Left Guard Gilbert Part 12

Ha! How's that! Get a pad and a pencil and try to look intelligent."

"All right? Mark 'em down, then. Starting at the left, number your holes 1, 3, 5, 7, 8, 6, 4, 2. Got that? Number your left end 1, the next man 3, the next 5. Omit centre. Right guard 6, right tackle 4, right end 2.

Now, your backfield. Quarter 0, left half 7, right half 8, full-back 9."

"Gee, that's hard to remember," murmured Don.

"And hard to guess," answered Tim. "Now, your first number, unless it's under thirty, is a fake. If it's under thirty it means that the next number is the number of a play. Over thirty, it means nothing. Your second digit of your second number is your runner. The second digit of the third number is the hole. The fourth number, as you doubtless surmise, is also a fake. Now, then, sir! 65--47--23--98! What is it?"

"Left half between end and tackle."

"On the left. Correct. 19--87--77--29?"

"I don't know. Nineteen calls for a numbered play."

"Right again, Mr. Gilbert, your performance is startling! The pity of it is, though, that about the time you get these signals pat Robey'll change them for the Claflin game. So far we've only got eight numbered plays, and they aren't complicated. Want to go into them tonight?"

"No, I guess not. I'd rather get these holes and players sort of fixed in my mind first. We'll go over the plays tomorrow, if you don't mind."

"It will break my heart, but I'll do it for you. Now will you come over to Clint's?"

"I'd rather not, Tim. You go. I want to mull over these signals."

Presently, having exhausted his vocabulary on his room-mate, Tim went.

Don settled his head in his hands and studied the numbered diagram for the better part of an hour. Don was slow at memorising, but what was once forced into his mind stayed there. A little before ten o'clock he slipped the diagram under a box in a bureau drawer and went to bed with a calm mind, and when Tim returned riotously a few minutes later Don was sleeping peacefully.

On Monday, in chapel, Don and the "heroes" of Farmer Corrigan's conflagration had another shock, and Don, for one, wondered when he was to hear the last of that affair. "Since last week," said Mr. Fernald drily, "when I requested the four boys who helped to put out a fire at the Corrigan farm to make themselves known to an admiring public, I have gained an understanding of their evident desire to conceal their ident.i.ties. I am forced to the conclusion that it was not altogether modesty that kept them silent. The fire, it appears, did not break out until nearly half-past nine. Consequently the young gentlemen were engaged in their heroic endeavours at a time when they should have been in their dormitories. I have not yet found out who they were, but I am making earnest efforts to do so. Meanwhile, if they wish to lighten the consequences of their breach of school regulations, I'd earnestly advise them to call and see me. I may add that, in view of the unusual circ.u.mstances, had they made a clean breast of the affair I should have dealt very leniently with them. That is all, I think. Dismissed."

None of the culprits dared to so much as glance at the others on the way out of the hall, but afterward, when breakfast was over, they gathered anxiously together in Number 6 Billings and discussed the latest development with lowered voices, like a quartette of anarchists arranging a bomb party.

"He's right up on his ear," said Clint gloomily. "If he gets us now he will send us all packing, and don't you doubt it!"

"Piffle!" This from Tim, the least impressed of the four. "Probation is all we'd get. Didn't the paper say we were heroes?"

"No, it didn't," answered Tom shortly. "And I wish that paper was in Halifax!"

"Might as well be fired as put on pro," said Clint. "It would mean no more football this year for any of us. My word, wouldn't Robey be mad!"

"Wouldn't I be!" growled Tom. "Look here, do you really suppose he's trying to find out who we were, or was that just a bluff to scare us into 'fessing up!"

"Josh isn't much of a bluffer," observed Don judiciously. "What he says he means. What I don't savvy is why he hasn't found out already. Every hall master has a record of leaves."

"Yes, but it was Sat.u.r.day night and I'll bet half the school had leave,"

said Tim. "I dare say, though, that if any fellows are suspected we're amongst 'em, Don. Being on the first floor, Josh knows we could sneak in easily. Still, he can't prove it on us."

"I'm not so sure," replied Don thoughtfully. "Suppose he asked Mr.

Brady?"

A dismayed silence ensued until Tom laughed mirthlessly.

"That's one on us," he said. "We never thought of that. Maybe he has asked Brady already."

"Brady doesn't know our names," said Tim. "You didn't tell him, did you, Don?"

"No, he didn't ask. But he could easily describe us so that Josh would recognise us, I guess."

"That's the trouble with being so plaguy distinguished looking," mourned Tim. "Seems to me, fellows, that there's just one thing to be did, and did sudden."

"You mean warn Mr. Brady?" asked Clint.

"Exactly, my discerning young friend. Maybe the horse is stolen----"

"What horse?" asked Tom perplexedly.

"Merely a figure of speech, Tom. I was about to observe when so rudely interrupted----"

"Oh, cut out the verbiage," growled Tom.

"That possibly it was too late to lock the stable door," continued Tim, "but we'd better do it, just the same. Let's see if he has a telephone."

"Of course he has," said Clint, "but I don't think it would be safe to call him up. We'd better see him. Or write him a letter."

"He wouldn't get a letter until tomorrow, maybe," objected Don. "One of us had better beat it over to his place as soon as possible and ask him to keep mum."

"I can't go," said Tom. "I've got four recits this morning and Robey would never let me off practice."

"I don't believe any of us will do much work this afternoon," said Tim.

"I'll go if Robey'll let me cut. I wish someone would come along, though. It's a d.i.c.kens of a trip to make alone. You come, Clint."

"I will if I can. We'll ask Robey at dinner. What shall we say to this Brady man?"

"Just tell him what's doing and ask him to forget what we looked like if Josh writes to him or calls him up or anything. Brady's a good old scout, I'll bet," added Tim with conviction. "Maybe we'd better buy a setting of eggs to get on the good side of him."

"Don't be a chump," begged Tim. "I don't call this a comedy situation, if you do, Tim. I'd certainly hate to get on pro and have to drop football!"

"Don't be a chump," begged Tom. "I don't say it's a comedy, but there's no use weeping, is there? What's done is done, and we've got to make the best of it, and a laugh never hurt anyone yet."

"Well, then, let's make the best of it," answered Tom peevishly.

"Talking doesn't do any good."

"Neither does grouching," said Tim sweetly. "You leave it all to Clint and me, Tom. We're a swell pair of fixers. If we can get to Brady before Josh does we're all right. And it's a safe wager Josh hasn't asked Brady yet, for if he had he'd be on to us. There's the nine o'clock bell, fellows, and I've got a recit. See you later. Hope for the best, Tom, and fear the worst!"

Tim seized his books and dashed out, followed more leisurely by Clint.

Tom remained a few minutes longer and then he, too, took his departure, still filled with forebodings. Don, left to himself, drew a chair to the table and began to study. Truth, however, compels me to state that what he studied was not his German, although he had a recitation coming in forty minutes, but two sheets of buff paper torn from a scratch-pad and filled with writing interspersed with numerals and adorned with strange diagrams, in short, Tim's elucidation of the eight numbered plays which up to the present comprised Brimfield's budget of tricks. It can't be said that Don covered himself with glory in Mr. Daley's German cla.s.s that morning or that the instructor was at all satisfied, but Don had the secret satisfaction of knowing that stored away in the back of his brain was a very thorough knowledge of the Brimfield football signal code and of Mr. Robey's special plays.

CHAPTER XI