At supper Westby did not look at Irving. One of the boys, Blake, made a comment; he said,—
“That was a mighty good race you ran, Westby; hard luck you were handicapped.”
“You can call it hard luck if you want,” said Westby.
“How did it happen, anyway?” Blake asked, quite innocently.
“Oh, don’t ask me,” said Westby.
Three or four of the boys who did know glanced slyly at Irving, and Irving, though he had meant to say nothing, spoke up; there was electricity in the air.
“Westby was unfortunate enough to foul Flack at the start; that was all there was to it,” he said. “I saw it and set him back a yard. I was under the impression that in case of foul a penalty had to be imposed—and I made the penalty as light as possible.”
He felt that this statement ought to appease any reasonable boy. But Westby was not in a reasonable mood. He paid no attention to Irving; he addressed the table.
“I told Scarborough he might have known things would be botched somehow.”
“Why?” asked Blake.