Clayton H. Ernst

“ Teeny-bits, Neil Durant and Ted Norris sat without moving; their eyes were on the red and yellow fireplace flames, but what they saw was a bit of the old Chinese Empire, in-land on a tributary of the Yangtse—and a bungalow at Tung-sha. The mining engineer was silent so long that finally they looked up—and, seeing the expression on his face, looked quickly down again—as those turn away their faces who look by mistake too deeply into the intimate thoughts of another. ”

“ The news flew from room to room, from dormitory to dormitory, with the rapidity of wireless. It was as if the story had suddenly been blazoned across the clear November sky above the Ridgley campus; in one moment, it seemed, the whole school knew that Whirlwind Bassett had come to his end under tragic circumstances and that Tracey Campbell was lying in the Greensboro hospital with an even chance of recovery. It was difficult at first for many a member of Ridgley School to believe that the tragic news was true,—so vivid is life, so unreal seems death. ”

“ Teeny-bits poised at the edge and took a deep breath. This was living. Down there, growing smaller and smaller, a moving speck that seemed a mere shadow on the snow, was a new friend of his. It seemed strange that this was one of the outcomes of the Jefferson-Ridgley game: that from so desperate a struggle had arisen this opportunity to know the leader of the purple for whom he held a growing admiration. A fellow who fought so hard and so cleanly, who took defeat so wonderfully and who made such a good pal was only a little less to be admired than Neil Durant. ”

“ Doctor Wells never took his eyes from Teeny-bits' face, but the expression in them underwent a slight change; it was as if he had been looking for something that he greatly wanted to see—and suddenly had seen it.
"I believe in you, Holbrook," he said. "And I want you to know that I sympathize with you as I would with any one else against whose honesty a cowardly assault has been made. One has to defend himself sturdily against such underhand attacks. Have you any enemies who might try to injure you in this way?" ”

“ Teeny-bits felt as if he wanted to rest where he had fallen in the last scrimmage with his body against the brown earth and let the happiness of victory sink in slowly, but suddenly he was aware that a howling mob had descended from the stands, that the members of the Ridgley team were surrounded by frenzied schoolmates who were insisting on lifting them up on their shoulders and carrying them off the field. ”

“ Teeny-bits looked at Terrible Turner and then at Bassett, the Whirlwind.
"No," he said, "I don't want to wrestle in these clothes."
"Take off your coat, then; we consider it an insult to the whole school if you don't accept the challenge. Are you afraid of Terrible Turner? He's no bigger than you are."
Teeny-bits saw that the freckle-faced boy was in fact no larger than he, but he did not seem any the more inclined to accept the call to combat.
After waiting a moment, Bassett said in a taunting voice: "Friends, let me introduce you to Teeny-bits, the quitter." ”

“ Stevens and Doctor Wells his visit was a startling exemplification of that old saying: "Like father, like son." When they talked to him it was as if they were talking to Whirlwind Bassett grown into a man of fifty. His visit was an unpleasant incident,—he showed so plainly that he had made a failure of his duties as a father and he groped so helplessly in his grief for the reason why his boy, whose body he would carry back to the West, had by his own acts brought an unhappy termination to his career. ”

“ But it is one thing to ride up to Ridgley School in an automobile from the Hamilton Station with half a dozen other new Ridgleyites, some of whom have already become your friends, and to get your first view of the campus while cheerful voices are sounding in your ears, and quite another thing to walk up the long winding road from the village alone and to wonder as you come nearer and nearer to those neat white buildings whether you will succeed in making any friends at all among the fellows who have come up in the automobiles. ”

“ Teeny-bits suddenly found that he had something to say and he said it in a manner that brought the already enthusiastic crowd to its feet.
"I want to tell you," he said, "that I'm glad Jefferson has such a good team; every one says it's the best their school has ever produced. That's something worthy to strive for—to beat their best ever—and I know that every member of our team has his mind and heart and soul made up to meet Jefferson more than halfway and to fight so hard for Ridgley that when the game is over there'll be shouting and bonfires on our hill." ”

