John D. MacDonald

Runaway Cleats

Gavis took it on the eight and got just over the twenty before he was dumped. On the first play, running from the T. Shelevat went wide on a naked reverse. I had plowed deep and come up in their backfield, but I was too far off the play for anybody to bother with a block.

It looked good for at least five. Maybe more. But a wide little chunk of meat traveling at terminal velocity hit Skimmer Shelevat across the thighs in the process of nearly tearing him apart, drove him back inside the twenty.

The wide little chunk of meat, Ferris Gallahan — Sir Gallahan — bounced up and yelled to Big Hunk, “You like that?”

Big Hunk, the assistant line coach, was carrying the whistle on the scrimmage. He had a sour, amused look on his wide face.

“You’re wonderful, kid!” he said.

Shelevat bounced a few times to make sure he still had legs. He towered over Sir Gallahan. He spat, looked down at Gallahan, and said, “What was that school again, kid?”

“Yohannus College.”

As always, it got a laugh. And, as always Sir Gallahan looked bothered by the laugh.

Mike Kaydee, the head coach, was sitting across the field on top of the sound truck, the hand-mike in his hand. “Get rolling out there!” the metallic voice bawled.

The next play looked like the same thing. When you play two seasons of big time football, you begin to smell out the plays. Once again I found my way under the line and popped up out of the play. I saw right away that it was an old game called suckalong.

Sir Gallahan came in fast as before. Maybe faster. And when Skimmer went up for the jump-pass into the flat, Sir Gallahan didn’t horse around with tackling him. He went right up too, a beefy elbow tickling Shimmer under the chin as the outstretched fingers of his hand tipped the pass straight up into the air.

Gallahan came down on his feet and moved under the pass, and the jarring tackle that Nick Toroki handed him didn’t loosen the ball a bit. Sir Gallahan had it. He jumped up and yelped, “We did it that way at Yohannus.”

It didn’t get much of a laugh.

Too many guys were hot after their positions on that fourth day of September. As you well know, Karr Tech always puts a team on the field. A very loyal alumni group keeps the talent rolling in. Mike Kaydee turns out tough, smart teams, and each year there are always a dozen ex-high school team captains on the freshman squad.

It was my senior year, and no different from the others. First comes spring practice, and then the pre-season warm-up. Each year the forty top boys go to the estate of Homer Winkledine. He played guard for Karr back in the days of the flying wedge. His estate is set in beautiful country, and there is a special wing big enough to handle the whole forty and the coaching staff — all except Mike Kaydee who stays over in the main part of the house.

The remaining eighty or so hopefuls turn out for the first practice sessions back at the school after registration. Sometimes before scheduled toughies, Kaydee will set up a secret practice session at Winkledine’s place.

We all knew how come Sir Gallahan was with us. He was a transfer from Yohannus College somewhere out in the wilds where, during his sophomore year, he had captained the stalwart Yohannus eleven. One of the biggest contributors to the alumni fund had talked him into the transfer and had let Mike Kaydee know that it was give Gallahan a king-size break, or else...

And thirty-nine of us were wishing Mike had taken the “or else.”

I had arrived, drawn my room, gone up and found him sitting on the bed. He was a kid with a face like one of those brown rocks you find in New England fields, with a pair of perpetually surprised-looking blue eyes stuck into it.

“Jeez!” he said when I walked in. “Why, you’re Ed Stumpke! All-American! Jeez!”

“You’ve been reading my scrapbooks,” I said, tossing my bag onto a bench.

“Yeah, I keep one too. But of course, you never heard of I’m Ferris Gallahan from Yohannus.”

“You’re what from what?”

“They call me Sir Gallahan,” he said hopefully.

“Oh, sure. Sir Gallahan from Yohannus,” I said. I can go along with a gag. I looked him over. “Back?”

“Oh, I play any position. I played ’em all with Yohannus.”

It was hard to keep from laughing at the kid. And yet there was something almost pitiful about him. I hadn’t seen a wide-eyed look like that in years. I noticed he had a funny build. Wide as a barn door and about the height of a hydrant. And no waist. Just meat. Beefed to the heels is a good expression.

“Gosh,” he said. “I never thought I’d be rooming with the great Ed Stumpke.”

