Without more ado, the boys struck out bravely, determined to overtake the girls in the shortest time possible. They found it was not so easy, however, as might have been anticipated. The girls had had a big advantage and were still swimming strongly. Will and Roy began to agree with Frank that they had given them too long a handicap.
On the other hand, the girls were not so confident. The strain was beginning to tell even upon their tried young muscles. Their breath was becoming labored and the goal seemed terribly far away.
Mollie and Betty had fallen a short distance behind the other two. They had felt the tax the speed was making on their strength, and had decided wisely to save the rest of it until it was more needed then at the present.
Naturally Amy and Grace thought their friends were giving up and marveled at it. How on earth could they have lost out so soon? Had they been more versed in races they could have answered that question themselves.
Meanwhile the boys, pulling hard, had managed to make up half the distance between them and the girls, and in sight of Betty's and Mollie's evident weariness their hopes soared high. Why, with these last two out of the running the race was as good as won.
On, on they came, hand over hand, stroke following stroke, rhythmic and strong and confident.
Betty looked at Mollie and Mollie looked at Betty, and each knew she had discovered the other's secret and at the same time recognized a rival.
Amy had come to the limit of her strength with the goal an eighth of a mile away. She knew that for her the race was over. The waters pushed her back, forced her back, seeming like some pitiless enemy bent upon her downfall.
And what of Grace? She would not acknowledge to herself that her strength was leaving her—why, she had swum as far as that many a time before—it was absurd that she should give up now. Besides, she was leading them all. With this thought she put the remainder of her waning strength into a few last desperate strokes.
Meanwhile, the boys had caught up with Mollie, and seeing this she quickened her stroke, forging ahead again. But Betty kept the same calm, steady stroke which had so deceived the boys—and the girls, too, for that matter, with the exception of Mollie.