“ A second wild howl of delight went up from the Ridgley stands; those two small incidents, the quick downing of the runner after the kick-off and the stiff stand of the Ridgley line on this first play from regular formation, had brought a sudden feeling of confidence. Down there on that white-lined field the wearers of the red had begun to show that they could hold their own. But the next play—an end run by the left-half, who made seven yards and advanced the purple within two yards of first down—brought a thunderous roar from the other side of the field. ”

“ Teeny-bits could feel the man's hands on his bare back. Suddenly the hands paused in their work; then the sweater was pushed an inch or two higher and there came to Teeny-bits' ears one of the strangest sounds that he had ever heard: an exclamation, a startled cry in syllables that, though wild and meaningless in themselves, conveyed an unmistakable effect,—discovery and the highest degree of astonishment. This strange cry was answered in kind by another voice, and Teeny-bits felt the two Chinese fumbling at his back with trembling fingers. ”

“ Teeny-bits felt keen and fit; his long sleep had completely refreshed him. As he raced down the field one thought was in his mind: to get into the play and tackle whatever Jefferson man caught the ball. Ned Stillson had made a clever kick-off; the leather oval flew to the right of Norris and settled into the arms of one of his team-mates, who had dashed forward only ten yards when Neil Durant met him with a clean, hard tackle and brought him solidly to earth. ”

“ The cheer leader himself was leaping up and down, throwing his megaphone into the air and emitting war whoops which were drowned and assimilated by the volume of shouts that echoed back and forth.
The old-timers up there in the stands now began to breathe fast; this was not merely a good game of football, it was a wonderful game, a struggle in which extraordinary playing and fine spirit and brains and courage were united to make a combat that would live long in the memory of every person who witnessed it. ”

“ Yes, Chuan Kai understood; he knew English and he knew well enough what societies were; this he imagined was a "play" society, the kind with which young Americans amused themselves, quite unlike some societies he knew about.
Chuan Kai called out suddenly two words that sounded to Bassett and Campbell like "Ka-wah changsee", and within twenty seconds one of the Chinese waiters stood in the doorway with an expectant look in his eyes. More words of Chinese like pebbles rattling over stones and falling into water flowed from the singsong lips of Chuan Kai. ”

“ Certain weak spirits in the Ridgley stands now looked at each other with faces which showed plainly that hope had fled from them, that they now knew that the Jefferson menace which had been built up week after week by rumor and also by fact, as represented in scores, was real,—that the purple team was invincible, that Ridgley had met the irresistible force and could not by any alchemy of spirit turn defeat into victory. ”

“ In the morning Teeny-bits went to see Snubby Turner early,—before the newspapers brought the first information of the tragedy. Snubby, still in his pyjamas, let the new captain of the Ridgley eleven into his room and blinked happily at his visitor.
"Oh, what a day, and oh, what a night!" he said. "It was the best thing that ever happened and I'm glad I didn't miss it." Then genial Snubby held out his hand to Teeny-bits and added: "Ridgley owes you a lot and I'm mighty glad that the fellows made you captain. Every one says that you're the man for the job." ”

“ They were jabbering their outlandish tongue up and down the singsong scale as if here before them, sitting on the floor, were a new species of being, newly discovered and strange beyond imagination. Teeny-bits did not know what to make of them; he blinked his eyes and remained sitting there, wondering what would happen next. Both of the Chinese seemed to be asking him questions and they were pointing at him in a way that brought the thought to Teeny-bits that they were both insane. ”

“ The trains came rolling into the Hamilton Station, discharged their burdens of humanity and rolled on. Automobiles by the score climbed the long hill to the school,—automobiles bearing the fluttering red of Ridgley and the fluttering purple of Jefferson. There were shouts of greeting and shouts of gay challenge, honking of horns and a busy rushing here and there that suggested excitement, anticipation and hopes built high. ”

“ And then came the special train from Jefferson—the Purple Express, so named—bearing hundreds of cheering students and a brass band of twenty pieces which led the procession into Lincoln Hall to the strains of the Jefferson Victory Song,—a fiendish piece of music in the ears of Ridgley's loyal sons, a stirring pean of confidence and challenge in the ears of those who waved aloft the purple. ”