I straightened up from the bag I was unpacking and looked at him. It if turned out that it was a gag, I was going to learn him some manners. But it wasn’t. Those sappy words were dished right out of his little soul.

I grinned at him. “Kid, it’s awful hot and old Mike Kaydee is going to melt some of that baby fat right off you.”

His face fell. “Oh, I’m in good shape. I’m in better shape than you are. You puffed a little after coming up the stairs.” He jumped up, spread his arms out and said, “Go ahead, Ed. Hit me in the gut. Hard as you can.”

I shouldn’t have done it. He had made me sore and even so, I pulled the punch a little. But I know how to pivot and get my back into it. It was exactly like hitting the shoulder of a side of beef. Smack! It didn’t even put a trace of a crimp in his smile.

“See?” he said. “I bet you wouldn’t let me do that to you.”

I held my arms out and shut my teeth hard. He had to look up at me a little. My heels lifted off the floor and came down again. Little yellow pinwheels were bouncing off the backs of my eyeballs. I walked over calmly and stretched out on the bed. Then I tried to breathe. It sounded like the last bit of water running down a drain.

“See?” he said. “Condition is everything. The coach was very firm about that at Yohannus.”

During the first couple of days of push-ups and trotting around, Mike Kaydee had the look of a cat after a canary sandwich. He knew he had something. With his backfield of Blair, Toroki, Gavis and Shelevat on offense — and with Jak, Silberson, Gestrey and Raegen on defence, a very rough schedule began to look soft indeed.

I could tell that he was itching to throw us at each other. Mike Kaydee is a firm believer that there is no way to get in shape for football like playing football. He was willing to risk pre-season injuries in order to find out for sure that the stuff was good, and nobody had faded too badly.

Raegen, the defensive left wing, had sprained an ankle during the summer. He said it was okay, but Johnny Jerome, the trainer, didn’t like the look of it. And that was why, during the first scrimmage of the practice session, Sir Gallahan was in there.

But after the first couple of days, he was far from unknown. The boys were fed to the teeth with his big talk about Yohannus. He wasn’t a bad little guy, but be talked too much. And he let it be known at meals, in the showers, and everywhere else that he was one hell of a fine football player. At any position.

But every squad needs a fall guy. Sir Gallahan elected himself to the position.

However, I couldn’t help but feel there was something just a little phoney about him. It didn’t seem possible that he could have lived so long and stayed so green.

It noted, however, that he worked hard.

Now we were all beginning to wonder if maybe Sir Gallahan had some stuff after all.

When we grabbed the ball — or Gallahan grabbed it — old Mike raised hell with the offensive backfield, and sent us trotting down the field to kick off again.

Gavis took it, flipped it back to Toroki, and they formed fast. I was angling over and didn’t quite step clear of a good block. As I scrambled up, I saw Gallahan go in hard, and get bounced on his can while Toroki stepped around him. Silberson finally knifed through and nailed Toroki on the forty.

When the P.A. system said, “Single wing for a while,” I wondered if maybe old Mike Kaydee had the same ideas that I knew Shelevat had.

Blair was calling them — no instructions from Mike. Old Mike likes to develop smart quarters. You never can tell when you might need one. Look what quarterbacking did for Columbia in the ’47 season.

They swept around left end, and the play piled up after six yards, with Sir Gallahan on the bottom. The next time they smashed through the other side of the line from me, and I called it in time to swing out and come down on it from the side. Both Gallahan and I dumped the ball carrier.

Gallahan bounced up like a rubber ball. He had a wide grin on his face. “This is the way we did it at Yohannus!” he said. “This is football!”

“Don’t take it so serious, kid,” Big Hunk said mildly. “This is practice. Remember?”

Sir Gallahan gave him that blue-eyed look, but he wasn’t smiling. “I like to take it serious,” he said flatly. “To me it’s important. I’m going to earn myself a berth in the top backfield you got at Karr.”

It’s the sort of a thing you might think, but you don’t say it. Not in front of a lot of guys who get some of the bread and butter from the top-team slots.

Then it began to get really rugged. For Gallahan.

Shelevat mumbled to Blair and the next powerhouse play bounced off the left side of our line. Then Toroki ran wide and flipped a lateral outside to Shelevat, and Gallahan rolled onto his feet after a vicious block and yelled as he cracked into Shelevat.

