_ CHAPTER THIRTY FOUR. THE MATCH AGAINST THE COUNTY
The boys, astounded and bewildered by this unexpected revelation, slowly rose to obey the Doctor's order, leaving Loman alone with the head master.
The boy was ashy pale as Dr Senior turned to him and said, solemnly--
"How do you account for this, Loman?"
Loman lowered his eyes and made no reply.
"Answer me please, Loman. Can you account for this?"
"No."
"Did you ever see this paper before?"
"No."
"Do you know how it came into your Juvenal?"
"No."
"Did you know anything at all about the lost paper?"
"No."
The Doctor looked long and searchingly at him as he said once more--
"Loman, are you sure you are telling me the truth? You know nothing whatever about the paper--never saw it before this moment?"
"No."
"You knew the paper had been missed off my desk?"
"Yes."
"Had you the least reason for believing any boy took it?"
Loman hesitated.
"I would rather not say," he said at last.
"You must please answer me frankly, Loman. Had you any reason, I ask, for believing any boy took the paper?"
"Must I say?" asked Loman.
"Yes--you must."
"Well, then, I did fancy some one had taken it."
"Who?"
"Greenfield senior," said Loman, flushing quickly as he said the name.
"And what made you suspect Greenfield senior?"
"All the boys suspected him."
"That is not an answer, Loman. Why?"
"Because, for one thing," said Loman, sullenly, "he was seen coming out of your study that evening."
"And why else?"
"Because he came out so high in the exam."
"And for these reasons you suspected Greenfield of taking the paper? Why did you not mention the matter to me?"
Loman did his best to look virtuous.
"I did not wish to get any one into trouble."
"And you preferred to let an affair like this go on without taking any steps to have it cleared up? Did Greenfield deny the charge?"
"No."
"Did he admit it?"
"Very nearly. He wouldn't speak to any one for months."
"And you really believe that Greenfield took the paper?"
Loman looked up at the Doctor for a moment and answered, "Yes."
"Did you lend him your Juvenal at any time?"
"Not that I remember."
"Do you suppose he put the paper in the book?"
"I couldn't say; but I don't see who else could."
"That will do, Loman; you can go. Kindly leave the paper and the Juvenal with me."
Loman turned to go, but the Doctor stopped him with one more question.
"You know, I suppose, that the questions which you actually had set for the Nightingale examination were quite different from those on the paper?"
"Yes," said Loman. "I mean--that is," he added, stammering, and taking up the paper in question. "I see by this paper they were quite different."
"Yes; you can go now, Loman."
There was something so solemn and hard in the head master's voice as he dismissed the boy that Loman felt very uncomfortable as he slowly departed to his own study.
_He_, at any rate, was in no humour for enjoying the big football match which was just beginning.
And it must be confessed the event of the morning had had the effect of disconcerting a good many more than himself. Stansfield had quite hard work going round among his troops and rousing them once more to the proper pitch of enthusiasm.
"What--whatever does it matter," he said, "if the fellow did take it? _You_ didn't take it, Winter, or you, Wren; and what on earth's the use of getting down in the mouth, and perhaps losing the match, because of it? We're always having our football spoiled by something or other," he added with a groan. "I'll tell you what it is, let's only lick these fellows this afternoon, and then I'll howl and groan and do anything you like, for a week."
There was no resisting such a generous offer. The fellows made up their minds to forget everything else that afternoon but the County, and so to play that the County should have some difficulty in soon forgetting them.
"Fire away, you fellows, and peel!" cried Stansfield, as Oliver and Wraysford sauntered past.
They fired away. But while dressing they exchanged a few words on the forbidden subject.
"Did you ever expect it would be brought home to Loman like this, Noll?" asked Wray.
"No, I didn't. And yet in a way--"
"Eh? What do you say?"
"Why, Wray, you remember me saying that evening, after I left the study, the only fellow I met in the passage besides Simon was Loman?"
"Yes; so you did."
"He was going towards the Doctor's study," said Oliver.
"Hum! I remember now you said so."
"And yet," continued Oliver, plunging into his jersey--"and yet I can't see how, if he did take the paper, he didn't do better in the exam. He came out so very low."
"Yes, that's queer, unless he took a fit of repentance all of a sudden, and didn't look at it."
"Then it's queer he didn't destroy it, instead of sticking it in his Juvenal."
"Well, I suppose the Doctor will clear it up, now he's on the scent."
"I suppose so," said Oliver; "but, I say, old man," he added, "of course there's no need for us to say anything about it to anybody. The poor beggar doesn't want _our_ help to get him into trouble."
"No, indeed. I'd be as glad, quite, if it were found to be another wrong scent, after all," said Wraysford. "The fellow's in a bad enough way as it is."
"Are you nearly ready, you two?" thundered Stansfield at the door.
