Down to the turn
they raced. Speed was leading. Fright had acted upon him as an
electric charge; his terror lent him wings; he was obsessed by a
propelling force outside of himself. Naturally strong, lithe, and
active, he likewise possessed within him the white-hot flame of
youth, and now, with a nameless fear to spurn him on, he ran as
any healthy, frightened young animal would run. At the second
turn Skinner had not passed him, but the thud of his feet was
close behind.
This unparalleled phenomenon surprised Lawrence Glass perhaps
most of all. He had laid his plans to slip quietly out of the
crowd under cover of the first confusion and lay his own course
eastward; but when he beheld his protege actually in the lead, he
remained rooted to his tracks. Was this a miracle? He turned to
Covington, to find him dancing madly, his crutches waving over
his head, in his eyes the stare of a maniac. His mouth was
distended, and Glass reasoned that he must be shouting violently,
but could not be sure. Suddenly Covington dashed to the turn
whence the runners would be revealed as they covered the last
half lap, for nothing was distinguishable through the fence,
burdened by human forms, and Larry lumbered after him, ploughing
his way through the crowd and colliding with the box upon which
stood the Echo Phonograph, of New York and Paris.
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