“Then yah’ll get wet,” was Mr. Dunne’s reasonable answer.
“And catch my death riding back in the bus.”
“Don’t ride. Walk. I’m giving this to yah for fresh air.”
“But Mr. Dunne—”
“Time!”
It may have been this fresh grievance which lay heavy upon Darcy’s chest, clogging her breathing and slowing her suppled muscles. She was conscious of doing less well than usual—and of not caring, either! The medicine-ball was heavier and more unwieldy than ever. The punching-bag, instinct with a demoniac vitality, came back at her on a new schedule and bumped her nose violently, a mortifying incident which had not occurred since the first week. The despicable little hand-ball, propelled by her trainer, bounded just a fraction of an inch out of her straining reach, and when she did hit it, felt as soggy as sand and as hard as rock and raised stone-bruises on her hands. She even pinched her thumb in the rowing-machine, which is the zenith of inexpertness. With every fresh mishap she became more self-piteous and resentful and reckless. Andy, the Experienced, would have ascribed all this to that common if obscure phenomenon, an “off day,” familiar to every professor whether of integral calculus or the high trapeze. Then the dreadful thing happened, and he revised his opinion.
The last, and therefore worst, five minutes of the grind had come. Darcy lay on the mat going through the loathed body-and-limb-lifting while Andy Dunne exhorted her to speed up. “Now the legs. Come on. Hup!”
Something in Darcy went on strike.
“Can’t,” she said.
“Grmph! What’s matter?”