“They’re out there somewhere. Thatcher says we’re going to get it put all over us,” said Allan.
“Thatcher’s an old raven,” said Harris, as they crowded out to where they could watch the race. “If he runs as well as he croaks, we’re all right.”
Harvard secured the race with University of Pennsylvania, and though the result was not long in doubt, yet the crimson-clad runners were forced to better the record by three-fifths of a second. Then the clerk’s voice was heard at the dressing-room door:
“All out for Erskine-Robinson Team Race! All out!”
Of Erskine’s relay team, only Thatcher, the captain, was an experienced runner. The others—Poor, Gibbons, and Tolmann—had earned the right to represent the college at the trials, but for all of that were unknown quantities. They were all of them, Thatcher included, small men; Poor was little over five feet in height, and looked as though he had never had enough to eat. As they trotted around the track, getting warmed up, Robinson’s candidates overtopped them to a man. It was a big, long-limbed quartet that Robinson had sent, and had the result depended on height and length of leg alone the Brown would have had the race won at the start.
Allan had secured a place near the front of the throng at the dressing-room door, and beside him, noticeable because of the evening clothes which he wore, was one of the officials, an inspector whose name was down on the program as “Horace L. Pearson, N. Y. A. C.” It was while the two teams were still warming up that Allan heard his name spoken, and turned to find Mr. Pearson in conversation with Harris.
“Beg your pardon,” the inspector was saying, “but the man beyond you there is Ware, of your college, isn’t he?” But he wasn’t looking in Allan’s direction at all.
“No, sir,” answered Harris, “that’s Rindgely.”
“Sure of it?”
“Quite, sir,” replied Harris, smiling.