“What’s on to follow this race, Chip?” asked Clancy, while they were waiting.
“A half mile for single paddles,” Merry answered.
“That will give Pink a chance, if there are canoes enough to go round.”
“Don’t fret about Pink,” called that worthy from the bank, happening to overhear the talk between his chums. “I’m going to run along the bank and root for the heroes of Farnham Hall. I invented canoes, and naturally I’m a better paddler than Red, but I can put more heart into you from the shore than I could with a paddle.”
Clancy slapped the water with his paddle and threw a small shower over Ballard.
“You invented the long bow, too, you old chump,” laughed Clancy, “and you’re a champion hand at pulling it. Come on in, the water’s fine.”
Ballard had leaped out of the way of the shower, and was sputtering about his wet clothes.
“You’ll get all you want of the water if I’m any prophet, you red-headed false alarm!” he shouted. “For half a cent I’d wade out there and swamp you.”
“Somebody got a nickel?” sang out Clancy. “Throw it to Pink and let him keep the change.”
At just this point, the other canoes glided out into the water, taking up their positions on each side of Merry and Clancy.
“All ready?” cried a fellow named Dart, who was acting as starter, as the canoes lined up.
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“All ready!” came the chorus from the racers.
“Then, go!”
Splash went the paddles, and the light, graceful water craft jumped ahead like restless thoroughbreds. Before they had gone twenty feet, Merry realized that in Bleeker and Hotchkiss he and Clancy had foemen worthy of their mettle. The lads in the other craft were working hard, but were left behind almost from the start. By an unlucky move they overturned their canoe before the Point was reached, and the last Frank saw of them on the first lap they were swimming for the bank, towing their water-logged craft.
Clancy was in the stern, and he was doing the steering in masterly fashion. Frank, wielding his paddle with grace and power, knelt at the bow.
“Steady, Clan!” he called. “Don’t use up all your ginger at the beginning!”
“Steady it is,” answered Clancy.
Bleeker and Hotchkiss were working like Trojans. Foot by foot they drew ahead of the other canoe.
“Dig, you Farnham Hall fellows!” bellowed Ballard from the bank. “What do you think this is—a picnic excursion? Dig, I tell you! If you’re last at the finish, don’t you ever speak to me again.”
“Come on, you Bleek!” shouted the Gold Hillers.
“Come on, Hotch!”
“Keep it up, Gold Hill! You’ve got ’em beaten.”
“Oh, you Bleeker! We’re slow at football, but I reckon we’re there with the goods on the water.”
“It isn’t Jode Lenning you’re up against now, Merriwell!”
All this rooting on the part of the Gold Hill fellows did not in the least disturb Merriwell or Clancy. They were paddling like clockwork, but were saving their
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 energies for the last lap. After the white flag was met and turned, they’d begin to show what they were made of.
The main thing was to keep a clear head and steady nerves while the competing canoe was moving away from them. And in this certainly Merriwell and Clancy were put to a severe test.
Before the Point was reached, the stern of the other canoe was even with Merry’s position in the bow of his own craft. Bleeker had the inside, and he went so close to the perpendicular wall of the cliff that his paddle touched the base of the rocks. He looked over at Merry.
“Come on, old man!” he called.
“Not yet, Bleek,” Merry answered, with a laugh. “We want you to get farther ahead first.”
“Much obliged! Now watch us.”
Merry and Clancy had to go farther in getting around the Point than Bleeker and Hotch, for they were forced farther away from the cliff. Inasmuch as the gulch curved at the Point, the rival canoe was offered an advantage, similar to that which comes to a pole horse on the oval of a race track. When once more on a straightaway, Bleeker and Hotch were leading by a full canoe length.
The boys on the bank had not been able to get around the Point, so some of them, including Ballard, crossed to the opposite shore in the other canoes.
“What’s the trouble with you chumps?” shouted Ballard. “Don’t you know the other boat’s ahead? Buckle in—paddle like you used to. Do better than that, Red, or I’ll swim out there and take your place.”
“You got ’em, Bleek!” cried the Gold Hillers frantically. “Keep a-coming!”
“Here’s where the chip off the old block gets a setback!
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 I reckon Merry’s dad was better with a baseball than he was with a paddle!”
In the excitement of the moment some ill-considered words were roared across the water. This remark, by a Gold Hill partisan, was probably excusable, in the circumstances, but it struck a spark from Merry’s temper.
It opened up the old, tantalizing question of heredity—the very thing which Merriwell had called a “handicap.” His father could pitch better ............