“It’s Dan and Billy, of course,” declared Mildred.
Spink laughed at that statement. “Hardly,” he said. “I have seen the professional racers on the Hudson, and that is the way they manage their craft. See it! what a swoop. See that fellow standing up on that out-runner, and hanging on just by his teeth, as you might say! That’s some sailing—believe me!”
“It is Billy Speedwell!” cried Lettie, suddenly becoming anxious. “He’ll be killed! The reckless boy!”
“And it’s Dan at the helm,” added the doctor’s daughter.
“Never!” exclaimed Barry. “It can’t be those milkmen.”
But nobody paid any attention to the new boy just then. The crowd all ran to watch the fast-flying ice yacht speed down the river. Monroe Stevens’s Redbird was nowhere. The strange craft flew fully two lengths to its one, and was very quickly at the entrance to the Boat Club Cove.
They beheld Billy Speedwell hanging to the wire cable that helped steady the mast, and swinging far out from the out-runner, so as to help keep that steel on the ice as the boat swung into the cove.
Dan let go the sheet at just the right moment, and the sail rattled down into the standing-room. Billy dived for it, and kept the canvas from slatting, or getting overboard under the runners. Thus, under the momentum she had gained, the craft ran in to the landing amid the cheers of the Speedwells’ school fellows.
“Great work?”
“I’ve got something to tell you right now, Billy Speedwell!” shouted Jim Stetson, above the confusion.