But to know where Wolcott was to be found was one thing, to get at him another. Around each group of players crowded the hero-worshippers, who, though they shifted and squirmed and danced in and out of their places, still kept a serried line of backs to the outer world, and offered no practicable opening to a middle-aged intruder, awkwardly conscious that he was out of place. As he stood wavering on the outskirts of the throng, there passed within his reach an eager, glad-faced youth, with a red badge on the lapel of his coat, a megaphone in his hand, and, as Mr. Lindsay discovered on addressing him, a hoarse voice in his throat. The youth halted, heard the stranger’s appeal, and dived unceremoniously under the elbows of the outer circle. Soon the circle parted again and Wolcott popped forth, making haste a little stiffly, and showing a face on which smears of mud were streaked by rivulets of sweat, but shining with exultation.
“We did it, father, didn’t we?” he cried, as he caught Mr. Lindsay’s clean glove in both his grimy hands. “Oh, it was splendid! You can’t imagine the fun; I wouldn’t have missed it for anything! Didn’t Milliken buck the line, though? When he once got his nose by my shoulder, they simply couldn’t stop him. And Hendry was all over the lot—there seemed at least two of him. And Paul Durand! Wasn’t that the cleanest tackle that ever was made? If Joslin had got by that time, I believe we’d have been done for. You’ll never see anything better than that if you go to a hundred games!”
“I dare say not,” calmly interposed Mr. Lindsay, who had no desire to see one more game, not to mention a hundred. “Did you get hurt?”
“Not a bit!” answered the young man, cracking the smooch of mud by a sudden laugh. “I’ve a scratch or two, and my left hip seems to work as if it needed a little oiling, and I’m pretty tired, but that’s all. How did you like it? Wasn’t poor Dave in hard luck to have to go out just when we needed him most? It was dead silly in him to throw away his head-gear like that!”
“I’m glad it wasn’t you,” observed Mr. Lindsay, dryly.
“He’s all right now except for a headache,” went on Wolcott, eagerly. “He really didn’t know what he was about when he went off. The first thing he asked when he came to himself was whether Hillbury got the touchdown.”