Sir Gallahan got up, and Shelevat didn’t.

Johnny Jerome came out and the P.A. system told us to take it twice around the field and into the showers.

Gallahan was dressing ten feet down the bench from me when Sid Raegen strolled in. Raegen is the black and bitter type.

“Nice going, kid,” he said to Gallahan, his voice loaded with contempt.

Sir Gallahan looked up quickly, his pleased smile slowly fading as he saw the expression on Raegen’s face.

Raegen said, “We keep a fast, smart club here, kid. We save the old school try for the schedule. Maybe Shelevat will be okay for the first game. Maybe not. So you’ve helped us a hell of a lot. Skimmer is worth nine of you.”

Gallahan stood up. The blue eyes suddenly were narrow, dangerous. “If the coach wanted us to play pattycake, Mr. Raegen, he would have said so. I didn’t hit Shelevat any harder than I was hit.”

“You’re a smart little backwoods punk, Gallahan. I don’t like your face.”

Gallahan moved toward Raegen like a cat. He flowed along. It was a sort of movement that didn’t go with his build, and with that wide-open face. But as be got close, his balled fists slowly dropped and the fury left his face. It was then that Raegen hit him.

I remembered catching a sledge hammer in my middle and waited for the counterpunch. It didn’t Gallahan stood there, the blood trickling down his chin, looking almost sleepy. “I might have known it,” Raegen said, almost to himself. He turned on his heel and walked away.

Gallahan smeared the blood with the back of his hand, gave me a broken grin and said, “He might have been right about Shelevat. If I’d hit him, Ed, I might have broken his jaw.”

“That excuse is as good as any, kid,” I said. I finished lacing my shoes and left him there.

After that, Gallahan was no longer the butt of the rough gags. They left him alone. Even Big Hunk treated him with mild contempt. The boys had him cased. A showoff, an ambitious guy, and saffron in the clutch.

I guess I was the only one in the group that was a little uncertain about the correctness of that analysis. In some subtle way, the kid bothered me. I didn’t have much to say to him, and he stopped trying to make conversation when we were in the room.

He didn’t read or anything. Just stretched out on the bed with his hands locked behind his bead and stared at the ceiling.

Old Mike didn’t run many more scrimmages, and had us work hard on fundamentals. We were weak in the downfield blocking assignments, and the defensive backfield was slow in covering potential receivers.

But Gallahan did get in on one more session. He got in at Raegen’s spot, as before. Twice he ran Toroki out of bounds when he could have saved four or five yards with a clean tackle. That just gave the boys more evidence.

I noticed a few funny little things about Sir Gallahan. Whenever he was alone in the room, the door stood open. Once I shut it with him in there. I stopped in the hall and waited. In a matter of seconds the door swung open and I beard the springs creak as he got back on the bed.

By the consent of all, he was brushed off, left out of the horseplay.

Once, out of a clear sky, he said to me, “Ed, I just started wrong, I guess.”

“Started what wrong?”

“They’ve got me wrong, Ed.”

I didn’t answer him. We were beginning to shape up, and I knew that the sessions back at the school would put us in top shape. The skull sessions began to get rough with the plays that old Mike had dreamed up during the summer. We spent the last day walking through them, with old Mike correcting the positions over the P.A.

I wondered how much old Mike knew about the Gallahan situation. I guessed that he knew all there was to know — somehow Mike Kaydee even learns what you’re thinking.

Mike was putting everybody in there on the walking plays, and late in the afternoon, Gallahan came in. It was one of Mike’s inventions. We call signals on defence, of course, and the defensive team was trying to outguess the offensive team, with the rules that no man could move faster than a walk. A slow motion form of touch football, but damn good for familiarizing yourself with the fast-breaking plays.

Toroki was over by the truck, chatting with Mike. Then he came in. A power sweep around the left end was called, and Jak had called a defensive shift to the left. Toroki had a blocking assignment. As they walked it around, and as Gallahan came to meet the play, Toroki put his big hand in the middle of Gallahan’s face and shoved. Gallahan went down onto his back and got up, looking surprised.

Nick Toroki is six-two, two hundred and five, fast, hard and smart. With a lazy grin on his face, he pushed Gallahan down again. We all looked toward the truck. By all rights, Mike should have been yelling our ears off, and should have ripped Nick apart at the seams. Mike doesn’t allow that sort of stuff.

The P.A. speaker bawled, “What’s the matter, Yohannus? Yellow?”

Gallahan looked toward the truck in a stupefied manner. He began to grin. It wasn’t a pretty grin. And he suddenly looked a foot taller.

He was giving away over thirty pounds, plus a hell of a lot of height and reach. It was hopeless from the beginning, because a good big man can always lick the good little man. We had drifted into a loose circle around them. Gallahan went in like a man chopping wood with a hatchet in both hands. The fury of it drove Toroki back. We weren’t padded because we were just walking through the plays.

Toroki, after he got over the initial surprise, acted like it was a joke. He tried to clown it a little, and Gallahan caught him with a right and a left that dropped him. Toroki came up, fast and mad, and Gallahan ran into a jolting right that knocked him back.

There was no sound except the splat of fists on flesh, the sobbing grunts of Gallahan. There was something incredibly persistent about the little guy. Toroki knocked him down a half dozen times, and each time Gallahan came back like a rubber ball. His face was beginning to lose shape, but his eyes were like blue fire. Every once in a while he scored on Nick, and I could see that Nick was beginning to worry. Gallahan wouldn’t stay down. It was like hitting a rubber ball with a hammer.

Then Gallahan began to get up a little slower each time, but each time he came in as though he were going to kill Nick with his fists. I glanced around at the wide eyes and open mouths.

Suddenly, as though some signal had been passed, three of us grabbed Gallahan. Nick stood to one side, breathing hard, fingering a lump on his jaw. He grinned in a shamefaced fashion and said, “You can’t lick the guy!”

Gallahan sobbed as he tried to twist away from us and get back at Nick. Finally he relaxed. His chest heaving, he looked around and said in a low tone, almost a whisper, “Now give me a shot at Raegen!”

Raegen was ten feet away. He wore a startled expression. Suddenly Gallahan ripped loose from us, stumbled and fell. He wavered when he got up and blinked to focus his eyes. Then he began to move toward Raegen. Sid licked his lips, and began to back away.

Gallahan stopped, swayed, and fell heavily onto his face. We let out a long, pent-up sigh.

Mike’s amplified voice said, “Carry him in. Twice around the field, the rest of you.”

But they only carried Gallahan about fifteen feet. He sat up, rolled off the stretcher and, in a blundering run, caught up with the rest of us, took his two circuits of the field and came in with us.

He was standing in the shower when I heard Blair yell across to Gestrey, “Say, Al, where the hell is Yohannus?”

There was a roar of laughter and I knew that Sir Gallahan was part of the group more than he had ever been before. But I still didn’t have all the answers. I did notice that the boys were being very polite and formal with Sid Raegen.

I knew Raegen wouldn’t let that pass.

There was about an hour between showers and the evening meal. By the time I got to the room, Sir Gallahan was already there. He gave me a crooked grin. One eye was nearly closed and his face was as lumpy as a bag of apples.

“I had you wrong, kid,” I said.

“Thanks, Ed.”

At that moment Nick Toroki came in. He walked over to Gallahan and stuck out his hand. “You licked me, kid. If they hadn’t grabbed you, I wouldn’t have been able to lift a hand when you came in again.”

They shook hands and Gallahan said, “Don’t make me laugh. It hurts my face.”

Shelevat came in a few moments later and said, “Glad Yohannus isn’t on our schedule kid. Sounds like a rough league.”

We sat on the beds and talked about the team chances, and I could see that Sir Gallahan was practically bursting with pride at being considered one of the group.

When a break came in the talk, he said, “You know, I had the wrong angle. I guess I — maybe I was too anxious to get a good slot on the squad.”

“Hell, everybody’s anxious,” Nick said.

“I can’t figure why Mike let you two scrap like that,” I said. Nick gave me an odd look.

Just then Raegen came in. I took one look at his face and knew that there was trouble in the air.

He had a mean and gloating look about him.

“Hi, guys. Say, I’ve just been over in the main house looking up some information.”

