While Fudge, completely exhausted, was being restored to usefulness, Captain Nostrand converted the six points to seven by an easy goal. And before Fudge, assisted by admiring team-mates, had reached the bench the game was over, High School had won, 13 to 6, the North Siders were dejectedly leaving the field and Fudge had leaped into fame! A full eighty-five yards, they called that run, which, allowing for slight exaggeration born of enthusiasm, it was. But Fudge, with becoming modesty, insisted that it hadn’t been a foot over eighty-three! Back in the dressing-room, having recovered breath and presence of mind, Fudge rendered his version of the feat to a respectfully attentive audience.
“I saw the fumble and tried to get through, but their center blocked me off and I had to crawl under him. I could almost reach the ball, but not quite; I touched it, I think. Then I dived across for it, knocking a couple of North Siders out of my way, and picked it up right under the nose of that fellow Wightson. My, but he was mad! Then I started down the field, and——”
“What did you stop for?” asked some one puzzledly.
Fudge’s modesty again asserted itself. “Well,” he answered frankly, “I’m no sprinter; not built for it. I can run a long time, but I’m not fast, if you see what I mean. So I thought that if I could pass the ball to one of you fellows who was a better sprinter I’d do it. You see, it didn’t matter who made the runs so long as we got the touchdown.” Faint murmurs of admiration greeted this noble sentiment. Pete Farrar’s countenance expressed slight amazement. It didn’t sound quite like Fudge. Still, that youth’s expression was so guileless that Pete concluded that perhaps, after all, Fudge was as unselfish as he pictured himself. “There was no one to take it, though,” continued the hero, warming to the narrative; “and so I saw that I’d have to make the score myself. Shores was right after me, and a lot of the others too. Once Shores almost had me, but I swung aside——”
“It was Grover who put Shores out,” said Sawin.
“I know. It was good work, too,” declared Fudge heartily. “But he wouldn’t have caught me, because I’d got my second-wind by that time, and the rest was easy. With the start I had none of them could have caught me.”
“Hm,” said Captain Nostrand, “you sort of hate yourself, don’t you, Fudge?”
But the consensus of opinion was that Nostrand’s sarcasm was in poor taste, although perhaps excusable to some extent since envy is a common failing. Nor was Sprague McCoy’s remark thought any better of. McCoy chuckled and observed: “I thought once or twice, Fudge, you were going to lie down and go to sleep! The trouble with you is that you’re geared too high!”
Fudge smiled patiently, sweetly, as if to say: “’Twas ever thus! Success is always a target for the shafts of Envy!”
At that moment, as if Fate sought to secure an even balance between joy and sorrow, Jim Grover, who had gone to the telephone a minute before, hung up the receiver and faced the others with gloomy countenance.