Page:The fighting scrub, (IA fightingscrub00barb).pdf/173

 and the wails of that aggregation were loud and heart-*rending. As Tom pointed out, and as most of the others acknowledged, it was luck for Clem, and for his sake they were glad enough, but his loss left a gaping hole in the Scrub line that Joe Craigie couldn't wholly fill. After two days of experimenting, Coach Babcock put Joe back at left tackle and gave the right guard position to Howlett. Howlett was light, but he had plenty of fight, and in time he learned his duties very well. But during the rest of that week the disrupted Scrub took some fine wallopings from the First and got but one score. That single bit of glory belonged about evenly to Clif and Johnny Thayer. It was Clif who pulled down Jackson's long heave across the left of the line and ran it through a thickly populated alien territory to the four yards where he was tackled from behind by Duval. If Clif was still weak at making tackles he was certainly strong at avoiding them, for no fewer than four of the First at one time or another laid hands on him. Clif had a way of spinning out of delaying clutches that was very pretty indeed! From the four yards, Johnny Thayer, at fullback, took the ball across in one straight plunge on Cotter. Sim Jackson fumbled the pass and there was no goal.

Clif and Johnny were metaphorically presented with the Key of the City by their grateful team mates on Friday night. That score had been sorely needed to prop up the Scrub's declining self-respect, and so those who had provided it were momentary heroes. Tom