CHAPTER XIV
THE LAST GOAL
The second half began. A blast from the referee's whistle sent the twoteams scurrying to their positions. Again Sheffield and the Elkanacenter faced each other in the middle of the floor; again the officialtossed the ball high into the air; again he blew his warning signal asit reached the top of its flight.
But here the repetition of the first play of the game ended. AsSheffield raised his right arm for the tap, his elbow jabbed againstthe breast of his opponent, topping the boy off-balance. With adesperate effort, the latter tried to straighten and swing for thefalling ball; but he was an instant too late. Sheffield whanged itstraight and hard into Kiproy's waiting arms.
"Oh!" gasped Bunny, on the substitutes' bench. It was like the cry fromsome hurt.
No shrill of the referee's whistle marked the foul. Clearly, theofficial had been watching the flight of the ball, rather than the twoopposing players who had leaped for it as it fell, and had thus failedto detect any unfair interference.
But the spectators had seen. A little hiss of disapproval grew to abuzzing growl, like a tiny breeze that nods the daisies in a distantfield and snarls through the bushes as it comes close.
Kiproy bent to make a pass. Sheffield held up a staying hand.
"Wait!" he called. In the tense silence that followed, Bunny could hearhim clearly. "I interfered with that toss-up--unintentionally; jabbedthe Elkana center with my elbow. Call a foul, Referee!"
The noise broke anew, but it was the clapping of hands this time, andthe stamping of feet and little shouts of approval, like a rollickinggale at play. Bunny looked out at Sheffield, through what seemedqueerly like a fog, and said, "Oh, that's fine!" And even when someElkana fellow was given a free trial for goal and netted a basket, herepeated, "Yes, that's fine!" At that moment, he liked Sheffield morethan he ever had before.
Over at the blackboard, the boy rubbed out the ten under Elkana's nameand traced an eleven in its place. Lakeville's total was still eight.
Sheffield outjumped the opposing center on the next toss-up, which wasfree of any semblance of foul, and whacked the ball to Barrett. Peterwhirled completely around, to throw off the guard hovering in front ofhim, and started a dribble. But just as he was ready to make the pass,some Elkana player stepped in and captured the ball. It was not anunusual incident, but it made Bunny squirm. Peter had been just thetick of a watch too slow.
After that, things began steadily to go wrong. The four players whohad been in the tank started to shrink when they should have charged,to submit weakly to an opponent's making a pass when they should havescrimmaged for a toss-up, to be always the tiny fraction of a secondtoo late in catching, shooting, dodging. Elkana scored. It scoredagain. After perhaps three minutes of play in the second half, thefigures on the blackboard read: Lakeville, 8; Elkana, 15.
"We're licked," Bunny muttered, digging his finger tips into moistpalms, "unless--"
It was like a cue for Sheffield's action. Before the ball could be putinto play again, the Lakeville captain stepped to the referee's sideand said something in a quick, decisive manner. The man nodded. ThenSheffield lifted a beckoning finger toward the substitutes' bench.
Bunny looked at the other three, as if expecting one of them to rise atthe signal, and the other three looked at Bunny the same way. None ofthem seemed to know which substitute he wanted.
"Come on!" called Sheffield gruffly; then, after one heart-breakinginstant of hesitation, "All of you!"
At that, of course, they dropped the single blanket they had thrownover their shoulders and scampered out upon the floor. They triedto look unconcerned during the little journey, but nobody was muchdeceived. Barrett, Kiproy, Collins and Turner, walking wearily anddejectedly toward the bench, passed them without speaking.
There was no time for Sheffield to coach them in the style of game hewanted them to play. Possibly, too, he thought any instructions of hiswould be so much wasted breath. All he could do was to hope for thebest, in a forlorn sort of way, and trust to their natural ability tonet a basket when the opportunity offered. They knew the formations andthe signals; individually, he admitted, they were crack players. Well--
Lakeville had practiced its deceptive forward crisscross at least onehundred times. When Sheffield hit the ball on the toss-up, he sent itdirectly across the floor to S. S., playing left guard, on the doublehope that this unexpected maneuver would fool Elkana again and thatyoung Zane would be ready for the catch.