"Just ready!" they exclaimed; and in another minute they, too, had dismissed from their minds everything but Saint Dominic's versus County, as they trotted off to join the rest of their comrades on the field of battle.
And, indeed, for the next two hours there was no opportunity, even, had they desired it, for any one to think of anything but this momentous struggle.
For three years running the County had beaten the schoolboys, each time worse than before, until at last the latter had got to be afraid the others would begin to think them foemen not worthy of their steel. This year they hardly dared hope a better fate than before, for the enemy were down in force. Yet the boys had determined to die hard, and at least give their adversaries all the trouble they could before their goal should fall; and of this they were all the more sanguine, because their team was the very best the school could muster, and not a man among them but knew his business, and could be depended on to do it too.
Bad luck! Of course, just when it's not wanted there's a breeze got up, blowing right down the field, and in the very teeth of the schoolboys, who have lost the toss, and have to play from the oak-tree end for the first half of the game!
"It's always the way," growls Ricketts. "They'll simply eat us up while they've got the chance, you see!"
"No they won't," says Stansfield, bound to take a cheerful view of things. "We're strong in backs. It's not like last match, when Greenfield wasn't playing, and Loman was there to make such a mess of it."
"Well, it's a comfort, that, anyhow."
"Of course it is," says the captain. "What you fellows have got to do is to keep the ball in close, and nurse it along all the while, or else run--but you'd better let the quarter-backs do that."
This sage advice is not thrown away on the worthies who lead the van for Saint Dominic's, and an opportunity for putting it into practice occurs the moment the game begins. For the School has to kick-off, and to kick-off against that wind is a hopeless business. Stansfield does not attempt anything like a big kick, but just drives the ball hard and low on to the legs of the County forwards, sending his own men close after it, so that a scrimmage is formed almost at the very spot where the ball grounds.
"Now, School, sit on it! Do you hear?" calls out the captain; and certainly it looks as if that unhappy ball were never destined to see the light again. The enemy's forwards cannot get it out from among the feet of the School forwards, try all they will, until, by sheer weight, they simply force it through. And then, when it does go through, there is young Forrester of the Fourth ready for it, and next moment it is back in its old place in the middle of the "mush." In due time, out it comes again--this time on Wren's side--and once again, after a short run, there it is again, on almost the identical spot of earth where it has undergone its last two poundings.
"Played up, Dominies!" cries out Stansfield, cheerily. "Stick to it now!"
Stick to it they do, with the wind fresh on their faces, and the County fellows charging and plunging and shoving like fury upon them.
Ah! there goes the ball, out at the County end for a wonder. The spectators cheer loudly for the schoolboys. Little they know! It had much better have stayed there among their feet than roll out into the open. The County quarter-back has it in his hands in a twinkling, and in another twinkling he has lifted it with a drop-kick high into the air, all along the wind, which carries it, amid cheers and shouts, right up to the boundary of the School goal.
So much for cutting through the scrimmage!
Wraysford, the Dominican "back," is ready for it when it drops, and, without touching-down, runs out with it. He is a cautious fellow, is Wraysford, and does not often try this game. But the ball has far outstripped the enemy's forwards, and so he has a pretty open field. But not for long. In a _few_ seconds the County is upon him, and he and the ball are no longer visible. Then follow a lot more scrimmages, with similar results. It is awfully slow for the spectators, but Stansfield rejoices over it, and the County men chafe.
"Can't you let it out there? Play looser, and let it through," says their captain.
Loose it is.
"That's better!" says the County captain, as presently the ball comes out with a bound full into the quarter-back's hands, who holds it, and, to the horror of the boys, makes his mark before he can be collared.
The scrimmage has been near up to the Dominican goal--within a kick--and now, as the schoolboys look round first at the goal and then at the County man with the ball, the distance looks painfully small. And even if it were greater, this wind would do the business.
The County man takes plenty of room back from his mark, up to which the School forwards stand ready for one desperate rush the moment the ball touches the ground. Alas, it is no go! They have a knowing hand and a quick foot to deal with. Before they can cover the few yards which divide them, the ball is dropped beautifully, and flies, straight as an arrow, over the cross-bar, amid the tremendous cheers of the County men and their friends.
"Never mind!" says Stansfield, as his men walk out once more to the fray, "they shan't get another before half-time!"
Won't they? Such is the perversity of that creature people call Luck, and such is the hatred it has for anything like a boast, that two minutes--only two minutes--after the words are out of the captain's mouth another Dominican goal has fallen.
For Stansfield in kicking off gets his foot too much under the ball, which consequently rises against the wind and presents an easy catch to any one who comes out to take it. A County forward sees his chance. Rushing up, he catches the ball, and instantaneously, so it seems, drop-kicks it, a tremendous kick clean over the School goal, before even the players have all taken up their places after the last catastrophe.
