Page:The purple pennant (IA purplepennant00barb).pdf/338

Rh were next. Soper was a yard or so behind them. But that order changed again in the next few seconds. Perry was breasting Kirke then and Lawrence was almost even with them. Soper was making bad going and falling back. The shouts of the crowd in the stands and around the finish made a crashing bedlam of sound that drowned completely the quick scrunch-scrunch of the runners' shoes and their hoarse breathing.

Now it was half-distance, and Perry saw the white figure at his right fall back and felt rather than saw another form crawling up and up on the other side near the rim. Lawrence held on, too, and fifty yards from the finish Perry, Lawrence and Gedge were neck-and-neck, with Kirke a single pace behind. Soper and Knight were already beaten. Then Gedge forged ahead and the wild shouts of the Springdale contingent took on new vigor. Cries of "Clearfield! Clearfield!" "Springdale! Springdale!" filled the air. Dimly, Perry heard his own name over and over.

Now the slim white thread was rushing up the track toward him. He had no sense of moving himself, although his lungs were aching and his arms swung back and forth and his legs, suddenly weighted with lead, still spurned the track. It was as though he, in spite of the painful efforts he was