Nobody answered him. He flushed a little and said, “Yeah, I was looking up schools and colleges in the almanac. Funny thing, there’s no such a place as Yohannus College. How about that, Gallahan?”

I looked at the kid. His face was crimson, and he was staring down at his clasped hands.

Shelevat looked puzzled. “What’s the pitch, kid?” he asked.

“Shut up!” Toroki snapped.

Sir Gallahan looked quickly at Toroki. “You know?” he asked quietly, turning to Raegen.

“Know what?” Raegen asked. He continued, “You know what I think, guys? I think Gallahan is a phoney. He’s too young to have come out of an industrial league. And he didn’t transfer from a college. There’s only one other place where they play ball like he plays. A prison team.”

When Gallahan looked up, his face was changed. It was a bitter face. And somehow he looked shrunken.

“Okay,” he said wearily. “There’s always a smart guy. I got my school credits on the inside. I got drunk when I was fifteen and woke up in the middle of a gas station hoist that didn’t come off and I drew five. Served four, and got first year college credits on the inside. I wanted to come here, and the guy backing me rigged up the story. So it didn’t work. I was to be Brighteyes from Yohannus. So the hell with it.”

He stood up. “The dean knows about it. Kaydee knows about it. Now you guys know about it. So I guess it won’t work. I might steal your pants while you take showers.” He pushed by Raegen, went to the door. He turned and said, “I’ve got a pro offer. Read about me in the papers.”

The door slammed. Raegen turned toward the door, but Toroki was quicker. Nick spun Raegen around and shoved him back against the wall.

“Have you shot off your mouth about this, Sid?”

Raegen grinned. “Not yet. Good thing I dug it out of him, hey? I don’t want any jailbirds on the squad.”

“What you want, Sid, and what we want, may be a couple of entirely different things.”

“What the hell do you mean?” Sid blustered.

“Just this!” Nick shoved a big fist in his face. “If you ever pop off, Sid, I’ll break you in half. And I’m not kidding about that.”

Nick turned and looked at me and at Shelevat. “That goes for you two guys too.”

“Hell,” Skimmer said. “I’ll help you work out on Sid.”

“And when you two guys are tired of beating on him,” I said, “I’ll work him over a little.”

Raegen licked his lips and looked at each one of us in turn. “You guys are nuts!” he said hoarsely.

“Crazy as bedbugs,” Nick said. “What’s your decision, Mr. Raegen?”

“I... I’ll keep still.”

Nick let him go. The three of us raced down and piled into Skimmer’s car and roared out the main gate and headed toward town.

Gallahan was trudging along just beyond the crest of the first hill. He heard the car, turned and thumbed a ride.

But when he saw who it was, he picked up his bag again and walked on. Shelevat drove ahead, and then he stopped and we got out.

Gallahan’s face was a stubborn mask. His mouth was set in a tight line. “What the hell do you want?”

Nick Toroki grinned. “A little exercise, kid. You want to leave. We don’t want you to leave. So here’s your chance to lick me.”

Sir Gallahan stood and looked at us. Slowly the hard, bitter look dissolved and once more it was the face I had seen when I had first checked in at my assigned room. He looked like an uncertain, but enthusiastic, kid.

“You guys are kidding,” he said, and his voice was uncertain.

Skimmer grinned. “Sure we are. We are smart boys and we take care of ourselves. We’ve got rugged teams on the schedule. Nick and I are in the offensive backfield. If you walk out on us, we lose a good chance to soften up the opposition. So come on, Gallahan, get in and we’ll go back.”

He had a wide grin on his face as we drove back through the big gates and up to the house.

They went inside and I stood by the car for a few moments. Mike Kaydee was strolling around the grounds. He came over. He grinned at me.

“Ed,” he said, “it looks like some of the boys might have managed to learn something.”

I looked him in the eye. “Learned something? I don’t know what you’re talking about. All I learned today was that Nick Toroki messed with a buzz saw.”

He sighed. “Nick’s a good boy. I had a hell of a job talking him into it.”

“The squad looks good,” I said.

“Could be, Ed. Could be.” His eyes were keen. “Maybe we’ll play the brand of ball they do at Yohannus.”

He walked off. I laughed to myself and went in to dinner.

Content

John D. MacDonald
Runaway Cleats