“We gotta stop ’em here,” Spearchucker said.
“We need a time-out,” Trapper John said, “and some information.”
“Time-out!” Hawkeye called to the referee.
“Radar,” Trapper John said, when Radar O’Reilly came in with the water bucket and the towels, “do you think you can monitor that kaffee-clatch over there?”
He nodded toward the other team, gathered around their quarterback.
“I think I can, sir,” Radar said. “I can try, sir.”
“Well, goddammit, try.”
“Yes, sir,” Radar said, fixing his attention on the other huddle.
“What are they saying?”
“Well, sir,” Radar said, “the quarterback is saying that they will run the old Statue of Liberty, sir. He’s saying that their left end will come across and take the ball off his hand and try to get around their right end.”
“Good,” Spearchucker said. “What else are they saying?”
“Well, sir,” Radar said, “now the quarterback is saying that, if that doesn’t work, they’ll go into the double wing.”
“Good,” the Duke said.
“Ssh!” Hawkeye said. “What are they gonna do out of the double wing?”
“Well, sir,” Radar said, “they’re having an argument now. Everybody is talking so it’s confusing.”
“Keep listening.”
“Yes, sir. Now one of the tackles is telling them all to shut up. Now the quarterback is saying that, out of the double wing, the left halfback will come across and take the hand-off and start to the right. Then he’ll hand off to the right halfback coming to the left.”
“Radar,” Hawkeye said, “you’re absolutely the greatest since Marconi.”
“Greater,” Trapper John said.
“Thank you, sir,” Radar said. “That’s very kind of you, sir.”
“Time!” the referee was calling. “Time!”
It was as Radar O’Reilly had heard it. On the first play the enemy quarterback went back, as if to pass. As he did, the left end started to his right, and the Red Raiders, all eleven of them, started to their left. The left end took the ball off the quarterback’s hand, brought it down, made his cut and met a welcoming committee of ten men in red, only Ugly John, temporarily buried under 265 pounds of tackle, failing to make it on time.
“Double wing!” Spearchucker informed his associates as the enemy lined up for the next play. “Double wing!”
“Hut! Hut!” the enemy quarterback was calling. “Hut!”
This time the left halfback took the hand-off and started to his right. The eleven Red Raiders started to their right and, as the right halfback took the ball from the left halfback, ran to his left and tried to turn in, he, too, was confronted by ten men wearing the wrong colors. This time it was the Painless Pole who, tripping over his own feet, kept the Red Raiders from attaining perfect attendance.
The first man to hit the halfback was Spearchucker Jones. He hit him so hard that he doubled him over and drove him back five yards, and as the wind came out of the halfback so did the ball. It took some time to find the ball, because it was at the bottom of a pile of six men, all wearing red jerseys.
“Time!” Spearchucker called, and he walked over and talked with the referee.
“What’s the matter?” Trapper John asked him, when he came back. “Let’s take it to them.”
“Too far to go, and we’re all bushed,” Spearchucker said. “I just told the referee that we’re gonna try something different. We’re gonna make the center eligible …”
“Who?” Vollmer, the sergeant from Supply and center from Nebraska said. “Me?”
“That’s right,” Spearchucker said. “Now everybody listen, and listen good. We line up unbalanced, with everybody to the right of center, except Hawkeye at left end. Just before the signal for the snap of the ball, Duke, you move up into the line to the right of the center and Hawkeye, you drop back a yard. That keeps the required seven men in the line, and makes the center eligible to receive a pass.”
“Me?” Vollmer said. “I can’t catch a pass.”
“You don’t have to,” Spearchucker said. “Trapper takes the snap and hands the ball right back to you between your legs. You hide it in your belly, and stay there like you’re blockin’. Trapper, you start back like you got the ball, make a fake to me and keep going. One or both of those tackles will hit you …”
“Oh, dear,” Trapper said.
“Meanwhile,” Spearchucker said to Vollmer, “when your man goes by you, you straighten up, hidin’ the ball with your arms, and you walk—don’t run—toward that other goal line.”
“I don’t know,” Vollmer said.
“You got to,” Hawkeye said. “Just think of all that dough.”
“I suppose,” Vollmer said.
“Everybody else keep busy,” Spearchucker said. “Keep the other people occupied, but don’t hold, and Vollmer, you remember you walk, don’t run.”
“I’ll try,” Vollmer said.
“Oh, dear,” Trapper John said.
“Time!” the referee was calling again. “Time!”
When they lined up, all of the linemen to the right of the center except Hawkeye, they had some trouble finding their positions and the enemy had some trouble adjusting. As Trapper John walked up and took his position behind the center and then Duke jumped up into the line and Hawkeye dropped back, the enemy was even more confused.
“Hut!” Trapper John called. “Hut!”
He took the ball from the center, handed it right back to him, turned and started back. He faked to Spearchucker, heading into the line, and then, his back to the fray, he who had once so successfully posed as The Saviour now posed as The Quarterback With the Ball. So successfully did he pose, in fact, that both tackles from the Browns and two other linemen in orange and black fell for the ruse, and on top of Trapper John.
Up at the line, meanwhile, the sergeant from Supply and center from Nebraska had started his lonely journey. Bent over, his arms crossed to further hide the ball, and looking like he had caught a helmet or a shoulder pad in the pit of the stomach and was now living with the discomfort, he had walked right between the two enemy halfbacks whose attention was focused on the trappings of Trapper John. Once past this checkpoint, about ten yards from where he had started and now out in the open, the sergeant, however, began to feel as conspicuous as a man who had forgotten his pants, so he decided to embellish the act. He veered toward his own sideline, as if he were leaving the game.
“What’s going on?” Henry was screaming as his center approached him. “What’s going on out there? What are you doing?”
“I got the ball,” the center informed him, opening his arms enough for Henry to see the pigskin cradled there.
“Then run!” Henry screamed. “Run!”
So the sergeant from Supply and center from Nebraska began to run. Back upfield, the two tackles from the Browns had picked up Trapper John. That is, each had picked up a leg, and now they were shaking him out like a scatter rug, still trying to find the ball, while their colleagues stood around waiting for it to appear, so they could pounce on it. Downfield, meanwhile, the safety man stood, shifting his weight from one foot to the other, scratching an armpit, peering upfield and waiting for something to evolve. He had noticed the center start toward the sidelines, apparently in pain, but he had ignored that. Now, however, as he saw the center break into a run, the light bulb lit, and he took off after him. They met, but they met on the two-yard line, and the sergeant from Supply and center from Nebraska carried the safety man, as well as the ball, into the end zone with him.