That no such performance as that was contemplated or desirable was being explained when [the ball sailed up and away] and the informant relapsed into silence. Somewhere at the north end of the field a player caught the pigskin, tucked it against him and went down before he had taken two strides. The Wyndham cheers burst forth, high and sharp. Wolcott tried the Wyndham left and was repulsed, shot her fullback at Desmond and got three yards and then punted far, the wind that quartered the gridiron adding a good ten yards to the kick. Wyndham ran the ball back six yards or so, tried two slams at the brown line and punted back to Wolcott’s forty. The ancient enemies were trying each other out.
Wolcott got three yards outside Cotter and two more through Captain Dave, but a five-yard penalty set her back and again she punted on third down. This time the ball rolled over the line. Jensen got free around Wolcott’s left end and carried the pigskin on the first down to the twenty-eight yards. Ogden, from kicking position, tried a straight buck on right tackle and was thrown for a yard loss. Jensen made two outside left tackle and Ogden punted short to midfield, where the ball went out. Not until the quarter was almost over did either team bid for a score. Then Wolcott tried a short forward-pass over the center that grounded and followed it from the same formation with a fake that sent left half around the right for fourteen yards and placed the ball on Wyndham’s twenty-eight. A cross-buck on Cotter failed of an inch and Wolcott again threw forward. This time the throw was long, fast and low and aimed at the corner of the field. Over there, close to the goal-line, the Brown’s left halfback turned as the pigskin sped forward. Four strides would have taken him across, but, although he had skillfully eluded the Wyndham defense until now, Nemesis, in the form of Pete Jensen, was at hand, and while Pete couldn’t get in position to steal the catch he could and did bat the ball aside.
With two downs left, Wolcott sent her fullback outside right tackle from kicking position and gained four yards, placing the ball on the twenty-four. From the thirty-three, with quarterback holding the ball, Johnson, Wolcott’s rangy left tackle, tried a goal from placement while the Wyndham cohorts held their breaths. Johnson had the quartering gale to figure with, and it seemed that he underestimated the force of it, for the pigskin, while it started true enough, met the full strength of the wind before it had covered half the distance and swerved widely to the left. Not until an official waved his arms negatively, though, was Wyndham certain that the effort had failed.
A minute later, after Wyndham had punted, the whistle blew and the teams made for the water pails. The Wolcott band came to life again, and the cheer leaders swung their megaphones. Then Wyndham took the north goal and faced the enemy on the thirty-nine yards. There were no changes in the Wyndham line-up. Archer and Drayton were still the ends, Cotter and Weldon the tackles, Lothrop and Desmond the guards, Carlson the center, Stoddard the quarter, Whitemill and Jensen the halfs and Ogden the fullback. Nor had Wolcott yet altered her team. The opposing elevens were strikingly alike in appearance. Each presented a center trio of big, fairly heavy men closely matched for height and weight. Each featured fast, rangy tackles and rather light ends. In the backfield Wolcott had a slight advantage in weight, for James, her fullback, was a fellow after “Big Bill” Fargo’s style, although he lacked Fargo’s ability to start quickly and was far less dangerous on end runs. Wolcott’s quarter had weight and carried the ball frequently. Her halfbacks were fairly light and showed speed. One, Hoskins, had already proved himself a very shifty player.
The second period saw a good deal of old-fashioned football on the part of Wolcott and a punting game on the part of the opponent. Wolcott used straight plunges and slants with sufficient success to take her to the Blue’s thirty-six yards. There her gains lessened and two sweeping plays and two forward-passes took her no further than the twenty-seven, where she yielded the ball. Hoskins was the Brown’s forward-pass ace, but Hoskins was so closely watched that he was unable to show anything. Wyndham punted on second down and watched for a break. With that wind quartering the field a fumble by a Wolcott back would have surprised no one. But the break didn’t come. Wolcott declined to catch the punts after two narrow escapes and the ball was allowed to roll, twice going over the goal line for touchbacks. Four penalties were handed out by the referee, two to each team, but none affected the fortunes of the game appreciably. The whistle ended the half fifty-two minutes after the kick-off.
CHAPTER XXIV
WATTLES AGREES
The teams trailed off and the rival cheering sections became concertedly vocal once more. One had to either cheer or sing if only to keep warm! The Wolcott songsters followed the band through a martial effort that wasn’t a great success because most of the fellows had forgotten the words and sang “dum-ti-dum-dum” instead. Then Dodson, Wyndham cheer captain, tossed aside his big blue megaphone and threw his arms aloft.
“Let’s have ‘We Beat Her,’ fellows! Everybody into it and make it snappy. All right! ‘We-e-e—’!”
Whereupon the visiting contingent answered with their latest effusion, sung to the tune of a popular ballad of the year: