The Girls of Central High on Track and Field Part 13

Eve went to town that afternoon, for she was due for practice at the athletic field, full of this adventure. The strange girl had not said a word about herself save that she had been traveling through the marsh early that morning and had mistaken the path.

Eve had told her mother her suspicions as to who the girl was, and it was plain that the young Gypsy would be unfit for travel for some days.

The Sitzes would try to find out something about her condition and why she was striving to escape from her companions.

"But, it's plain why she left town so hurriedly," declared Jess Morse, one of those to whom Eve told her story. "I've seen those Gypsy women in town myself this week. I saw the queen--Grace Varey, did you say her name is?"

"That's the name she gave us last year," said Eve.

"Well, I saw her only this morning. The Gypsies have come to town to search for that girl. She knows it and was escaping into the country when she got into that swamp. My! It was lucky you rode that way, Eve."

But it was Bobby Hargrew who showed the most interest in the affairs of the mysterious Gypsy girl. She asked Eve a hundred questions about her and finally admitted that she had reasons for wishing to know all about her that she did not feel free to divulge.

"I tell you honestly, Eve, I wish you'd let me go home with you so that I can see that girl before Monday morning," said Bobby, bluntly.

"Well, why not?" returned the farm girl, laughing. "You'd be welcome, Clara."

"I'll telephone father at the store and run home and pack a bag and meet you at the station," announced Bobby, greatly excited.

"Why, we'll be more than pleased," urged Eve. "I'd like to know what the matter is with that girl, too. If you find out, will you tell me?" and she laughed again.

"If it's only _my_ secret I'll tell you in a minute," promised Bobby.

But in her heart she believed that it would prove to be partly Miss Carrington's secret, and she could not speak of _her_ affairs, that was sure.

CHAPTER XII--THE RACES

Bobby, as she said, "fished" for this invitation and got it while the girls were dressing in the gym. building, before the try-out work on the field that Sat.u.r.day afternoon. Eve went to her broad jump, while Bobby lined up with a lot of the would-be sprinters from all four cla.s.ses, to try their speed from the fifty-yard dash up to the quarter-mile.

Only the very best of the candidates were allowed to try the longer races, and they had all to go to Dr. Agnew's office first. The doctor spent the most of every Sat.u.r.day afternoon at the gym. building, and he doled out good advice to the girls while he prodded them, and listened to their heart and lung action, and otherwise discovered if they were "fit."

Laura had been delegated by Mrs. Case to watch the sprinters, and most of them were quickly sent to the courts to play tennis, or basketball, or some other game, and the cinder track was soon devoted to those only who were earnestly endeavoring to develop their speed as runners--and who had some small chance, at least, to make a good record.

Bobby tried the first short dash, and then the third. There was some crowding on the track and she could not do her best--nor did she wish to. As long as she made a good enough showing to be advised to wait for the finals, she was content, and so was Laura.

"Hold yourself in," advised Mother Wit, smiling on her. "If you spend your best wind trying to beat these others at first you'll be lost when it comes to the quarter-mile, and be retired."

So Bobby bided her time until the quarter-mile was called. There were but six contestants. It was the longest trial of speed that Mrs. Case would allow on the track. The Girls' Branch Athletic League gave but a doubtful approval, at most, to the quarter-mile trial.

The six were "set" on the line and Laura, watch in hand, waited for the arrow to touch the mark, her hand raised.

"Go!" she shouted, and the girls sprang away, each doing her very best from the start. For the quarter-mile run leaves little s.p.a.ce for jockeying. It is soon over, and the contestant who gets off ahead is quite frequently the winner.

The six girls were not so unevenly matched; and they started well on a line. For the first few yards they kept together.

But then the pace began to tell. For fifty yards, say, they were matched to a degree; then it was plain that only two of them had the "sand" to keep up that killing pace for long.

Bobby and one other forged ahead. Breast to breast, their arms working in unison, their stride equal, the two girls pa.s.sed ahead of the others and shot along the track with unabated swiftness.