Never had Bob Collins played it better. With a deceptive lunge, S.S. shook off the player hovering about him, dashed forward, took thepass, dribbled the ball till the very last safe moment, and then shotit across to Bi, at right guard. From him it zigzagged back to theopposite side, into Jump's waiting hands, and, with just enough delayto pull in the baffled Elkana players, on to Bunny, playing in onecorner of the court, within easy looping distance of the basket.
All this time, of course, Sheffield had been racing down the middle,till he was now squarely in front of the goal, with only one negligentguard anywhere near him. But Bunny was also clear for the moment.
"Shoot it!" shouted the captain, eyes already raised to the basket forthe try.
Bunny poised the ball in his hands. Sheffield's guard shuffled towardthe danger zone. But even as he drew back his arms, Bunny whirled andmade an overhand pass to his captain. So unexpected was this play, andso rapid the throw, that Sheffield came near being taken unawares.
But he set himself in time. Hard and true came the ball, zippingagainst his open palms, with every last Elkana player temporarilyparalyzed by surprise. With something very like a smile, Sheffieldbalanced himself, taking plenty of time, and nonchalantly looped itupward for the gaping basket in front of him. It was a perfect goal.
Score: Lakeville, 10; Elkana, 15.
"Nice work!" Sheffield grunted to Bunny.
He wasn't sure--yet. But a minute later, when Jump, in the very shadowof the goal, lifted the ball high above his head and then flicked itback to his captain, six feet behind him, Sheffield knew for certain.He made that basket, too, and he ran laughing for the next toss-up,as if all the people in Elkana couldn't stop his team now. The Scoutswere doing just what he had trained those others to do, just what hehad declared the Scouts would never agree to do. They were feeding himthe ball; they were playing, not for the applause and glory of shootinggoals, but for the bigger thing, for the team itself.
Score: Lakeville, 12; Elkana, 15.
Neither side scored during the next few minutes. But that worried Bunnynot one whit, and he guessed Sheffield felt the same about it. ForLakeville had come into her own at last, as if her five players werea single body with ten arms and ten legs. They rushed the ball towardtheir goal, tapping, tossing, dribbling, shooting it from boy to boy,looping it for the basket, scrambling after misses, and turning fromoffense to defense when Elkana took possession of it and began a march,with many side trips, in the other direction.
Elkana had not fought victoriously throughout the season without soundcause. Its team answered this new challenge like thoroughbreds. Putupon their mettle, the five players rose to a skill they had nevershown before, and swept down the floor to the climax of another basket.
"Never mind that!" grinned Bunny, passing a grimy hand over hisstreaked face. "We'll beat 'em yet!"
"You bet we will!" Sheffield flashed back.
Hard on the heels of this stiffening determination, Lakeville scoredagain, and yet again. Sheffield shot both goals, but Bunny knew he wasready enough to give credit to the machine behind him.
Elkana led now by a single point. The score board read: Lakeville, 16;Elkana, 17.
Sixty seconds later, in a most peculiar manner, came the chance to tiethe score. Lakeville had already failed on a direct side-center passformation and on a single side cross-forward play that had counted inother games. Wisely, Sheffield called for the forward crisscross thathad twice baffled Elkana.
It looked as if the play were to go through. B
ackward and forwardacross the floor, the ball wove its way, till it was time for the finalpass to Sheffield, already in a favorable position to shoot the basket.But just at the last, an Elkana player sensed the trick. With flyingarms, like a Holland windmill adrift, he swept down upon the Lakevillecaptain.
Sheffield dodged. So did the Elkana boy. Sheffield dodged back again,to confuse his opponent. The result was a semi-success. The otherplayer had guessed wrong, and what happened was as much a surprise toone as the other.
With a crash, the two collided solidly. Sheffield fell flat on hisback, the Elkana boy piled on top of him, and the referee's whistleshrilled.
"Foul for charging!" the official announced. "Free trial for goal forLakeville!"
