Bringing her around, she issued her orders, her mind too intent upon the business in hand to be conscious that all on the launch had been watching her with absorbing interest. Anchors were thrown over fore and aft in order to hold the launch steady against the current, then turning the wheel over to the admiring c.o.xswain, Peggy wiped her hands upon her handkerchief and holding out her right one to Captain Boynton, said:
"Thank you so much for letting me try. It was perfectly glorious to feel her respond to every touch and thread her way through all that ruck."
"Thank me? Great Scott, child, you"ve done more for the whole outfit than you guess. Stewart, my congratulations."
Poor Peggy was overcome, but the boys and Polly were alternately running and praising her, every last one of them as proud as possible to call Peggy Stewart chum.
But out yonder the sh.e.l.ls were already in the water and the electric spark of excitement had flashed from end to end of that long line of gayly bedecked expectant yachts and launches, as down to them floated the strains of the Yale boating song as it is never sung at any other time, and thousands of eager eyes were peering along the course watching for the first glimpse of the dots which would flash by to victory or defeat.
CHAPTER XVI
THE RACE
The sh.e.l.ls had now gotten away and were maneuvering to get into a good position at their stake boats, far beyond the sight of the gay company on h.o.a.rd the Frolic, which could only guess how things were progressing by the rocketing cheers all along the line of anxiously waiting spectators.
Along the course the launches of the committee were darting thither and yonder like water-bugs in their efforts to keep the course clear.
Presently arose the cries:
"They are off! They are off! They are coming! They are coming," and far up the line the puffing of the observation train could be heard with now and again an excited, hysterical tooting of the engine"s whistle, as though in the midst of so much excitement it had to give vent to its own.
Presently two dots were visible, looking little more than huge water- bugs in the perspective, the foreshortening changing the long sixty-foot sh.e.l.ls into spidery creatures with spreading legs.
The observation train following along the sh.o.r.e presented an animated, vari-colored spectacle, with its long chain of cars filled with beautifully gowned women and girls, and men in all the bravery of summer serges and white flannels. Banners were waving and voices cheering, to be caught up and flung back in answering cheers from the craft upon the river.
Peggy and Polly stood as girls so often do in stress of excitement, with arms clasped about each others" waists. The boys stood in characteristic att.i.tudes: Durand with his hands upon his hips--lithe and straight as an arrow, but intent upon the onrushing crews; Shortie with his arm thrown over Wheedles" shoulder subconsciously demonstrating the affection he felt for this chum from whom he would so soon be separated and for how long he could not tell. The friendships formed at the Academy are exceptionally firm ones, but with graduation comes a dividing of the ways sometimes for years, sometimes forever. It is a special provision of Providence that youth rarely dwells upon this fact, and the feeling is invariably expressed by:
"So long! See you later, old man." Captain Stewart and Commander Harold were a striking evidence of this fact. They had not met until years had elapsed and the common tie of daughter and niece had re-united their interests. But, another strange feature; they had as much in common today as though their ways had divided only the week before.
They now stood watching the approaching crews with powerful gla.s.ses, their terse comments enlightening their friends as to what was taking place beyond their unaided range of vision. Peggy and Polly were fairly dancing up and down in their eagerness.
On came the sh.e.l.ls growing every second more defined in outline, although from their distance from the Frolic their progress seemed slow, only the flashing of the blades in and out of the water indicating that the men were not out for a pleasure pull, and the blue ripples astern telling that sixteen twelve-foot sweeps were pushing that water behind them for all they were worth.
Thus far Harvard was in the lead by half a length, and holding her own as she drew near the three-mile flag, where the Frolic swung and tugged at her anchors. But it must be admitted that the sympathies and hopes of all in the Frolic centered in the Yale sh.e.l.l; a Yale coach had drilled and scolded and "cussed" and petted the Navy boys to victory only a few weeks before, and Ralph, if no one else, felt that all his future rested in the ability of that Yale coach "to knock some rowing sense into his block."
"Daddy Neil! Daddy Neil, yell at them! Yell!" screamed Peggy, breaking away from Polly to run to her father"s side and literally shake him, as the crews drew nearer and nearer.
"I AM yelling, honey. Can"t you hear me?"
"I mean yell something that will make those Yale men put--put oh, something into their stroke which will overhaul the red blades."
"Ginger? You mean ginger? To make "em pull like the very--ahem. Like the very d.i.c.kens? Hi! Shortie, whoop up the Siren--there are only about a dozen of us here but give it hard. Give it for all you"re worth when the Yale crew crosses our bow. You girls know it and so do the older women, and the crew can make a try at it. Now be ready. Whoop it up!"