“ Somehow that little incident seemed to change Teeny-bits' state of mind toward Norris; he had been unconsciously thinking of him as scarcely a human being, rather as a super-athlete who was virtually invincible. He began to develop a great desire to play against him, and then suddenly something happened that seemed to make what had been a remote possibility almost a certainty.
Ten days before the big game, during a scrimmage in front of the scrub's goal line, White's weak ankle gave way sharply beneath him with the result that the bone was cracked and White was out of the game for the season. ”

“ Teeny-bits followed directions and again and again came down upon the coach and the captain, remembering their instructions to shift, to use his straight arm, to dodge, to change his pace and to exercise every stratagem that differentiates the skilful back-field runner from the novice. He felt that he was learning real football and took each bit of advice that was offered with an intense concentration. ”

“ Teeny-bits remembered well the story of that tragic day as told him by the man whom he had always fondly known as Dad,—old Dad Holbrook with the white hair and the limp. On that long-ago day a train had crawled slowly into the station at Hamilton. There was a hot box on one of the cars, and while the train waited for the heated metal to cool, a woman with a small child—a boy of about a year and a half—stepped down to the track to find relief from the stifling air of the car. The Chicago express had come hurtling down the track at fifty miles an hour. ”

“ The mining engineer's voice had grown thick—it was as if another person were speaking.
"I should have told you more at the start about Red Knife," he said. "He was a Chinese robber—the chief of a gang of hill-men who for years had levied tribute from those poor, ignorant people of Honan. His name was a living terror—I have never seen such abject fear on the faces of human beings as one day when a rumor passed among our mine workers that Red Knife was in the hills near by waiting to pounce down upon them. They reminded me of sheep huddling together to escape wolves. ”

“ But the first team did not put an end to Teeny-bits' career. They laughed when the coach gave him a chance on the scrub one afternoon and laughed harder when he at last got a chance to carry the ball and by clever dodging succeeded in making a twenty-yard gain. He slipped out of the grasp of Ned Stillson and nearly eluded big Tom Curwood, who covered Teeny-bits so completely when he finally had him down that ball and runner were almost completely out of sight.
"He's as slippery as an eel," said big Tom. ”

“ A buzz of talk filled the dining hall and every one knew that Ridgley was face to face with a forlorn hope.
"Well, we'll have to fight," said Mr. Stevens, who sat at the head of Teeny-bits' table, "and fight hard—it will never do to get discouraged."
But discouragement is subtle; there was good need of something to instill spirit into the Ridgley team, for in the days that followed, rumors like the fables of old began to reach the school on the hill. It was said that tacklers found it almost impossible to stop Norris, the Jefferson full-back. ”

“ But why had Snubby stayed away from the mass meeting except to break into the rooms of his classmates? It was all too confusing. Teeny-bits could evolve no satisfactory explanation. At two or three in the morning he fell into a troubled sleep during which he dreamed that he was playing in the Jefferson game and that the stands were yelling in a tremendous chorus:
"He's a thief; he's a thief!" ”

“ There was scarcely a son of Ridgley gazing down on the field but whose teeth were gritted together, whose breath was coming fast, and whose voice as he shouted encouragement to the team was like the voice of a man hurling defiance to a mortal enemy. ”

“ White had never been a spectacular player, but by hard work he had earned the reputation of being the "Old Reliable" of the team. Neil Durant and Ned Stillson were better at running with the ball and played perhaps more brilliantly, but White was steady and sure. His team-mates called him "a bear at secondary defense." He had an uncanny way of guessing where a play was coming through, and he made it his duty to plant himself in front of it,—and to stop it. If he had had more of leadership in his personality, he might have made as good a captain as Neil Durant made. ”

“ Teeny-bits soon discovered that the vigorous, middle-aged man who had been introduced to him that first day as Ted Norris' uncle was in reality taking the place of the Jefferson football captain's father, who had died several years before. It seemed to him that here was the most intensely interesting man he had ever met. He was a mining engineer, and from little things that were said now and then it was evident that there was scarcely a quarter of the world into which he had not penetrated. ”