Bunny Payton fairly wriggled with eagerness. "Tie score if you makethis goal!" he exulted, as Sheffield clambered to his feet dabbing athis eye with an open hand. "Not hurt, are you?"
"No. Where's the ball? Everybody ready?"
Bracing himself, feet apart, directly behind the foul line, Sheffieldtook the ball in both hands, raised it suddenly in an overhand loopshot--and missed the basket by a good six inches!
Nobody spoke. Nobody told him it didn't matter; for it did, mightily.Nobody even asked what the trouble was. But that wide miss, by a centerwho could net a goal nine times out of ten on free throws, was like adash of cold water to the Lakeville team.
"But we won't quit," Bunny told himself, trotting into position for thenext toss-up. "He'll have another chance in a minute."
It came even sooner than he expected. Scurrying here and there overthe floor, apparently without aim or purpose, but in reality dodgingand running with preconceived plan, the Lakeville five edged closerand closer to the basket, till in the end Sheffield caught a long passalmost in front of the goal. With a quick leap to one side, he shookoff the Elkana guard; with the precision born of much practice, helooped the ball up and over.
The shot was long. Hitting the backboard a full foot above the net,the ball bounced back against the outer edge of the metal ring, hunguncertainly a moment, and then trickled free to the floor. For thesecond time in as many minutes, Sheffield had failed.
"Three minutes to play!" the timekeeper called, as they raced back totheir positions.
Three minutes! And Lakeville one point behind! Bunny balled his nervoushands into hard fists and tried to swallow the lump that kept coming upin his throat. There was a chance yet, of course, but with Sheffieldshooting wildly--
For the third time in succession, a little later, the Lakeville captainmissed the basket. This throw was the worst of the three; a blind man,Bunny told himself bitterly, might have come as close. What was thegood of feeding Sheffield the ball, if he chucked away his chances likethat?
There couldn't be much more than a minute to play now. When Sheffieldlined up against the Elkana center once more, he spat out a curt,"Everybody in it this time," and jumped and batted the ball to S. S.That _in_ was the signal for the old forward crisscross. Bunny shookhis head doubtfully, but ran to his place.
The ball darted to and fro, like a swallow winging for safety: from S.S. to Bi, from Bi to Jump, from Jump to Bunny. Everybody was runningand shouting, quite as if each player had gone suddenly insane. "Hereyou are!" somebody would call. "Shoot it!" "Watch out!" "Careful!""Plenty of time!" "Plenty of time!" And then, having tantalized someopposing rusher, "Come on!" "Shoot it!"
By now, Sheffield was down the floor, in front of the basket and alittle to the left. But Bunny was as close on the other side and lesscarefully guarded. Elkana, you see, had discovered that Lakeville'scaptain was usually the final link between the last pass and the tryfor goal. As a result, its players were beginning to watch him likehawks.
"Shoot it!" yelled Sheffield, trying vainly to shake off the Elkanaguard.
Bunny bounced the ball long enough to give this order time to registerin his brain. "He means for me to try for a basket," he decidedhappily. He tapped the ball to the floor again. "And I can make it,too; I know I can."
None of the Elkana players seemed to be worrying about him in theleast. Bunny dribbled the ball a little nearer the goal, keeping a waryeye on Sheffield, who was twisting and doubling and flopping about,like a--like a chicken with its head off.
"That's just what he looks like," Bunny grinned to himself. "Shucks! IfI did pass him the ball, he'd throw it wild. He's done it three timesnow."
"Shoot it!" ordered Sheffield, in a frenzy of excitement. He ran back afew steps and threw up his hands. Bunny wanted to think he was pointingtoward the goal, but some curious prick of his conscience suggestedthat he might be motioning for a catch.
There was only a second or two to decide now. Down in his heart, Bunnywas sure--absolutely sure--that he could make the goal. He couldalready see himself holding the ball with both hands in front of hischest, pushing it upward till his arms were straight from shouldersto fingertips, and launching it, straight and true, upward and overand down, in a great looping shot that would nestle it in the swayingnet below the iron hoop. He knew, just as certainly as he knew he wasstanding there, that he could score that goal.
