“They’re off!”
“Ride for all you’re worth, Jack!”
“You can win this race without half trying, Sedley!”
“Don’t forget Heddon’s brook—it’s a bad one!”
Such were some of the cries, mingled with cheers, as the two riders dashed away on the two-mile race. Soon they were well on their way down the road, followed for a short distance by a number of people in automobiles and on motorcycles.
“Sedley is ahead!”
“Yes; but Jack Rover is a close second!”
The first quarter mile of the race was over a level road and easy. Then the two contestants turned into a side road and were lost to view among the trees and bushes. Here the automobiles and motorcycles following had to come to a halt.
“Wish we could have followed them on horseback,” remarked Randy.
“Well, that wasn’t to be permitted, so all we can do is to go back to the finishing point and wait for ’em to come,” answered Fred.
“Oh, Fred, do you think Jack will really win?” asked Ruth.
“I don’t see why not. Of course, Joe Sedley has had lots of experience in riding and his Black Diamond is sure a fine runner. But Jack has just got to win, and that’s all there is to it!”
The Rover girls and Ruth had brought their cameras with them, and all had taken snapshots of the start of the race. Now they fixed their cameras so that they might get other snapshots of the finish.
“But I won’t want any snapshot if Jack comes in second!” declared Martha.
“Oh, well, I want a picture, anyhow,” said Ruth. “If Mr. Sedley wins he’ll be glad to have a picture of the event.”
In the meantime Jack and Sedley were riding for all they were worth, cheered on by friends and neighbors lining the roadway of the race.
Joe Sedley had taken the lead at the start and held it at the end of the first half mile. Then the two contestants turned into another road where the going was unusually rough, and here Jack gradually pulled up until the two horses were neck and neck.
“Here is where I’m going to pass you, Sedley!” cried Jack gayly.
“It’s the last lap that counts, Rover!” yelled the rich young man in return.
A little further on they took the first of the two streams to be crossed. Some days before Jack had inspected this carefully and now he reined up Carrots at a point where the steed could get a good footing. Over they went with ease, Black Diamond and his rider immediately following. Then they took to a narrow road running to the rear of Valley Brook Farm.
By the time the first mile had been covered the pace was beginning to tell on both horses. Then came the point where they had to take two hedges in quick succession. Carrots took the first with scarcely an effort, but for some unaccountable reason shied at the second. Black Diamond and his rider shot ahead, and when Jack finally brought his mount over he found himself a good fifty yards to the rear.
“I’ve got to make it up! I’ve simply got to do it!” he muttered to himself, and, setting his teeth hard, he urged Carrots forward in a desperate effort to overtake Sedley.
Then came another turn and the riders crossed the state highway and came out on a stretch of road leading behind the Sedley estate. Here going was again rough, but this seemed to please Carrots better than it did Black Diamond and at a mile and a half Jack found himself only a length behind his opponent. Then each rider settled himself for the struggle on the homestretch.
“Here they come!” yelled Andy, as he looked down the roadway.
“Joe Sedley is in the lead! Hurrah!” shouted one of that young man’s admirers.
“Oh, don’t tell me Jack’s going to lose!” murmured Martha.
“Come on, Jack! Come on! You’ve got to win!” shouted Fred. “Come on!”
As the two riders drew closer there were all sorts of shouts and cries. In the midst of this the girls, and also several other spectators, prepared to take snapshot pictures of the finish.
“Joe Sedley is still ahead! He wins the race!”
“Jack Rover is crawling up!”
“It’s neck and neck!”
“Come on! Come on! Let the best man win!”
By this time everybody was wildly excited and it was almost impossible for those in charge to keep the spectators off the road. It was seen that Joe Sedley was riding well, even though Black Diamond showed evidences of the herculean exertions the steed had made. Only a few feet behind came Carrots, his tail flying out and Jack bending well over the sorrel’s neck.
“It’s Sedley’s race!”
“Not much! Rover will pass him!”
“Here they come neck and neck!”
“It’s a tie!”
“That’s right—it’s a tie, sure enough!” came from a score of throats, and then the two riders with their steeds flashed by and the race was over.
“Oh, Fred! was the race a tie?” asked Ruth, as she and the other girls were putting their cameras away.
“I’m afraid it was,” answered the youngest Rover boy.
“I don’t think it was a tie,” declared Andy. “It looked to me as if Jack was at least six inches ahead.”
“That’s the way it looked to me, too,” said his twin.
“Rover ahead? Nonsense!” cried one of the Sedley supporters. “If anybody was ahead it was Joe.”
“Oh, it was a tie, and that’s all there is to it,” put in a gentleman who lived at Dexter’s Corners. “They’ll have to ride it over again.”
It was the consensus of opinion among those who had seen the finish of the race that it had been a tie.
