Then again came tough going. The Hillcrest team was tiring. Like shock troops, a half dozen husky subs were pushed into the Naperville team and again they battered their way across the field and over the goal. The kick was good. Once again the score was tied.
Then came the five last tense moments of the game. Even faces in the grandstand were drawn into hard fixed lines. Men were there, stout, gray haired men, who, in their day, had gone romping over their ancient enemy to victory. Now they wanted that victory once again, wanted it terribly. True, there was one more game scheduled with this team, but every game counted, every game! There was no time like the golden now.
“Smash that line!” they chanted. “Smash that line! Smash that line!”
As they went into a huddle, Dave muttered to his team: “Remember what we did in the beginning? They’ve forgotten by now. Same play, all the way through, except just three plunges through left tackle, then one through right guard.”
Hillcrest’s ball on the enemy’s thirty-yard line. Four minutes to play. First down, ten to go.
Snap! The ball fairly cracked as it reached Kentucky’s hands. Dave broke a wide opening. Kentucky went through to a first down.
“Break that line! Break that line! Smash ’em! Smash ’em! Smash ’em!” the bleachers chanted.
Kentucky passed his hand before his eyes—that leering sophomore was there again.
Now he was off once again for a gain of six yards.
“Make it a first down!” Dave muttered grimly.
From the enemy’s bleachers there came a mighty roar: “Stop that man! Stop that man! Kill him! Kill him!” Dave knew they meant him. He grinned broadly. A moment more and he was laughing, for the bruised and battered tackle of the opposing team straightened up to shout back to the now silent bleachers:
“Stop him yourself! He ain’t no man! He’s a stick of flaming red dynamite!”
“Red dynamite!” The Hillcrest bleachers caught the words and hurled it back. “Red dynamite! Red dynamite! ’Ray for Red Dynamite!” And so, in a flash, Dave was named for life.
They did not make it a first down, not that time, for, as if he had rehearsed the act, that grinning, leering guard broke through once more and threw Ballard for a loss. As he did so, he hissed some words in the mountain boy’s ears. Kentucky heard it but indistinctly. Even so, his blood raced. His fingers itched for action. As he rose, he stood there like a marble statue, white and cold.