“Much obliged! Now watch us.”
Merry and Clancy had to go farther in getting around the Point than Bleeker and Hotch, for they were forced farther away from the cliff. Inasmuch as the gulch curved at the Point, the rival canoe was offered an advantage, similar to that which comes to a pole horse on the oval of a race track. When once more on a straightaway, Bleeker and Hotch were leading by a full canoe length.
The boys on the bank had not been able to get around the Point, so some of them, including Ballard, crossed to the opposite shore in the other canoes.
“What’s the trouble with you chumps?” shouted Ballard. “Don’t you know the other boat’s ahead? Buckle in—paddle like you used to. Do better than that, Red, or I’ll swim out there and take your place.”
“You got ’em, Bleek!” cried the Gold Hillers frantically. “Keep a-coming!”
“Here’s where the chip off the old block gets a setback! I reckon Merry’s dad was better with a baseball than he was with a paddle!”
In the excitement of the moment some ill-considered words were roared across the water. This remark, by a Gold Hill partisan, was probably excusable, in the circumstances, but it struck a spark from Merry’s temper.
It opened up the old, tantalizing question of heredity—the very thing which Merriwell had called a “handicap.” His father could pitch better than he could paddle, could he? If that was the case, then by winning that contest he might prove that what he had learned about canoes had come to him in his own right.
“Good old Merry!” cried one of the Gold Hill crowd, by way of tempering the unwise rooting of his camp-mate. “You’re the stuff! Never say die is your slogan—and that’s all that came down to you from the champion in Bloomfield.”
A thrill raced along Frank’s nerves. At the risk of giving the competitors a still longer lead, he looked shoreward to locate the chap who had called those electrifying words.