Saturday afternoon, and one o'clock. The old "Elm House" barge drew up promptly at the academy door. "Pete" Marston had driven that barge for the boys on every athletic occasion in the last fifteen years. No one enjoyed the successes or mourned the defeats of Blackwood Academy more sincerely than Pete.
"I vum, boys, ye look 's if ye cal'lated to start for the north pole this trip, with all them duds wound round ye!" he called back as the players tumbled in.
Sweaters, ulsters, toboggan caps, and padded suits made it difficult to tell where woollen goods left off and the boys began. Buck Harris had wrapped a huge Turkish towel around himself on top of everything else, "by way of ornament," he remarked. Buck's dark eyes were the only visible portion of him, but from the continual "chaff" he kept flying, the rest knew that somewhere was an open passage to his mouth. Everybody was talking except Mark Alden. Some were excited, and a few were gayly indifferent. Mark did not look at all worried; he simply kept quiet.
Half past three o'clock on the grounds of the Winston Normal Institute. The game with Blackwood was in progress. Mark Alden had just "tackled" a Winston player in his decided way, which left no doubt as to where the ball was "down."
"That Captain of yours is an ugly customer, I judge," said the Winston storekeeper to Pete Marston, who had put up his horses and was leaning against the fence.
"Waal no, Reddy ain't ugly 'xac'ly. He's square 's a meetin'-house—ain't afraid 'f th' inside o' one neither; only when football's on he plays the game, that's all. Don't believe he sees anythin' but the ball, or knows there's anybody here but them players. He's jes so in ev'rythin' else. 'Twouldn't be no diff'rent if 'twas drawin' trygomertry figgers on that there blackboard up 't Blackwood school. He wouldn't hev nothin' in his red head then but rules 'nd chalk-marks. He ain't jest what I call a chromo fer looks, but he's all pluck, 'nd I hain't seen no cleaner-talkin', perliter boy in the last ten years."
It was a disheartened group that gathered in the Blackwood dressing-room for the intermission when the game was half over. Winston had five points, Blackwood none. Buck Harris had fumbled the ball almost in front of his own goal. A Winston man immediately dropped on it, and in the play that followed Mellen had kicked a clean goal from the field at twenty-eight yards.