s,
could not be blamed for feeling a little resentment toward both Mr.
Detweiler and Clint. That they refrained from showing it was creditable.
But Clint felt it even if he didn't have optical or auricular evidence
of it and for the first few days at least experienced some embarrassment
and constraint.

But life was too busy to leave him much time for troubling about whether
or not Saunders and the others approved of his presence. His work was
cut out for him from the start. Mr. Detweiler was forever at his heels
and Mr. Detweiler's voice was forever raised in criticism or
instruction. More than once Clint felt like giving up. Toward the end of
that first week it seemed to him that the coach paid no heed to anyone
but just Clint Thayer and that nothing Clint Thayer did was ever quite
right! But he never did give up, however. He was often discouraged,
sometimes angry, always tired out when work was over, but he kept
on trying.

Mr. Detweiler dogged his footsteps every minute, or so it seemed to
Clint. Returning from practice the coach would frequently range himself
alongside and deliver one of his brief lectures. Sometimes he would
intercept him between locker and shower and tell him something he had
forgotten earlier. On Thursday evening Clint found him awaiting him in
Number 14 Torrence when he returned from supper, and, punctuated by
lugubrious wails from Penny Durkin's violin, the coach delivered a
twenty-minute lecture on "The Duties of a Tackle on Offence when the
Play is on the Other side of Centre." Clint got so he dreamed of
football and neglected his studies wofully until both Mr. Simkins and
Mr. Jordan remonstrated. In the Southby game, which was played at
Brimfield, Clint started in place of Trow at right tackle, with Tyler at
left. Offensively he showed up particularly well, but it must be
acknowledged that on the defence he was far from perfect. The Southby
left end was a clever player and Clint's efforts to out-guess that youth
were not very successful. Several times during the two periods in which
he played the runner went over or around Clint for good gains.
Considering it afterwards, it was a surprise to him that he had not been
taken out before he was. Perhaps, though, the fact that Brimfield scored
twice in the first period and so secured a lead that was never
threatened had something to do with it. Probably the coaches were
willing to sacrifice some yards of territory in exchange for experience
fo