When, a half-hour later, Sid joined his room-mate in Number 14 Sohmer, he found to his relief three boys amicably and unemotionally discussing the prospects of the college football teams. Blash, however, looked horribly pleased and innocent, and Sid’s suspicions returned. He always suspected Blash when he looked innocent. The St. Luke’s Academy game on the following Saturday proved one of the best contests of the season. The visitors usually gave an excellent account of themselves, but the closeness of the score on this occasion was a big surprise to Parkinson. The best the home team could do in the first half was to drop a single field-goal over the cross-bar, and even that modest performance was delayed until the second quarter was almost over. It was Newhall, the big right guard, who made the tally possible by breaking through on St. Luke’s thirty-two yards and spoiling a punt. The pigskin bounded away from Newhall’s body as he leaped into its path, and went trickling across the sod. A dozen players pursued it but it was Bob Peters who won, and when the pile-up was disentangled it was found snuggled under his chest. From the enemy’s twenty-eight to her eighteen Gaines and Kirkendall alternated, the latter finally making the last of the distance with only inches to spare. Warden failed to gain and a quarter-back run netted but three yards. With Kirkendall back, on a fake kick, Gaines got through right guard for three more. With four to go on fourth down Kirkendall dropped the ball between the uprights for the only score of the half. St. Luke’s presented a heavy team and a most aggressive one. From end to end, her line outweighed Parkinson’s by many pounds, but weight didn’t mean slowness in her case, and time and again the visitors made gains by getting the jump on their opponent. In the back-field she was lighter but quite as fast as the Brown-and-White. St. Luke’s suffered, however, as was generally agreed, from a lack of good scoring plays. She relied on weight and speed to break through the enemy line and her reliance was not misplaced. But she had not counted evidently on the excellent defence put up by Parkinson’s back-field. Her lighter backs, once through the line, were almost invariably stopped short of conclusive gains. She had almost nothing to offer in the way of variety and her runs outside tackles were weak. The overhead game she let severely alone during the first half of the contest and tried but four times later. At punting, however, she excelled Kirkendall by five yards and, in the last quarter, when K went out, bested Gaines by fully eight.