Barry had bought a Sportsman at the station, and he unfolded it as the train began to move. Searching the left-hand column of the middle page, as we all do when we buy the Sportsman on Saturday—to see how our names look in print, and what sort of a team the enemy has got—he made a remarkable discovery. At the same moment Drummond, on the other side of the carriage, did the same.
“I say,” he said, “they must have had a big clear-out at Ripton. Have you seen the team they’ve got out today?”
“I was just looking at it,” said Barry.
“What’s up with it?” inquired Allardyce. “Let’s have a look.”
“They’ve only got about half their proper team. They’ve got a different back—Grey isn’t playing.”
“Both their centres are, though,” said Drummond.
“More fun for us, Drum., old chap,” said Attell. “I’m going home again. Stop the train.”
Drummond said nothing. He hated Attell most when he tried to be facetious.
“Dunn isn’t playing, nor is Waite,” said Barry, “so they haven’t got either of their proper halves. I say, we might have a chance of doing something today.”
“Of course we shall,” said Allardyce. “You’ve only got to buck up and we’ve got them on toast.”
The atmosphere in the carriage became charged with optimism. It seemed a simple thing to defeat a side which was practically a Ripton “A” team. The centre three-quarters were there still, it was true, but Allardyce and Drummond ought to be able to prevent the halves ever getting the ball out to them. The team looked on those two unknown halves as timid novices, who would lose their heads at the kickoff. As a matter of fact, the system of football teaching at Ripton was so perfect, and the keenness so great, that the second fifteen was nearly as good as the first every year. But the Wrykyn team did not know this, with the exception of Allardyce, who kept his knowledge to himself; and they arrived at Ripton jaunty and confident.
Keith, the Ripton captain, who was one of the centre three-quarters who had made so many holes in the Wrykyn defence in the previous term, met the team at the station, and walked up to the school with them, carrying Allardyce’s bag.
“You seem to have lost a good many men at Christmas,” said Allardyce. “We were reading the Sportsman in the train. Apparently, you’ve only got ten of your last term’s lot. Have they all left?”
The Ripton captain grinned ruefully.
“Not much,” he replied. “They’re all here. All except Dunn. You remember Dunn? Little thickset chap who played half. He always had his hair quite tidy and parted exactly in the middle all through the game.”
“Oh, yes, I remember Dunn. What’s he doing now?”
“Gone to Coopers Hill. Rot, his not going to the ’Varsity. He’d have walked into his blue.”
Allardyce agreed. He had marked Dunn in the match of the previous term, and that immaculate sportsman had made things not a little warm for him.
“Where are all the others, then?” he asked. “Where’s that other half of yours? And the rest of the forwards?”
“Mumps,” said Keith.
“What!”
“It’s a fact. Rot, isn’t it? We’ve had a regular bout of it. Twenty fellows got it altogether. Naturally, four of those were in the team. That’s the way things happen. I only wonder the whole scrum didn’t have it.”
“What beastly luck,” said Allardyce. “We had measles like that a couple of years ago in the summer term, and had to play the Incogs and Zingari with a sort of second eleven. We got mopped.”
“That’s what we shall get this afternoon, I’m afraid,” said Keith.
“Oh, no,” said Allardyce. “Of course you won’t.”
And, as events turned out, that was one of the truest remarks he had ever made in his life.
One of the drawbacks to playing Ripton on its own ground was the crowd. Another was the fact that one generally got beaten. But your sportsman can put up with defeat. What he does not like is a crowd that regards him as a subtle blend of incompetent idiot and malicious scoundrel, and says so very loud and clear. It was not, of course, the school that did this. They spent their time blushing for the shouters. It was the patriotic inhabitants of Ripton town who made the school wish that they could be saved from their friends. The football ground at Ripton was at the edge of the school fields, separated from the road by narrow iron railings; and along these railings the choicest spirits of the town would line up, and smoke and yell, and spit and yell again. As Wordsworth wrote, “There are two voices.” They were on something like the following lines.
Inside the railings: “Sch-oo-oo-oo-oo-l! Buck up Sch-oo-oo-oo-oo-l!! Get it out, Schoo-oo-oo-oo-l!!!”
Outside the railings: “Gow it, Ripton! That’s the way, Ripton! Twist his good-old-English-adjectived neck, Ripton! Sit on his forcibly described head, Ripton! Gow it, Ripton! Haw, Haw, Haw! They ain’t no use, Ripton! Kick ’im in the eye, Ripton! Haw, Haw, Haw!”
The bursts of merriment signalised the violent downfall of some dangerous opponent.
The school loathed these humble supporters, and occasionally fastidious juniors would go the length of throwing chunks of mud at them through the railings. But nothing discouraged them or abated their fervid desire to see the school win. Every year they seemed to increase in zeal, and they were always in great form at the Wrykyn match.
It would be charitable to ascribe to this reason the gruesome happenings of that afternoon. They needed some explaining away.
Allardyce won the toss, and chose to start downhill, with the wind in his favour. It is always best to get these advantages at the beginning of the game. If one starts against the wind, it usually changes ends at halftime. Amidst