This is dreadful! worse than ever! Never in their worst days had such a thing happened. For once in a way Stansfield's hopefulness deserts him, and he feels the School is in for an out-and-out hiding.
The captain would like extremely to blow some one up, if he only knew whom. It is so aggravating sometimes to have no one to blow-up. Nothing relieves the feelings so, does it?
However, Stansfield has to bottle up his feelings, and, behold! once more he and his men are in battle array.
This time it's steady all again, and the ball is kept well out of sight. It can't even slip out behind now, as before; for the School quarter-backs are up to that dodge, and ready to pounce upon it before it can be lifted or sent flying. Indeed, the only chance the wretched ball has of seeing daylight is--
Hullo! half-time!
The announcement falls on joyful ears among the Dominicans. They have worked hard and patiently against heavy odds; and they feel they really deserve this respite.
Now, at last, if the wind wouldn't change for them, they have changed over to the wind, which blows no longer in their faces, but gratefully on to their backs.
The kick-off is a positive luxury under such circumstances; Stansfield needn't be afraid of skying the ball now, and he isn't. It shoots up with a prodigious swoop and soars right away to touch-line, so that the County's "back" is the first of their men to go into action. He brings the ball back deftly and prettily, slipping in and out among his own men, who get beside him as a sort of bodyguard, ready at any moment to carry on the ball. It is ludicrous to see Ricketts and Winter and Callonby flounder about after him. The fellow is like an eel. One moment you have him, the next he's away; now you're sure of him, now he's out of all reach. Ah! Stansfield's got him at last! No he hasn't; but Winter has--No, Winter has lost him; and--just look--he's past all the School forwards, no one can say how.
Young Forrester tackles him gamely--but young Forrester is no hand at eel-catching; in fact, the eel catches Forrester, and leaves him gracefully on his back. Past the quarter-backs! The man has a charmed life!
Ah! Greenfield has got him at last. Yes, Mr Eel, you may wriggle as hard as you like, but you'd hardly find your way out of that grip without leave!
Altogether this is a fine run, and makes the School see that even with the wind they are not going to have it all their own way. However, they warm up wonderfully after this.
Steady is still the word (what grand play we should get if it were always the word at football, you schoolboys! You may kick and run and scrimmage splendidly, but you are not steady--but this is digression). Steady is still the word, and _every_ minute Saint Dominic's pulls better together. The forwards work like one man, and, lighter weight though they are, command the scrimmages by reason of their good "packing."
Wren and young Forrester, the quarter-backs, are "dead on" the ball the moment it peeps out from the scrimmage; and behind them at half-back Oliver and Bullinger are not missing a chance. If they did, Wraysford is behind them, a prince of "backs."
Oh, for a chance to put this fine machinery into motion! Time is flying, and the umpire is already fidgeting with his watch. Oh, for one chance! And while we speak here it comes. A County man has just darted up along the touch-line half the length of the field. Wren goes out to meet him, and behind Wren--too close behind--advances Oliver. The County man thinks twice before delivering himself up into the clutches of one of these heroes, and ends his run with a kick, which, Oliver being not in his place, Wraysford runs forward to take. Now Wraysford has hardly had a run this afternoon. He means to have one now! And he does have one. He takes the ball flying, gives one hurried look round, and then makes right for the thick of the fray. Who backs him up? Greenfield for one, and all the rest of Saint Dominic's for the other.
"Stick close!" he says to Oliver, as he flies past. Oliver wants no bidding. He follows his man like a shadow. In and out among the forwards, and round about past the quarter-backs; and when at last Wraysford is borne down by a combined force of half and three-quarter-backs, Greenfield is there to take the ball on.
"Look-out there!" cries the County captain, "mark that man." The County does mark that man, and they have the painful task of marking him pass one half-back and floor another before he is arrested.
"I'm here!" cries Wraysford's voice at that moment; and next instant the ball is again hurrying on towards the County goal in Wraysford's arms, Greenfield once more being in close attendance.
And now the County backs come into action, and the first of them collars Wraysford. But it is Oliver who collars the ball, and amid the shouts, and howls, and cheers of players and spectators rushes it still onward. The second "back" is the County's only remaining hope, nor surely will he fail. He rushes at Oliver. Oliver rushes at him. Wraysford, once more on his feet, rushes on them both.
"Look-out for the ball there!" is the panic cry of the County. Ay, look indeed! Oliver is down, but Wraysford has it, and walks with it merrily over the County's goal-line, and deposits it on the ground in the exact centre of the posts.
"There never was such a rush-up, or such a pretty piece of double play," say the knowing ones among the onlookers; and when a minute later the ball is brought out, and Stansfield kicks it beautifully over the goal, every one says that it is one of the best-earned goals that old meadow has ever seen kicked, and that Saint Dominic's, though beaten, has nothing in that day's performance to be ashamed of. _