Page:Stanwood Pier--Crashaw brothers.djvu/155

Rh on his splendid muscles, the ease with which they served him.

“And yet he never seems to he quite the best in anything,” she observed with some disappointment, after the competition on the  parallel bars had been awarded to a Fifth Former named Bird. “I’m sorry, for I’ve heard Edward speak of him, and I know how  much he likes him.”

“He’s the best oarsman in school, I guess,” said Lawrence. “And he’s good in nearly everything, even if he isn’t always the best.”

Standing on the stairs with the other members of the crew, all dressed for rowing, Edward had been looking on at the performances, watching Sheldon especially, and feeling somehow disappointed, too, because Sheldon did not  do better. He failed on feats which Edward had seen him accomplish with ease before a  group of admiring little kids.

Charles’s remark about Sheldon, “He’s a quitter,” flashed into Edward’s mind. Could his brother after all be right in that? Charles was so seldom wrong!