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"What's become of Clausen?" asked Remsen. But no one could answer. The play went on. With the ball on Hillton's twenty-yard line a fumble gave it to the home team, and on the first down Browne gathered it in his arms and tried to skirt St. Eustace's left end, but was thrown with a loss of a yard. A similar play with Wills as the runner was tried around the other end and netted a yard and a half.
And presently, when the wearied and crestfallen opponents had lined themselves along the goal-line, Decker held the ball amid a breathless silence, and Hillton's right end sent it fair and true between the uprights: Hillton, 6; Opponents, 5. The game, so far as scoring went, ended there.
When down was called the ball was eight yards nearer Hillton's goal, and Barnard lay still on the ground. Whipple held up his hand. Thistelweight a youth of some one hundred and forty pounds struggled agitatedly with his sweater and bounded into the field, and Barnard, white and weak, was helped limping off. For awhile St.
Eustace had battered her way down the field, throwing her heavy backs through the crimson line again and again, until she had placed the pigskin on Hillton's three-yard line. There the Hillton players had held stubbornly against two attempts to advance, but on the third down had fallen victims to a delayed pass, and St. Eustace had scored her only touch-down.
Then it was that the Crimson had waved madly over the heads of Hillton's shrieking supporters and hope had again returned to their hearts. In the second half Hillton had secured the ball on the kick-off, and, never losing possession of it, had struggled foot by foot to within fifteen yards of the Blue's goal.
The next moment he was thrown behind his goal-line with the ball safe in his arms, and Gardiner, on the side-line, was smiling contentedly. "Touch-back," cried Decker. "Line up on the twenty yards, fellows!" Hillton's ruse had won her a free kick, and in another moment the ball was arching toward the St. Eustace goal. The Blue's left half secured it, but was downed on his forty yards.
From there a kick from placement had been tried, but Gale, Hillton's captain and right half-back, had been thrown before his foot had touched the leather, and the St. Eustace right-guard had fallen on the ball. A few minutes later a fumble returned the pigskin to Hillton on the Blue's thirty-three yards, and once more the advance was taken up.
On the side-line, his hands in his pockets and his short brier pipe clenched firmly between his teeth, Gardiner, Hillton's head coach, watched grimly the tide of battle. Things had gone worse than he had anticipated. He had not hoped for too much a tie would have satisfied him; a victory for Hillton had been beyond his expectations. St.
Then back went the ball, there was a moment of grinding canvas, of muttered words and smothered gasps, of swaying, clutching, falling, and "Down!" was heard. "Hillton's ball; first down," announced the umpire. What a cheer went up from the grand stand! What joy was in Remsen's heart as the St. Eustace full-back went trotting up the field and Greer stooped over the ball!
Time and again the Blue's big full-back plunged through between guard and tackle, now on this side, now on that, and Hillton's line ever gave back and back, slowly, stubbornly, but surely. "First down," cried the referee. "Five yards to gain." The pigskin now lay just midway between Hillton's ten-and fifteen-yard lines. Decker, the substitute quarter-back, danced about under the goal-posts.
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