Ralph Barbour - Right End Emerson

“No, sir, we’re after the High School fellows and the public generally. But we do expect to get a good deal of patronage from the Academy. In fact, sir, what I want to do ultimately is persuade the athletic teams to trade with us instead of New York!”

“Well, I endorse your courage, Emerson, and I trust you won’t be disappointed. That is – ” The Doctor stopped and frowned at the pencil. “To be frank, Emerson,” he went on, “I had some idea of persuading you to give up this scheme when I sent for you. I say persuading because there is nothing in the rules of this institution that empowers me to forbid it. The mere fact that it has never before been done doesn’t prohibit it; although it is probably the reason that there is no regulation that does! I dare say you can understand why the faculty would view such a proceeding askance, Emerson.”

Russell looked frankly puzzled and finally shook his head. “No, sir, I’m afraid I can’t,” he said.

The Doctor’s brows went up a trifle and he smiled faintly. “Really? Doesn’t it occur to you that keeping a shop might interfere somewhat with the real purpose of your presence here?”

“You mean it might keep me from studying, sir?”

“Exactly, from study and progress, which, after all, Emerson, are what you are here for.”

“Why, but don’t you see, sir,” exclaimed Russell, “that if I don’t run that store I can’t stay here? Why, I – I’m doing it just because I want to study and learn! I’m doing it so I can , Doctor McPherson!”

The Doctor’s golden-brown eyes lighted kindly and the creases that ran from each side of his straight nose to the corners of his rather wide mouth deepened under his smile. “Yes, I do see it, my boy,” he replied heartily. “And because I see it I’ve quite changed my course of action since you arrived. I certainly would not like to see your example followed by – well, by many of your companions, Emerson. And for that reason I trust shop-keeping won’t become the fashion here at Alton! But in your case – well, we’ll see how it works out. I sincerely hope that we shall be satisfied with the results, Emerson. And I certainly hope you will, too. In fact, I wish you the best of luck, my boy. And, while I know very little of merchandising, I’ll be very glad to give you any assistance in my power. And” – whereupon the Doctor’s eyes twinkled – “I’ll certainly patronize ‘The Sign of the Football’ in preference to the gentleman who keeps second-rate goods at first-rate prices! Good morning, Emerson.”

“Good morning, sir,” stammered Russell. “And – and thank you.”

“Not at all. And let me know how you’re getting on sometime!”

Alton played her first game two days later, against the local High School team. The latter had suffered quite as much as the Academy from graduations, and the eleven that took the field to oppose the Gray-and-Gold knew very little football. Alton fairly ran High School off her feet in the first half, scoring three touchdowns and missing two excellent opportunities to kick goals from the field because of the Coach’s instructions to play only a rushing game. Along in the third period Mr. Cade began to send in substitutes, and ere the brief contest was ended Alton had tried out just twenty-one players. There was only one score in the last half, the result of a blocked kick on Alton’s thirty-two yards. High School, held for downs, had attempted a goal, but a plunge of eager Alton substitutes had borne down the defense and the ball had bounded aside from some upstretched arm to be gobbled up by Harmon and borne fleetly down the field. There was little opposition, for the nearest High School pursuer reached the final white line a good two yards behind the swift-footed left half-back. Harmon, rather tuckered, was taken out and Mawson replaced him, and it was Mawson who strove to add another point to the Academy’s total of 26. But his attempt was weak and the ball never threatened the cross-bar. That was in the third period. In the fourth the playing on both sides became amusingly ragged, and fumble followed fumble and signals were mixed and the spectators fairly howled with glee at times. Twice over-eagerness was penalized under the visitor’s goal and so two more probable touchdowns were averted. High School showed one brief session of determined offensive in the third quarter and, taking advantage of Crocker’s sleepy game at right end, managed two long runs which, together with a rather flukey forward pass, landed the pigskin on Alton’s twenty-two yards. There, however, the attack petered out and, after losing seven yards in three downs, High School faked a try-at-goal and tossed forward over the line, where the ball landed untouched on the turf.

Considered even as a first contest, the afternoon’s performance wasn’t encouraging from an Alton standpoint, for the line had been slow and had played high, the backs had worked every man for himself, with no semblance of team-play, and even Ned Richards’ generalship had been particularly headless. Against an equally green and much lighter team, Alton had failed to show any real football. However, one swallow doesn’t make a summer, nor one game a season, and so Coach Cade had little to say after the contest, and the audience, taking itself lazily away through the warm sunlit afternoon, chose to view the humorous aspects of the encounter and disregard its faults. Harley McLeod did fairly well at right end until he gave way to Billy Crocker, and Jimmy played at right half during a brief and glorious third quarter and retired with a bruised and ensanguined nose.

In the Coach’s room, across Academy street from the Green, Mr. Cade and Captain Mart Proctor conferred long that evening and in the end reached the conclusion, among other less certain ones, that the task of building a team this fall was going to be a man-sized job!

Jimmy had determined that he would drop in at the Sign of the Football and look the shop over at the first opportunity. By that he meant the first occasion when he was in want of something that might reasonably be expected to be on sale there. But it didn’t seem that the opportunity would come, for, with the football management supplying everything from head harness to shoe-laces, there wasn’t anything he stood in need of. Nor, between the reading of the advertisement to Stanley that Thursday afternoon and the hour of eleven on the following Tuesday, did he even get as far from the Green as West street. He had heard, though, many comments on the Sign of the Football. Among his acquaintances the store was treated as something of a sensation, while Russell Emerson and his partner in the enterprise were both scoffed at and commended. The idea of an Alton student descending to shop-keeping disturbed many fastidious ones, while others thought it rather a joke – though they couldn’t seem to put their finger on the point of it! – and still others declared that it was a corking good stunt and they hoped Emerson and his pal would make it go. Jimmy lined up with the latter when the matter was discussed in his hearing, and so did Harley McLeod, as, for instance, on Monday night when a half-dozen fellows were gathered in Harley’s room in Haylow. The number included Jimmy and Stanley, Ned Richards, Harley’s room-mate, Billy Crocker and Cal Grainger, the Baseball Captain. It was the latter who introduced the subject when, apropos of something Ned Richards had said regarding his finances, he informed them that anything approaching financial depression wouldn’t bother him hereafter as he and Brand Harmon were going to open a tea shop in the town.

“Keeping a shop is getting to be all the rage,” he explained airily, “and those that get into it early are going to reap the shekels. Brand and I have got it all doped out. Some swell little joint we’re going to have, too. Rose and gray is to be the – the color motif. We’re going to have three kinds of tea: hot, cold and Oolong; and a full line of sandwiches and cakes. Wait till you see us swelling around there with the High School girls! Fine moments, boy, believe me!”