There was the lightest sort of practice on Thursday for the regular, but the third-string players, reinforced by three or four first subs, among them Bert, gave the second a hard tussle for two fifteen-minute halves. Hugh didn’t see that game, for with the other first-choice players he was dispatched to the showers the minute practice was done, but he heard about it afterwards from Peet, who, at least according to his own story, was the one particular bright spot in the second team’s back-field. Peet wasn’t a very eloquent conversationalist and his report was vague and jerky, but Hugh gathered that Bert had more than distinguished himself that afternoon. There had, said Peet, been one burst through the whole second team that had netted forty-odd yards. And he had frequently piled through Myatt and Bowen for three and four at a whack. You just couldn’t stop him! He’d gained two once with both Hanser and Ayer hanging around his neck! And, in the end, he had crashed his way through the second team’s center from the six yards for the only touchdown scored by the substitutes. Hugh was very glad and hoped that Coach Bonner, who, according to Peet, had watched the game through, would change his mind and let Bert start on Saturday. That was the second team’s final game of the season and they won it 10 to 6. When it was over they cheered the first team, the coaches, the school, themselves and whatever else they could think of, and joyfully――and perhaps a little regretfully――disbanded. Bert was in good spirits that evening. He had had a fine time in the game and told Hugh all about it while they sat on the steps of Lothrop after supper and waited until it was time to go over to the mass meeting. But when Hugh suggested that perhaps, because of the good showing he had made, Mr. Bonner might put him into the line-up instead of one Hobo Ordway, Bert shrugged. “He won’t. I know Bonner pretty well. Anyway, I don’t care so much now. I had a bully time knocking around this afternoon and I’ll get a whack at Mount Morris if only for five minutes or so, I guess, and that’ll do. What time is it? We’ve got to sit on the stage tonight like a lot of wax figures. That’s what I always feel like when I’m on exhibition. Joe Leslie’s going to talk tonight. Have you heard him? Oh, yes, he jawed at Lit one time you were there, didn’t he? Well, he’s a dandy at it and no mistake. Joe always calls the turn, too. Last year he said we’d lose and we did. Year before he said neither team would score more than once, and, by Jove, he was right then, too. We played a nothing-to-nothing tie! Joe knows football from A to Izzard, and he would have been a peach of a player if he could have gone in for it.” “What was the trouble?” “Folks didn’t want him to. He――what?” “I didn’t say anything.” “Thought you did. Well, let’s go over.”