The girls behind were panting, and falling back. One wavered and dropped out entirely when she had run but a furlong. The others clung to the track, however, doing their very best to record a fair time, at least.

They had learned under Mrs. Case to play the game out, no matter how badly they seemed to be beaten.

Bobby and the girl with her felt the strain growing, however. Unless the runner is experienced, the dogged perseverance of a close opponent is likely to rattle one at the last moment. As the two came down the stretch and the watching girls began to cheer and "root" for their favorite contestant, the runners felt their nerve going.

A misstep now would cause the loss of the race to one, or to the other.

Bobby tried not to see the girls along the track, or to think of the one pounding away beside her.

She was breathing with comparative ease herself; but the sound of the other girl's breathing pumped in her ears, louder and louder! And how loudly her footbeats were, too!

Could she only get away from those sounds--leave them behind her--clear the rushing air about her of those noises!

There was the line stretched across the track. She knew it was there because Laura stood with it in her hand. If she could only breast that ribbon first!

Somewhere--it seemed to be a cry from the air right over her head--a shrill voice kept repeating:

"Come on! Come on, Bobs!"

And Bobby called up that reserve strength that Mrs. Case had talked so much about in her little lectures to the girls, and sprang ahead of her rival. She was unconscious of the fact that she was ahead. It seemed to her that the other girl was still clinging to her. She could hear the footsteps and the heavy breathing.

But suddenly she was aware that it was her own feet spurning the cinders that she heard--and her own breathing. She was winning!

And then the tape snapped across her chest and Jess and Eve Sitz, who had run over to watch the finish of the race, caught her in their arms.

"Splendid! Bully for you, Bobs!" cried Jess. "Why, there isn't any other quarter-mile runner in Central High. You take the palm!"

And not until then did Bob understand that the girl she thought she had run so closely was a hallucination. The second runner was yards behind her at the finish!

They bore Bobby into the gym. building and Mrs. Case insisted upon Dr.

Agnew's seeing her again almost immediately. The physician was still in the building, and he came when called. The physical instructor was examining the time card Laura and her a.s.sistants had made out. She would not divulge their time to the runners, and the time keepers were sworn to secrecy; but everybody knew that Bobby Hargrew had made a good showing.

"There's nothing the matter with that little girl," said the doctor, confidently. "Only, these sudden strains are not valuable. Yes, once, by the way, is all right. As long as one does not go beyond that reserve strength that your instructor harps upon," and he laughed.

Bobby was naturally proud over her achievement, for she knew that she had run a very fast quarter. She was only sorry that she could not know herself just how fast she was. But that was a secret Mrs. Case kept from her.

"The worst possible thing for a runner in training to know is how fast, or how slow, he is," she often declared, "Do your best each time; that is your business."

So Bobby got into her street clothes and, having telephoned to her father as she had promised Eve Sitz, she ran home to pack her bag. On the way she pa.s.sed by the house where Miss Carrington boarded. Gee Gee had two rooms in a wing of the old Boyce house, in which the Widow Boyce kept lodgers. Her front room had long, French windows which swung outward like doors upon the porch. And as Bobby ran by she saw a man come down from this porch, as though he had been listening at the windows, and hurry around the corner of the house and behind the thick hedge of the kitchen garden.

"That was the Gypsy--Jim Varey," Bobby thought, hesitating before the house. "What is he haunting Gee Gee for? Ought she to know that he is hanging around?"

But the girl hesitated about going in and speaking to the teacher. Gee Gee, she considered, was really her arch-enemy. Why should she try to shield her from any trouble? And, too, Miss Carrington might not thank her for interfering in her private affairs.

So Bobby ran on home and told Mrs. Ballister where she was going, huddled a few things into her bag, kissed "the kids," as she termed her sisters, and ran off for the station, there to meet Eve for the 5:14 train to Keyport.

And while she waited who should appear but that black-faced man with the gold hoops in his ears--Jim Varey!

The Gypsy saw her--Bobby knew he did. But he paid her no attention, slinking into the men's room and not appearing again until Eve arrived and the two girls went aboard the train. Then Bobby saw him once more.