“Oh, it always does. Besides, if the lake weren’t so rough, we would go in,—the lake water is always cold anyhow. We have to have a few storms once in a while. But it is fine and sunshiny today. Let’s take a run out to the athletic field.”
“All right. There are Pauline and Hilary, Isabel. I wonder if they would not like to come, too. We can practice for our fifty-yard dash.”
Lilian beckoned to Pauline and Hilary, who joined the girls presently, and the group walked to the athletic field. This was back of the gymnasium and separated by a fence from the pastures where grazed the riding horses. There were very few interscholastic events and games, but the trustees had provided enough seats under a canopy to accommodate about five hundred spectators. The tennis courts stretched beyond.
“Do you suppose that we shall be able to remain friends after the contests?” asked Isabel. “There is the collegiate field meet, in which seniors and juniors will be pitted against each other in a desperate battle. Then there are the canoe races in which the non-beatable juniors meet the unsurpassable seniors. What will happen then, who can foretell?”
The girls laughed, and Lilian said, “I was needing some new words for a poem on our athletics for the Star. ‘Non-beatable’ and ‘unsurpassable’ are good, though I am not sure how they will fit into the meter.”
“There is one thing, Isabel,” said Hilary, “which may soothe the disappointment of either side; the future success of the Whittiers, when you and Virgie win honors for us all in the inter-society debate. All our crowd are Whittiers, you know.”
“It is a great responsibility,” said Isabel, gravely shaking her head. “Absolute split in the Psyche Club unless the Whittier Society wins in debate!”
“Come on, girls,” said Hilary. “I’ll beat the bunch in a dash to the fence where the horses are looking over at us. The first one who touches it wins.”
“I accept the challenge,” said Isabel. “Line up, girls. On your mark. Get set. Go!”
The five girls scampered like mad. Five gym suits, five pairs of gym shoes on flying figures crossed the field. Cathalina gave it up when she was two-thirds of the way across and sat down in the grass to laugh. Prince, Poky and Lady Gay, were looking over the fence and had hoped for lumps of sugar, threw up their heads, snorted, and with cavortings and kicking of heels, fled, galloping over the pasture.