Shortie sprang into position as cheer-leader pro-tem and if wild gyrations and a deep voice lent inspiration certainly nothing more was needed, for as the sh.e.l.ls came rushing on
"Hoo--oo--oo--oo--oooo!
Hoo--oo--oo--oo--oooo!
Hoo--oo--oo--oo--oooo!
Hoo--oo--oo--oo--oooo!
Navy! Navy! Navy!
Yale! Yale! Yale!"
was wailed out over the water, and as upon many another occasion back yonder on the old Severn it had acted as a match to gunpowder to a losing cause with the Navy boys, so it now startled the men in the Yale boat, for they had many friends in the Navy School and had heard that yell too often when they were in the lead in some sport not to know the full significance of it. It meant to the losing people: "Get after the other fellows and beat them in spite of all the imps of the lower regions!"
The Yale men had no time to acknowledge the cheer; all their thoughts and energies must center upon the O-n-e, T-w-o, T-h-r-e-e, F-o-u-r, F-i- v-e, etc. of the c.o.xswain and his "Stroke! Stroke! Stroke!" But that yell had done what Peggy hoped and secretly prayed it would:
The long blades flashed in and out of the water quicker and cleaner, cutting down Harvard"s lead, until just as they swept by the Frolic that discouraging discrepancy was closed and the two sh.e.l.l"s noses were even.
Yale had made a gallant spurt.
"Up anchor and after them," ordered Captain Boynton and the crew sprang to obey orders, eagerness to see the finish lending phenomenal speed to their fingers, and the Frolic was soon in hot pursuit of the sh.e.l.ls, Yale now pulling a trifle ahead of her adversary in that last fateful mile.
How those eight bare backs swayed back and forth. Harvard"s beautiful, long, clean sweep was doing pretty work, but that Siren Yell seemed to have supplied the "ginger" necessary to spur on the Yale men.
"Give "em another! Give "em another!" shouted Captain Stewart, as the Frolic came abreast of the Yale crew, and fairly shaking Captain Harold in his excitement.
"Avast there! Give way, man! Do you want to yank me out of my coat?" he laughed.
"I"ll yank somebody out of something if those Yale boys don"t pull a length ahead of those Johnny Harvards," sputtered Neil Stewart.
"Whoop it up fellows--AND friends. The four N Yell for old Yale," bawled Shortie in order to make himself heard above the din and pandemonium of screaming sirens and the yelling, and in spite of it all the Yale crew heard
"N--n--n--n!
A--a--a--a!
V--v--v--v!
Y--y--y--y!
Yale! Yale! Yale!"
and laid their strength to their sweeps. Chests were heaving and breath coming in panting gasps, but the c.o.xswain of the Yale crew was abreast of number three in the Harvard sh.e.l.l, and inch by inch the s.p.a.ce was lengthening in favor of the blue-tipped blades.
"Yale! Yale! Yale!"
yelled the crowd as only such a crowd can yell. Then clear water showed between the sh.e.l.ls and the four-mile flag fluttered like a blur as the Yale crew rushed by it. Slower plied the blades, shoulders which had swayed backward and forward in such perfect rhythm drooped, and one or two faces, gray from exhaustion, fell forward upon heaving chests. Then the rowing ceased, the long oars trailed over the water, as Harvard"s crew slid by and came to a standstill. Friends flocked to the sh.e.l.ls to bring them alongside the floats where, nerve-force coming to the rescue of physical exhaustion, the big fellows managed to scramble to the floats and fairly hug each other as they did an elephantine dance in feet from which some stockings were sagging, and some gone altogether.
But who cared whether legs were bare or covered!
The Frolic came boiling up to the float at a rate calculated to smash things to smithereens if she did not slow down at short order, everybody yelling, everybody shouting like bedlamites.
"Best ever! Best ever! The Siren started it and the Four N. did the trick!" shouted Captain Stewart, while all the others cheered and congratulated in chorus.
"Give "em again. Give "em again. By Jove, I"m going to get up a race of my own and all you fellows will have to come to yell for us," cried Captain Boynton, and again the Navy Yell sent a thrill through those weary bodies upon the float. Then gathering together all the "sand" left in them they gave the old Eli Yell for their friends of the Navy with more spirit than seemed possible after such a terrific ordeal as they had just undergone.
And all those months of training, all that endless grind of hard work, for a test which had lasted but a few minutes, ending in a certain victory for one sh.e.l.l and a certain defeat for the other, since victory surely could not possibly result for both.
"See you all at the Griswold tonight," called Captain Boynton, as the launch shoved off and got under way.
"Sure thing! Have our second wind by that time we hope," were the cheery answers.