it, for once in a lull of the signal practice he looked up to find Roy's eyes on him sympathetically, and he smiled back with a dubious shake of his head that spoke volumes. Things weren't going very well, and that was a fact. The loss of Horace Burlen during that first month of practice meant a good deal, for Horace was a steady center and an experienced one. To a lesser extent the absence of Pryor and Warren, Horace's friends in exile, retarded the development of the team. By the end of the second week of practice a provisional eleven had been formed, for Mr. Cobb believed in getting the men together as soon as possible, having learned from experience that team work is not a thing that can be instilled in a mere week or two of practice. Whitcomb was playing center on the first squad in Horace's absence. Roy was at quarter on the second, with a slow-moving young giant named Forrest in front of him. But Forrest was good-natured as well as slow, and in consequence he and Roy got on very well, although they never exchanged unnecessary remarks. The back field had learned that Jack Rogers would not stand any nonsense, and if they had any desire to make things uncomfortable for the quarter-back they didn't indulge it on the football field. The second stood up very well in those days before the first, in spite of the fact that sometimes there weren't enough candidates to fill the places of injured players. With only forty-odd fellows to draw from it was remarkable that Ferry Hill turned out the teams that it did.
Meanwhile life was growing easier for Roy. Even the younger boys had begun to tire of showing their contempt, while the fact that Chub Eaton had "taken up" the new boy went a long way with the school in general. Chub was not popular in the closest sense of the word; he was far too indifferent for that; but every fellow who knew him at all liked him—with the possible exception of Horace—and his position of baseball captain made him a person of importance. Consequently, when the school observed that Chub had selected Roy for a friend it marvelled for a few days and then began to wonder whether there might not be, after all, extenuating circumstances in the new boy's favor. And besides this Roy's work on the gridiron had been from the first of the sort to command respect no matter how unwilling. And it was about this time that another friend was restored to him.
Roy had come across Harry but once or twice since she had passed him in the campus, and each time he had been very careful to avoid her. But one morning he ran plump into her in the corridor of School Hall, so plump, in fact, that he knocked the book she was carrying from her hand. Of course there was nothing to do but stoop and rescue it from the floor, and when that was done it was too late to escape. As he handed the book back to her he looked defiantly into the blue eyes and said, "Good morning, Miss Harriet." Strange to say, he was not immediately annihilated. Instead the blue eyes smiled at him with a most friendly gleam, and,
"Good morning," said Harry. Then, "Only I oughtn't to answer you for calling me 'Miss Harriet'; you know I hate Harriet."
"Excuse me, I meant Miss Harry," answered Roy a trifle stiffly. It was hard to forget that cut direct.
"That's better," she said. "You—you haven't been down to inquire after the health of the baby since you rescued him."
"No, but I hope he's all right?"
"Yes, but Methuselah is awfully sick."