"And I don't think Sheffield can," he argued stubbornly. "He--he's likea chicken with its head off."
Out of the corner of his eye, as he dribbled the ball, he saw an Elkanaboy sweeping toward him. It must be now or never. With a quick lungeahead, he diverted the other's straight line of charge; then, steppingbackward abruptly, he found himself clear for the moment. The ballbounded from the floor and plumped upon the open palm of his right hand.
But something stayed the left hand from clapping upon that side of theleather, preliminary to the try for goal. Instead, turning a little, heswung his right arm in a circle, shouted a warning to Sheffield, nowtemporarily free of heckling guards, and shot the ball to him.
"It's playing the game," he said to himself in a half-whisper. Just thesame, it hurt, even more than he cared to admit, to make that sacrifice.
The Lakeville captain seemed to catch the ball exactly in position forlooping it toward the basket. In the twinkling of an eye, Sheffieldhad tossed it upward, using the same overhand shot Bunny had partiallybegun.
Up and up sped the ball, with ten open-mouthed players following itscourse with twenty popping eyes; up and up, till it seemed it wouldnever stop, and then, after a languid pause in mid-air, down and down,going faster every instant, till it plopped squarely within the metalrim of the basket and swished on into the hanging net.
The goal was scored. Lakeville now led, 18-17.
In the midst of a scrimmage, directly after the next toss-up, a suddencrack from the timekeeper's pistol signaled the end of the game.Lakeville had won. The road to the championship would be easy travelingnow.
Sheffield took his honors without any display of emotion; he was thatsort of winner. To the four substitutes who had made possible thevictory, he merely said, "Good work, fellows!" But Bunny guessed hemeant a good deal more than the words expressed.
"Why didn't you try for that last basket yourself?" he asked Bunny, asthey piled downstairs to the dressing room. "You could have scored."
"Yes, I think I could," Bunny admitted honestly. "I was afraid of you,too, after you had missed those others, but--"
"Something in my eye," explained Sheffield; "got it in when I took thattumble. That's why those shots went wild. But it was out before yourlast pass."
"I gave you the ball," Bunny went on doggedly, "because I knew that wasthe kind of game you had planned--feeding it to you and letting youshoot the baskets. You didn't exactly tell us, of course, but we knew.And a Scout is supposed to be obedient to his leader and--"
"I see," nodded Sheffield, and let the matter drop. "By the way, whydidn't you fellows go swimming with the rest this afternoon?"
"How--how did you know about that?"
"Heard you talking to Barrett and Kiproy and Collins and Turner justbefore I called them for the second half. But I don't see why--Yes, Iguess I do, too. Your Scouts asked you if they could, didn't t
hey?"
"Yes."
"And you wouldn't let them, I suppose. Right!" He turned to Bunny witha smile in his eyes. "Obedience to the leader again, eh? Sort of apronstrings. H'm!"
Bunny couldn't make out whether Sheffield was sneering or just turningthe matter over in his mind. But when he began a stumbling explanation,the captain cut him short with a question.
"Would you Scouts object," he asked, "to being tied--well, sayloosely--to my apron strings in basketball?"
"Why--"
"Because if you wouldn't mind accepting me as a leader in the game,"Sheffield went on evenly, "I have an idea we might show those otherhigh schools quite a nifty little team."
In view of the fact that Lakeville simply romped through the balance ofthe schedule to the championship, it is to be supposed that the Scoutsdidn't object to obeying the captain. In any event, after another weekof strenuous practice, the notice on the bulletin board of the highschool read:
NOTICE!
The following basketball players will report at 12:30 Saturday afternoon, ready for the trip to Harrison City:
_Left Forward_ Payton _Right Forward_ Henderson _Center_ Sheffield _Left Guard_ Zane _Right Guard_ Jones
_Substitutes_ Kiproy, Barrett, Collins, Turner
(Signed) ROYAL SHEFFIELD, _Captain_.