THE SKATING RACE
There were nearly thirty girls who lined up for the second heat. Many who had tried the first time dropped out, having been distanced so greatly by the leaders.
"But that is no way to do!" laughed Agnes, ignoring Trix Severn and her gibes. "It is anybody's race yet. One never knows what may happen in a free-for-all like this. Trix, or Eva, or I, may turn an ankle——"
"Or break another strap," broke in Eva, laughing openly at Trix.
"Just you wait!" muttered Trix Severn, in a temper.
Now, giving way to one's temper never helps in a contest of strength or skill. Agnes herself was trying to prove that axiom; but Trix had never tried to restrain herself.
Ere this Miss Shipman had changed Agnes' seat in the class-room, seeing plainly that Trix continued her annoying actions; Agnes had striven to be patient because she loved Miss Shipman and did not want to make trouble in her grade.
Agnes took her place now as far from Trix as she could get. Ruth, and another of the older girls were at the line, and one of the high school boys who owned a stop-watch timed the race.
"Ready!" he shouted. "Set!"
The race was from a dead start. The girls bent forward, their left feet upon the mark.
"Go!" shouted the starter.
The smoothest stretch of ice was right down the center of the Parade. It was still so cold that none of the trees had begun to drip. Some employees of the town Highway Department were trying to knock the ice off the trees, so as to save the overweighted branches.
But thus far these workmen had kept away from the impromptu race-course. Down the middle of the park the girls glided toward the clump of spruce trees, around which they must skate before returning.
Trix, Eva, Myra, Pearl Harrod and Lucy Poole all shot ahead at the start. Agnes "got off on the wrong foot," as the saying is, and found herself outdistanced at first.
But she was soon all right. She had a splendid stroke for a girl, and she possessed pluck and endurance.
She crept steadily up on the leading contestants, passing Eva, Myra, and Lucy before half the length of the Parade Ground was behind them.
Trix was in the lead and Pearl Harrod was fighting her for first place.
Agnes kept to one side and just before the trio reached the spruce clump at Willow Street, she shot in, rounded the clump alone, and started up the course like the wind upon the return trip!
Trix fairly screamed after her, she was so vexed. Trix, too, had endurance. She left Pearl behind and skated hard after Agnes Kenway.
She never would have caught her, however, had it not been for an odd accident that happened to the Corner House girl.
As Agnes shot up the course, one of the workmen came with a long pole with a hook on the end of it, and began to shake the bent branches of a tree near the skating course. Off rattled a lot of ice, falling to the hard surface below and breaking into thousands of small bits.
Agnes was in the midst of this rubbish before she knew it. One skate-runner got entangled in some pieces and down she went—first to her knees and then full length upon her face!
Some of the other girls shrieked with laughter. But it might have been a serious accident, Agnes was skating so fast.
Trix saved her breath to taunt her rival later, and, skating around the bits of ice, won the heat before Agnes, much shaken and bruised, had climbed to her feet.
"Oh, Aggie! you're not really hurt, are you?" cried Ruth, hurrying to her sister.
"My goodness! I don't know," gasped Agnes. "I saw stars."
"You have a bump on your forehead," said one girl.
"I feel as though I had them all over me," groaned Agnes.
"I know that will turn black and blue," said Lucy, pointing to the lump on Agnes' forehead.
"And yellow and green, too," admitted Agnes. Then she giggled and added in a whisper to Ruth: "It will be as brilliant as Neale's hair was when he dyed it!"
"Well, you showed us what you could do in the first heat, Aggie," said Pearl, cheerfully. "I believe that you can easily beat Trix."
"Oh, yes!" snarled the latter girl, who over-heard this. "A poor excuse for not racing is better than none."
"Well! I declare, Trix, if you'd fallen down," began Eva; but Agnes interrupted:
"I haven't said I wasn't going to skate the third heat."
"Oh! you can't, Aggie," Ruth said.
"I'd skate it if I'd broken both legs and all my promises!" declared Agnes, sharply. "That girl isn't going to put it all over me without a fight!"
"Great!" cried Eva. "Show her."
"I admire your pluck, but not your language, Aggie," said her older sister. "And if you can show her——"
Agnes did show them all. She had been badly shaken up by her fall, and her head began to throb painfully, but the color had come back into her cheeks and she took her place in the line of contestants again with a bigger determination than ever to win.
