“I hope not,” laughed Mr. Maxwell.
“He’s fresh though,” insisted Fred.
“Not now,” puffed George. “My breath’s gone and I’m all in.”
“That was a great race,” insisted Mr. Maxwell. “I don’t remember ever having seen a better one.”
“We were about twenty-five yards ahead of them at one time, you know,” said Herbert. “I thought we would win easily.”
“So did I,” exclaimed Fred. “You kept drawing away from us all the time and I thought we wouldn’t even be in it. I wanted to paddle harder all the time but Pop here wouldn’t let me. He insisted that we keep up a steady gait and sprint at the end.”
“My system was all right, wasn’t it?” demanded George.
“It surely was. You didn’t count on the paddle breaking, though.”
“Oh, yes, I did. I knew that if you exerted all your strength that any paddle would snap; that’s the reason I wanted you to save it until the end. Suppose you’d cut loose over the other side of the island and the paddle had broken there. We’d have been in a nice fix, wouldn’t we?” and George winked solemnly at their three visitors who seemed much amused at his efforts to secure a rise from his companion.
“Oh, dry up!” exclaimed Fred shortly, and George laughed gleefully at having accomplished his purpose.