Page:The purple pennant (IA purplepennant00barb).pdf/52

Rh "To-day?" The Doctor's brows went up. "Sunday?"

Perry hastened to explain and was cheered by a slight smile which hovered under his father's drooping mustache when he pictured Fudge trying to be at both ends of the hundred-yards at once. "You see, dad, I can't play baseball well enough, and I'd like to do something. I ought to anyway, just to keep in training for football next autumn. I wouldn't wonder if I got to be regular quarter-back next season."

"Sprinting," observed the Doctor, tucking his handkerchief out of sight again, "makes big demands on the heart muscles, Perry. I've no reason for supposing that your heart isn't as strong as the average, but I recall in my college days a case where a boy over-worked himself in a race, the quarter-mile, I think it was, and never was good for much afterwards. He was in my class, and his name was—dear, dear, now what was it? Well, it doesn't matter. Anyway, that's what you'll have to guard against, Perry."

"But if I began mighty easy, the way you do, and worked up to it, sir"

"Oh, I dare say it won't hurt you. Exercise in moderation is always beneficial. It's putting sudden demands on yourself that does the damage. With