“I do the best I know how,” sighed Ned. “I suppose I am slow on the get-away, though. Corson is always calling me down about it. Oh, well, what do I care? I don’t own it.”
“I’d like to see you make good, though,” said Kewpie. “Besides, remember the honor of the Turners!”
Ned laughed. “Laurie will look after that. He’s doing great things in baseball, if you believe him, and it wouldn’t be right for us to capture all the athletic honors.”
“You make me weary!” grunted Kewpie. “Say, don’t you California chaps ever have any pep?”
“California, old scout, is famous for its pep. We grow it for market out there. Why, I’ve seen a hundred acres planted to it!”
“You have, eh? Well, it’s a big shame you didn’t bring a sprig of it East with you, you lazy lummox! Some day I’m going to drop a cockle-burr down your back and see if you don’t show some action!”
Hillman’s started her season on the following Saturday with Orstead High School. As neither team had seen much practice, the contest didn’t show a very high grade of football. The teams played four ten-minute quarters, consuming a good two hours of elapsed time in doing it, their members spending many precious moments prone on the turf. The weather was miserably warm for football and the players were still pretty soft.
Kewpie derived great satisfaction from the subsequent discovery that he had dropped three quarter pounds and was within a mere seven pounds of his desired weight. Had he played the game through instead of yielding the center position to Holmes at the beginning of the last half, he might have reached his goal that afternoon. Ned and Laurie wounded him deeply by declaring that there was no apparent improvement in his appearance.
Ned saw the game from the substitutes’ bench, and Laurie from the stand. High School turned out a full attendance and, since Hillman’s was outnumbered two to one, “O. H. S.” colors and cheers predominated. Laurie sat with Lee Murdock, who, as a baseball enthusiast, professed a great scorn of football. (There was no practice on the diamond that afternoon.) Lee amused himself by making ridiculous comments in a voice audible for many yards around.
“That’s piffle!” he declared on one occasion, when the ground was strewn with tired, panting players. “The umpire said, ‘Third down,’ but if they aren’t three quarters down, I’ll treat the crowd! The trouble with those fellows is that they didn’t get enough sleep last night. Any one can see that. Why, I can hear that big chap snoring ’way over here!” Again, “That brother of yours is playing better than any of them,” he asserted.