“We’ll let the photographs decide it,” declared Fred. “A whole lot of pictures of the finish were snapped. They ought to tell the tale. Come, what do you say?” he went on to the young man who had been managing the race for Joe Sedley.
“I’m willing to go by the photographs if they’re clear enough,” was the reply.
“Well, photographs don’t lie,” said the gentleman from Dexter’s Corners.
And now while Jack and Joe Sedley are turning back to the finish line to find out how the race was really decided let me take a few minutes of the readers’ time in which to introduce my characters to those who have not met the Rovers before.
In the first volume of this line of books, entitled “The Rover Boys at School,” I introduced three wideawake American lads, Dick, Tom and Sam Rover, and told how they left their home at Valley Brook Farm to go to school. From school they went through college, having many adventures in the between-times, and then settled down in business in New York City, forming The Rover Company, with offices in Wall Street.
The three young men married the sweethearts of their school and college days, and as a result of these unions Dick was blessed with a son and a daughter, Jack and Martha, Sam followed with a son and a daughter, named Fred and Mary, while the fun-loving Tom came forward with a lively pair of twins, called Randy and Andy.
At this time the three Rover families lived in three connecting houses on Riverside Drive overlooking the Hudson River. At first the young folks attended the local schools, but soon the boys’ propensity for fun and “cutting up” became so pronounced their elders thought it would be better to send them to some strict boarding school.
Colonel Colby, a school chum of the older Rovers, had established a first-class military academy, and in the first volume of our Second Series, entitled “The Rover Boys at Colby Hall,” was related how Jack, Fred and the twins went to that institution of learning and made many friends, including Gif Garrison and Spouter Powell, the sons of their father’s chums. At the same time Mary and Martha attended a nearby boarding school where they became intimately acquainted with Ruth Stevenson and May Powell, a cousin to Spouter.
A number of years had passed since the younger Rovers had first attended Colby Hall, and during that time they had had a number of thrilling adventures on Snowshoe Island, under canvas, on a hunt, in the oil fields, at Big Horn Ranch and at Big Bear Lake. They had also been shipwrecked, and had been abducted and held for a heavy ransom, as related in the volume preceding this, entitled “The Rover Boys on Sunset Trail.”
During the days at the military school and while on their numerous outings the Rover boys had made a great number of friends and also a number of bitter enemies. Some of their enemies had paid the penalty of their misdeeds and were now in prison, but others were still at large and eagerly awaiting an opportunity to do the Rovers an injury.
While at Colby Hall Jack had worked his way up until he became the major of the school battalion, while Fred became captain of Company C. Andy and Randy had been too full of fun to go in for military honors, but had taken their part in numerous sporting contests. When the time came for graduating from the school all of the boys had passed with flying colors, much to their parents’ delight.
“The kids are all O. K., even if they’re full of fun,” said Tom Rover proudly to his wife, Nellie.
“Well, you can’t blame them for being full of fun, Tom,” returned his wife, with a twinkle in her eye. “You were always chock-full of fun yourself—you know you were,” and she poked him affectionately in the ribs.
“Indeed!” said Tom very innocently. “Why, I always thought I was a model young man, as well as a model husband,” and then he ducked as Nellie made a move as if to catch him by the hair.
On leaving Colby Hall, the Rover boys had been undecided regarding what to do next. There had been some talk of going to college, but both Jack and Fred had intimated that they would like to go into business in Wall Street with their fathers. Andy and Randy declared for a trip around the world or “some kind of an outing somewhere.”
“I think we might as well let the boys rest and think it over,” said Dick Rover to his brothers. “They have been to school steadily for years. It won’t hurt them to let them go their own way for a while.”
So it had come about that the boys, as well as the girls, were allowed to journey from New York City by automobile to the farm at Dexter’s Corners where old Uncle Randolph, Aunt Martha, and Grandfather Rover still resided. Grandfather Rover was now very old and did little but sit in his chair and read the papers.
From his first meeting with Ruth Stevenson some years before, Jack had been greatly attracted by this young lady. She had been a good chum on more than one occasion and he had awakened to his real feelings for her when, through the actions of one of his enemies, Ruth had been in danger of losing her eyesight. This feeling had grown in intensity, and it was this which made Jack feel that he would like to settle down in business so that he might be in a position to ask Ruth to become his wife. He had thought it delightful that the Stevensons had purchased the land adjoining Valley Brook Farm and were about to build a summer residence there. But the entrance of Joe Sedley upon the scene had caused him some misgivings. Sedley was handsome, as well as rich, and owned a beautiful estate directly opposite that purchased by Mr. Stevenson. More than this, the young man had a manner which seemed to please Ruth not a little.
“Well, I suppose he’s got as much right to her as I have,” Jack told himself several times. But even as this thought coursed through his mind he felt a sudden sinking of the heart, such as he had never experienced before.