territory. Before the
Sunrise rooters had time to cease rejoicing, however, the invincible
quarterback was away again, and with two guards and a center on top of
Burleigh, now the plucky runner broke across the Sunrise line, and a
minute later missed a pretty goal. And the opposing bleachers counted
five.

The second half of the game was filled with a tense, fruitless strife.
Five points to five points, and four minutes of time to play. The
struggle had ceased to be a turning of tricks and test of speed.
Henceforth, it was man against man, pound for pound. Suddenly, the
opposing team braced itself and began a steady drive down the gridiron.
With desperate energy, the Sunrise eleven fought for ground, giving way
slowly, defending their goal like true Spartans, dying by inches,
until only three yards of space were left on which to die. The rooters
shrieked, and the girls sang of courage. Then a silence fell. Three
yards, and the Sunrise team turned to a rock ledge as invincible as the
limestone foundation of their beloved college halls. The center from
which all strength radiated was Victor Burleigh. Against him the weight
of the line-bucking plunged. If he wavered the line must crumble. The
crowd hardly breathed, so tense was the strain. But he did not waver.
The ball was lost and the last struggle of the day began. Two minutes
more, the score tied, and only one chance was left.

Since the night of the storm, Vic had known little rest. His days had
been spent in hard study, or continuous practice on the field; his
nights in the sick room. And what was more destructive to strength
than all of this was the newness and grief of a blind, overmastering
adoration for the one girl of all the school impossible to him. The
strain of this day's game, as the strain of all the preparation for it,
had fallen upon him, and the half hour in the rotunda had sapped his
energy beyond every other force. Love, loss, a reputation attacked,
possible expulsion for assaulting a professor, injustice, anger--oh, it
was more than a burden of wearied muscles and wracked nerves that he had
to lift in these two minutes!

In a second's pause before the offense began, Vic, who never saw the
bleachers, nor heard a sound when he was in the thick of the game,
caught sight now of a great splash of glowing red color in the
grandstand. In a dim way, like a dream of a dream, he thought of
American Beauty roses of which something had been said once--so lon