“All right,” answered the other, wondering at the track captain’s errand. “How about you?”
“Fine as silk,” he said. “Say, Ware, Robinson has sent a foolish letter, and asks the committee to look up your record. Of course,” he went on, carelessly and hurriedly, “it’s all poppycock, but they think they have a case, and so maybe you’d better walk over with me and see Nast about it; just explain things so he can write back to ’em, you know. Are you busy?”
Allan, bewildered and dismayed, looked across at Stearns with wide eyes and sinking heart. The track team captain’s forebodings of yesterday flashed into memory, and it was with a very weak voice that he asked finally:
“You mean that—that Robinson has protested me?”
Stearns laughed carelessly, but something in the other’s tone sent a qualm of uneasiness to his heart.
“Oh, there’s no question of a protest,” he answered, “because the time for protests has gone by. But, of course, they knew the committee would investigate the matter, and that if everything wasn’t all right they wouldn’t allow you to run. But, of course, as I say, it’s all nonsense. They say you were entered in the mile run at the St. Thomas Club Meet, in Brooklyn, during vacation, and came in third. And—and there’s a silly newspaper clipping with your name in it. But, as I told Nast, you can explain that all right, I guess. Fact is, you know,” he continued, with a little annoyed laugh, “you’ve got to; we can’t afford to lose you, Ware.”
Allan took his cap from the desk.
“Come on,” he said, quietly.