erard put his
hand, steadying himself against the shock that was less of surprise than
of poignant self-reproach for his own failure to divine this open
riddle. In that moment of final understanding, he knew that he had seen
the pitiful truth rise to the surface of Corrie's blue eyes a hundred
times, and had left its appeal to die out, unanswered.

Far down the course a ripple of cheering started, running nearer in a
wave of gathering volume. Out around the curve swooped a gray streak,
fled toward the camps, was opposite, and past. The Mercury was unleashed
and hunting down its lost lead in the fastest speed of the day.

Mr. Rose brought his eyes from following its flight to meet Gerard's
gaze.

"You remember how Isabel nagged him to take her around the race course
in his pink machine," he reminded. "I forbade it and thought no more
about the thing. Well, she got him alone--you know, I guess, that he was
wild with boy's near-love for her and would have let her drag the heart
out of his body--and she got his promise to take her around once. She
worked the plan all out; Corrie started without his mechanician, and she
waited for him a mile down the course, dressed in her riding-habit and
wearing a man's cap and motor-mask. She figured that no one would notice
her much on the road and Corrie could drop her off after making the
circuit, just before he reached the camps, so that he would come in
alone as he started and no one would be the wiser. They were just a
couple of fool kids on a kid lark."

A yellow car roared to a stop beside them, interrupting clamorously.
From his seat its mechanician fell rather than stepped.

"He smashed his wrist cranking her," the driver raged. "Someone
else--quick!"

A blue-clad factory mechanic flung himself into the vacant place,
bare-headed, without coat or mask.

"Here's my chance!" he exulted. "Go on, I'm it."

The car leaped out, no second wasted in parley. Men gathered up the
injured mechanician and hurried him away. Mr. Rose looked on as if at a
stage scene which did not interest him, and dully resumed his narrative.

"It worked all right, Gerard, until they met you on the back stretch and
you challenged Corrie to race. He didn't want to, with her along, but
she devilled him to go on, and he did. I can guess it went to his head,
having her beside him. When you began cutting Corrie off so he couldn't
pass by, he caught the joke right enough. She says he was laughing when
he b