The Scranton tribune. [volume] (Scranton, Pa.) 1891-1910, 1902-02-10
THE EPISODE
OF THE COWARD
7 TITLE Jimmy Dobbs, an arran

coward, was trying for the team
Everytime Jimmy himself thought
of this he used to blush, partly from
pleasure at the very notion of the
thing, and partly from shame. What
right had such a miserable little cow
ard on the squad at all? Jimmy
weighed somewhere around the one
thirties, and his build was certainly
not one that would be termed "colos-
sal" Still that was no excuse, and he
knew it, Time after time he missed
big Grey when he should have tackled
while the coaches and everybody look
ed on and murmured accordingly. Sew
eral times--only Jimmy himself knew
this, and he tried to forget the dis
grace--several times, when he did get
the man, and lay with his rough, tough
little body spread out under twenty
others on the field, he had shouted
pile Off" and once he had cried
"Help!'-which isn't foot ball at all.
Jimmy knew, for the coach had told
him so. Still, he used to come out
every afternoon and run through the
signals. He always gave the signals
in a queer piping little voice. He was
the scrub quarterback, was Dobbs, and
He was tIylh5 loI lIle varsity.
The big game was close at hand, and
things were in lively preparation on the
field. Little Jimmy Dobbs was plug
ging away with the scrubs and trying
to get the left-half pass correctly. when
the episode began, Leland, the Var
sity quarter, was hurt, hurt quite badly
it seemed, and they had to lift him,
groaning, off the ball and unlace his
shoe.
"Swollen?" grunted Leland through
his teeth.
"Sprained," grimly affirmed the head
coach who knew everything; and
sprained it was, and only three days
left.
Then the head coach turned and
called: "Dobbs." Jimmy heard and
jumped, for he was very much in awe
of the great man in the Princeton
jersey. Then he trotted over to the
crowd.
''Dobbs, you have the signals?"
"Y-yes, sir.' suffered Jimmy; it had
all happened so suddenly that he was
quite dazed.
"Well. little life" said the coach;
lets see you run through 'em."
There was exactly four minutes re-
naming of the second half. Up to this
Jimmy Dobbs had been passing the ball
mechanically and half unconsciously. 1T
was just at this time that he woke to
the realization of his position. His old
fear began to crawl back; he felt sore
and tired. He wanted to go off some
where and sleep and forget it all. Still
one cannot do this with ten thousand
frenzied people shouting, and a cap
tain behind you praying for touch
down that won't come. The other
team held the ball on the Vineyard
line, first down. Five to nothing in
their favor was the score. and only four
minutes left to play. They tried the
line. but big Grey broke through, spilled
things and they lost a yard
"Seventy-five--sixte called
the opposing quarter and the play
commenced.
1t was a line play again. Jimmy was
standing behind Grey. the guard, and
he fell back when the plunge began,
Crouch, crouch, crouch, sounded the
mole-skins. He dropped back still fur
ther, thanking the blessed stars he
wasn't under that pile.
Then, when it was all over, and the
heap had stopped pushing and rolling
about, the ball blundered out ridicul-
ously from the middle of the mass,
right at little Jimmy Dobb's feet. OF
course it took no time-he had skirted
the end, who wasn't expecting him,
before the bleachers awoke to the fact.
Then it was plod, plod. plod up the
great chalk-lined field with the tall,
white goal-posts so very far away be-
fore him. How the crowd did roar,
and howl and pray for him to run:
"Faster. Stumpy faster!" Though
"Stumpy" Dobbs could not hear or un-
derstand them at all, all that he knew
was that it was a chase and he the
hunted thing, with Ericsson, the terrible
end, after him. He saw him out of the
corner of his eye. He knew how
Erison could run. and tackle. His leg
was aching where this man had hurt
him before. Nearer, and little nearer
came the flying foot steps.
Then his fluttering heart choked little
Jimmy Dobbs and he determined to do
a most disgraceful thing. His steps
faltered. then stopped, just as Ericsson
dove for him. But this stop was pre-
cisely what the pursuing end had not
expected; and so he slipped by Jimmy
who stood still and trembled. THE
field was clear before him lay stretched
the enemy; so Dobbs ran on again and
touched the ball down between the
posts. OF course Brady kicked goal
he always did, Then the air was full
OF hats and things, and the bleachers
grabbed "Stumpy" Dobbs, for the game
was won.
This is a tale entirely without a
moral or excuse, but 1t seems to show
how the wicked sometimes triumph.
For though Jimmy Dobbs tried to ex-
plain how 1t was. and that he wasn't
a hero after all, but coward and a
traitor as well. and had stopped when
he did that the fall might be easier and
the tackle less fierce, everybody
laughed The captain said 1t was mag
nificent; the college said something of
the same sort. only stronger: and the
head coach, who knows all things, said