Reddy was just secretly congratulating himself upon his breach of etiquette when the shrill whistle of the referee brought dismay to his heart.  His act was declared a foul, and the Palatines were given a “free throw.”  Their left-forward was allowed to take his stand fifteen feet from the basket and have an unobstructed try at it.  The throw was successful, and the score now stood 6 to 5 in favor of Kingston.

The game went rapidly on, and at one stage the ball was declared “held” by the referee, and it was faced off well toward the Palatine goal.  Sawed-Off made a particularly high leap in the air and an unusually fierce whack at the ball.

To his chagrin, it went up into the gallery and struck the girl to whom the Twins were so devoted, smack upon her pretty snub nose.  Though the blow was hard enough to bring tears to her bright eyes, she smiled, and with a laugh and a blush picked up the ball and dropped it over the rail.

The Twins both made a dash to receive this gift from her pretty hands, and in consequence bumped into each other and fell apart.

The ball which they had robbed each other of fell into the clutch of Pretty, who made the girl a graceful bow that quite won her heart.  Pretty was, by the way, always cutting the other fellows out.  This was the only grudge they ever had against him.

The Twins were now more rattled than ever; and Heady determined to do or die.  He saw one of the Palatines running forward and looking backward to receive the ball on a long pass, and he gave him a vicious body-check.  He knew it was a foul at the time, but he thought the referee was not looking.  His punishment was fittingly double, for not only did the referee see and declare the foul, but the big Palatine came with such impetus that he knocked Heady galley-west.  Heady went scraping along a row of single sticks and wooden dumb-bells, making a noise like the rattle of a board along a picket fence.

Then he tumbled in a heap, with the Palatine man on top of him.  As the Palatine man got up, he dislodged a number of Indian clubs, which fairly pelted the prostrate Heady.  This foul gave the Palatines another free throw, and made the score a tie.

XIII

The Twins were now so angry and ashamed of themselves that they played worse than ever.

Everything seemed to go wrong with them.  Their passes were blocked; their tries for goal failed; the Palatines would not even help them out with a foul.  In their general disorder of plan, they could do nothing to prevent the Palatines from making goal after goal till, when the referee’s whistle announced that the first twenty-minute half was over, the score stood 12 to 6 against Kingston.

The Twins were feeling sore enough as it was, but when they went to the dressing-room dripping with sweat and gasping for breath from their hard exertions, Tug appeared to rub salt into their wounds by a little lecture upon their shortcomings and fargoings.