Chapter 15

In a daze, Speed saw his friend mount the porch painfully; in a daze, he shook his hand. Subconsciously he beheld Lawrence Glass come panting into view, throw up his hands at sight of Covington, and cry out in a strange tongue. When he regained his faculties he broke into the conversation harshly.

"What have you done to yourself?"

"I broke a toe," explained the athlete.

"You broke a toe?"

"He broke a toe!" wailed Glass, faintly.

"If it's nothing but a toe, it won't hurt your running." Speed seized eagerly upon the faintest hope.

"No. I'll be all right in a few weeks." Covington spoke carelessly, his eyes bent upon Jean Chapin. "You've g-got to run to-morrow."

"What!" Covington dragged his glance away from the cheeks of his sweetheart.

"I--I'm sick. You'll have to."

"Don't be an idiot, Wally. I can't walk!"

Helen explained, with the pride of one displaying her own handiwork: "Mr. Speed defends the Flying Heart to-morrow. You are just in time to see him."

"When did you learn to box, Wally?" Covington was genuinely amazed.

"I'm not going to box. It's a footrace. I'm training--been training ever since I arrived."

In his first bewilderment the latecomer might have unwittingly betrayed his friend had not Jean suddenly inquired:

"Where is Roberta?"

"Roberta!" Covington tripped over one of his crutches. "Roberta who?"

"Why, Roberta Keap, of course! She's chaperoning us while mother is away."

The hero of countless field-days turned pale, and seemed upon the point of hobbling back to "Nigger Mike's" buck-board.

"You and she are old friends, I believe?" Helen interposed.

"Yes! Oh yes!" Culver flashed his chum a look of dumb entreaty, but Speed was staring round-eyed into space, striving to read the future.

Helen started to fetch her just as the pallid chaperon was entering the door.

She shook hands with Covington. She observed that he was too deeply affected at sight of her to speak, and it awakened fresh misgivings in her mind.

"H-how d'y do! I didn't know you were--here!" he stammered.

"I thought it would surprise you!" Roberta smiled wanly, amazed at her own self-control, then froze in her tracks as Jean announced:

"Jack will be home to-night, Culver. He'll be delighted to see you!"

J. Wallingford Speed offered a diversion by bursting into a hollow laugh. Now that the world was in league to work his own downfall, it was time someone else had a touch of suffering. To this end he inquired how the toe had come to be broken.

"I broke it in