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Andrew shot clear, going at top speed. He swung into the inside place. So far so good. He’d got his inside place, and the lead too. Was he to make the running? He settled down to a stride, fast but easy.
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He breathed calmly through his nose. Although the race had started he still felt very nervous—an exhilarating nervousness now. He saw each blade of grass where out turf edge met track. A groundsman set down a whitewash pail.
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Andrew realized he was cutting out too fast a pace. He swung into a slower stride. So far all had gone according to plan, and he began to take courage.
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As they approached the pavilion for the first time and the second long corner of the race, he found Perry was creeping up on his outside. Andrew was surprised and a little worried. In all the half miles he had run before the pace he had set would have assured him the lead. He decided to make no effort, and Perry passed stride by stride and dropped into the lead. Andrew continued at his own pace, and a gap of a yard or two opened.
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As they came on to the bend there was a sudden sputter of feet and Andrew found that Brewster had filled the gap. Others were coming up and he realized that the whole field was moving faster than he was. He quickened up slightly and swung out tentatively to pass Brewster again. Before he could pass, the corner was reached. He at least knew better than to run on the outside round the curve; so he slackened again to pull back into the inside. But in the very thought of doing so, the runner behind closed smoothly and swiftly up to Brewster, and Andrew saw that Redbrooke had got his inside berth. Andrew had to take the curve on the outside. “Blinking fool” he told himself.
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Old Jones and one or two other experienced runners in the crowd caught each other’s eyes for a moment; the rest of the audience had no notion of the little display of bad technique that Andrew had given.
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So they went round the long curve. Perry in the lead and still pressing the pace; Brewster second, with no very clear notion of what the pace ought to be, and determined not to lose Perry; Redbrooke keeping wisely within striking distance, and Andrew bunched uncomfortably on the outside of Redbrooke with two others.
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By the time they came out of the long bend and completed the first half of the race Andrew was thoroughly rattled. Never had he felt such a strain at this stage of a half mile. Already it was difficult to get enough air; he was no longer breathing evenly through his nose. Already a numbing weakness was creeping down the front of his thighs. Hopeless now to think of gaining ground. With relief he found he was able to drop into the inside again behind Redbrooke. They had now been running for about one minute—it seemed an age. Could he possibly stick to it for another period, as long again? The long stretch of straight in front of him, the long sweep of curve at the end of the ground that only brought you at the beginning of the finishing straight. Then the sprint. Already he felt he could not find an ounce of sprint.
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Pace by pace he stuck to it watching Redbrooke’s feet.
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But even now he must quicken up if he was to hold Redbrooke. At each step Redbrooke’s back was leaving him. He struggled to lengthen but it was useless. Redbrooke was moving up to the front. Now he was equal with Brewster;now with Perry; now he was in the lead.
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How easy Redbrooke’s move down the back straight looked from the grand stand. “Pretty running,” people told each other. “Just the place to come up.” “Nicely judged.” “See how he worked himself through from the last corner.”
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And this was the very place at which Andrew had meant to move up himself. He remembered nothing of his plans now. It was impossible to increase his effort. One of the men behind came smoothly by and dropped into the gap that Redbrooke had left in front of him. The sixth man came up on his outside. There was a kind of emptiness at his back. He was running equal last.
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Now they came into the final curve before the finishing straight. His legs seemed powerless. He grunted for breath. The weakness in his thighs had grown to a cramping pain. And all the time with dull despair he saw Redbrooke going up, now five yards clear, now eight. Perry had dropped back to third, and Brewster was chasing Redbrooke.
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Dark waves of pain swept over Andrew. Hopeless. Hopeless.
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Still he must keep running with control. He must force his legs to a smooth long stride. This was the worst part of any race; nightmare moments, when the only hope was a last frenzied dash, yet still the body must be forced along with conscious control.
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“Come on,” he told himself, “another fifty yards—guts, man—guts.”
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Had only Andrew known what the others were feeling, he would have taken courage. The whole pace of the first quarter, thanks to Andrew’s own excitement, had been faster than anyone cared for. Redbrooke, untrained as he was, had found himself badly winded at the quarter-mile mark. He, too, doubted whether he could have any punch left at the finish. He determined, therefore, to make a surprise effort early, when he still had a powerful sprint in him. As soon as they came into the curve, he stepped on the gas as hard as he could, three hundred yards from home, and steamed away. He jumped a lead of five, eight, ten yards before Perry or Brewster realized what was happening. It was a thing the crowd could follow better than the men in the race.
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Now as they came into the straight, Andrew thought Redbrooke was gathering himself for a final dash. Far from it; he was hanging on for grim death. His sparkling effort had died right away. His stride was nerveless. The sprinting muscles in his thighs had lost every ounce of their power. He was struggling and asking himself at every stride: “Can I, can I, can I—surely those steps are drawing nearer—can I last it?”
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Perry was desperately run out. Brewster had already been chasing Redbrooke hard for the last thirty yards, but could not find any pace at all.
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Andrew alone of the field had he known it had been nursing his remnant of strength round that grueling bend. Only forty yards to go now and he could throw all he had into a last desperate effort. Keep it up just a moment more. Thirty yards to the straight now—twenty—suddenly his control was shattered. He was fighting in a mindless fury of effort for every ounce of strength in him.
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In ten yards he saw his whole fortune in the race change. He had got a sprint then!The man on his outside vanished. He raced round the outside of the fellow in front hand over fist as he came into the straight. In another few yards he had the faltering Perry taped.
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He had already run into third place. New strength surged through his limbs. “Come on, come on: up, you can catch Brewster. Level. Feel him struggling. He can’t hold you. Got him!”
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Far, far off, a distant frenzied pain, somewhere: someone else’s pain. Miles away a face on the side of the track.
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Second now. Second, and he could catch Redbrooke. But could he catch him in time? They were past the start of the hundred yards now: a bare hundred to go. Could he? Could he? The first brilliance of his sprint had gone. He was fighting again an agonizing weakness that dragged his legs back. But he was doing it, foot by foot. Fists clenched, to force speed-spent muscles.
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Split seconds dragged strange length out. The straight went on and on. Five yards behind, now four, now three.
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