The boys saw some real practice that day. The coach was merciless. They flung themselves against the dummy tackle until they were bruised and sore. They ran down the field under punts until their breath came in gasps. They practiced the forward pass until they were dizzy and seemed to see ten balls flying over the field instead of one. But no one complained or shirked, although every separate bone and muscle seemed to have its own particular ache. A short respite, the 'Varsity and scrub faced each other as they had the day before.
But the hour had struck for the scrubs. They faced their doom. To be sure, they faced it gallantly, but it was doom none the less. From the beginning they never had a chance. All the pent up rage of the 'Varsity that had accumulated while they were being flayed by the coach was poured out on the devoted heads of their opponents. They wiped out the stigma of the day before and paid their debt with interest. It was a "slaughter grim and great," and before their furious attack the scrub line crumpled up like paper.
In vain Morley yelled to his little band to stand fast. They might as well have tried to stem Niagara. Warren and Hodge tackled like fiends. Dick at center and Tom at quarter worked together with the precision of a machine. Bert's mighty kicks were sure to find Caldwell or Drake under them when they came down, and three times he lifted the pigskin over the bars. Then as the play was most of the time in the scrubs' territory, the kicking game gave place to line bucking. Bert was given the ball, and through the holes that Boyd and Ellis made for him in the enemy's line he plunged like a locomotive. There was no stopping them, and the game became a massacre. They simply stood the scrubs "on their heads." Their own goal line was not even threatened, let alone crossed. Touchdown followed touchdown, until when the whistle blew, the 'Varsity had rolled up a score of 54 to 0 and their humiliation had been gloriously avenged.
"Well, Morley," taunted Drake, as the panting warriors left the field, "how about that 'false alarm' stuff?"
"Who's loony now?" crowed Tom.
"Only a spasm," countered Morley, with a sickly grin. "We'll get you yet."
"Bull" Hendricks said never a word as the fellows filed past, but, as he turned to leave the field, his eyes encountered Reddy's, and he favored that grinning individual with a drawing down of the right eyelid that closely resembled a wink. And when he was alone in his own quarters, he indulged in a low chuckle.
"Pretty strong medicine," he said to himself as he lighted his pipe, "but it worked. I guess I'm some doctor."
CHAPTER III
A Thrilling Exploit
A PLEASANT surprise awaited the boys that evening as they went from the training table to their rooms. Under the elms in front of their dormitory, two men were pacing up and down. The close resemblance between them indicated that they were father and son. As they turned toward the boys there was an instant recognition, and they hurried forward in eager greeting.
"Mr. Quinby – Ralph," they cried in chorus.
"We can't tell you how glad we are to see you," said Bert. "What lucky wind blew you so far from California?"
"Business, as usual," responded Mr. Quinby, evidently pleased by the warmth of his welcome. "I had to attend a meeting of directors in New York, and while I was so near, I thought I'd take a day off and run down here for a look around."
"That's what he says," laughed Ralph, "but, as a matter of fact, Dad gets hungry to see the old college every once in so often, and I think he fakes up the 'business' talk just as an excuse."
"Impudent young cub, isn't he?" said Mr. Quinby with mock severity. "But I refuse to say anything in defense, on the ground that I might incriminate myself. Anyway, I'm here, and that's the main point. How are things going with you fellows?"
"Fine," was the response. "But come right on up to our rooms. We're not going to let you get away from us in a hurry, now that we've laid hands on you."
"We'll surrender," smiled Mr. Quinby. "Lead on MacDuff." And they mounted to the rooms that Bert and Dick occupied together, a floor higher up than Tom.
A flood of memories had swept over Bert at the unexpected meeting. Two years had passed since they had been closely associated and many things had happened since that time. Yet all the experiences of that memorable summer stood out in his mind as clearly as the events of yesterday.
Mr. Quinby had been the owner of a fleet of vessels plying between San Francisco and China. Needing a wireless operator on one of his ships, he had applied to the Dean of the college and he had recommended Bert, who was pursuing a course in electricity and making a specialty of wireless telegraphy. Tom and Dick had made that trip with him, and it had been replete with adventure from start to finish. At the very outset, they had been attacked by a Malay running amuck, and only their quickness and presence of mind had saved them from sudden death. Soon after clearing the harbor, they had received the S.O.S. signal, and had been able thereby to save the passengers of a burning ship. A typhoon had caught them in its grip and threatened to send them all to Davy Jones. His flesh crept yet as he recalled the tiger creeping along the deck of the animal ship after breaking loose from his cage. And, traced on his memory more deeply perhaps than anything else, was that summer evening off the Chinese coast when they had been attacked by pirates. Sometimes even yet in his dreams he saw the yellow faces of that fiendish band and heard the blows of the iron bars on their shaven skulls, when old Mac and his husky stokers had jumped into the fray.
How large a part he had played in that repulse he seldom allowed himself to dwell upon in thought and never referred to it in speech. But the country had rung with it, and his friends never tired of talking about it. And none knew better than Mr. Quinby himself that he owed the safety of his vessel and the lives of all on board to the quick wit of Bert in sending the electric current from the dynamo into the wires and hurling the screaming rascals back into their junks. His first words, after they were settled comfortably in their chairs, showed of what he had been thinking.
"Have you run up against any more pirates lately, Bert?" he asked.
"Not of the yellow kind," was the laughing response, "but it looks as though we might meet some white ones before long. They say that the 'Greys' and 'Maroons' are flying the skull and crossbones and threatening to give no quarter, when they stack up against us on the gridiron."
"Threatened men live long," said Mr. Quinby drily. "I've heard that talk before, but I notice that the Blues usually give a good account of themselves when it comes to an actual fight. It was so in my own college days. There'd be all sorts of discouraging rumors afloat and the general public would get the idea that the team was going around on crutches. But when the day of the game came, they'd go out and wipe up the field with their opponents. So I'm not worrying much for fear you'll have to walk the plank."
"You'd have thought so if you had heard the way the coach waded into us to-day," broke in Tom. "Since I heard him, I've had a new respect for the English language. I never knew it had such resources."
"There was a certain honeyed sweetness about it that was almost cloying," grinned Bert.
"'Twas all very well to dissemble his love,
But why did he kick us downstairs?"
added Dick.
Mr. Quinby laughed reminiscently.
"I've heard coaches talk," he said, "and I know that some of them are artists when it comes to skinning a man alive. They'd cut through the hide of a rhinoceros. But that is part of the game, and if a man is over-sensitive, he doesn't want to try to make a football team. I'll wager just the same that it did you fellows good."
"We licked the scrubs by 54 to 0," answered Tom. "We felt so sore that we had to take it out on somebody."
"Sure thing," commented Mr. Quinby. "Just what the coach wanted. He gets you fighting mad, until when you go out you are 'seeing red'