She got off on the right foot this time! Only eighteen girls started and all of them were grimly determined to do their best.
The boys had left off their hockey games and crowded along the starting line and the upper end of the track, to watch the girls race. People had come out from their houses to get a closer view of the excitement, and some of the teachers—including Mr. Marks and the physical instructors—were in the crowd. The boys began to root for their favorites, and Agnes heard Neale leading the cheers for her.
Trix Severn was not much of a favorite with the boys; she wasn't "a good sport." But the second Kenway girl had showed herself to be good fun right from the start.
"Got it, Agnes! Hurrah for the Corner House girl!" shrieked one youngster who belonged in the sixth grade, grammar.
"Eva Larry for mine," declared another. "She's some little skater, and don't you forget it."
Some of the boys started down the track after the flying contestants, but Ruth darted after them and begged them to keep out of the way so as not to confuse the racers when they should come back up the Parade Ground.
Meanwhile Agnes was taking no chances of being left behind this time. She had gotten off right and was in the lead within the first few yards. Putting forth all her strength at first, she easily distanced most of the eighteen. It was, after all, a short race, and she knew that she must win it "under the whip," if at all.
Her fall would soon stiffen and lame her; Agnes knew that very well. Ordinarily she would have given in to the pain she felt and owned that she had been hurt. But Trix's taunts were hard to bear—harder than the pain in her knee and in her head.
Once she glanced over her shoulder and saw Trix right behind—the nearest girl to her in the race. The glance inspired her to put on more steam. She managed to lead the crowd to the foot of the Parade.
She turned the clump of spruce trees on the "long roll" and found a dozen girls right at her heels as she faced up the Parade again. Trix was in the midst of them.
There was some confusion, but Agnes kept out of it. She had her wits very much about her, too; and she saw that Trix cut the spruce clump altogether—turning just before reaching the place, and so saving many yards.
In the excitement none of the other racers, save Agnes, noticed this trick. "Cheat!" thought Agnes. But the very fact that her enemy was dishonest made Agnes the more determined to beat her.
Agnes' breath was growing short, however; how her head throbbed! And her right knee felt as though the skin was all abrased and the cap fairly cracked. Of course, she knew this last could not be true, or she would not be skating at all; but she was in more pain than she had ever suffered in her life before without "giving in" to it.
She gritted her teeth and held grimly to her course. Trix suddenly pulled up even with her. Agnes knew the girl never would have done so had she not cheated at the bottom of the course.
"I'll win without playing baby, or I won't win at all!" the Corner House girl promised herself. "If she can win after cheating, let her!"
And it looked at the moment as though Trix had the better chance. She drew ahead and was evidently putting forth all her strength to keep the lead.
Right ahead was the spot where the broken ice covered the course. Agnes bore well away from it; Trix swept out, too, and almost collided with her antagonist.
"Look where you're going! Don't you dare foul me!" screamed the Severn girl at Agnes.
That flash of rage cost Trix something. Agnes made no reply—not even when Trix flung back another taunt, believing that the race was already won.
But it was not. "I will! I will!" thought Agnes, and she stooped lower and shot up the course passing Trix not three yards from the line, and winning by only an arm's length.
"I beat her! I beat her!" cried Trix, blinded with tears, and almost falling to the ice. "Don't you dare say I didn't."
"It doesn't take much courage to say that, Beatrice," said Miss Shipman, right at her elbow. "We all saw the race. It was fairly won by Agnes."
"It wasn't either! She's a cheat!" gasped the enraged girl, without realizing that she was speaking to her teacher instead of to another girl.
This was almost too much for Agnes' self-possession. She was in pain and almost hysterical herself. She darted forward and demanded:
"Where did I cheat, Miss? You can't say I didn't skate around the spruce clump down there."
"That's right, Aggie," said the high school girl who had been on watch with Ruth. "I saw Trix cut that clump, and if she'd gotten in first, she'd have lost on that foul."
"That's a story!" exclaimed Trix; but she turned pale.
"Say no more about it, girls. The race is won by Agnes—and won honestly," Miss Georgiana said.
But Trix Severn considered she had been very ill-used by Agnes. She buried that bone and carefully marked the spot where it lay.