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Page 40
"Do go and have a good skate yourself, David," she insisted. "I'll rest
for awhile and look on."
But it was far too cold to sit still.
"I'll give myself a lesson," she said. "This is a quiet spot. All the
others seem to have skated up to the other end."
As she was carefully taking the strokes David had taught her, with an
occasional struggle to keep her balance, she heard a great shouting behind
her. The next instant, some one had seized her by the hand.
"Keep your feet together!" was shouted in her ear, and she found herself
going like the wind at the end of a long line of girls. They were juniors,
she saw at once, and it was Julia Crosby at the whip end who had seized
her by the hand.
Anne closed her eyes. They were going at a tremendous rate of speed, it
seemed to her, like a comet shooting through the air. Then, suddenly, the
head of the comet stood still and the tail swung around it, and Anne, who
represented the very tip of the tail and who hardly reached to Julia
Crosby's shoulder, felt herself carried along with such velocity that the
breath left her body, her knees gave way and she fell down in a limp
little bundle. Julia Crosby instantly let go her hand and the impetus of
the rush shot her like a catapult far over the ice into the midst of a
crowd of skaters.
But the juniors never stopped to see what damage had been done. They
quickly joined hands again, and were off on another expedition almost
before Anne had been picked up by David and Hippy.
"It's that Julia Crosby again," cried David. "I wish she would move to
Europe. I'd gladly buy her a ticket. The town of Oakdale isn't big enough
to hold her and other people. She's always trying to knock somebody off
the side of the earth."
Anne went home, tired and bruised. She had had enough of skating for one
morning David returned to join the others; for this was not the last of
the day's adventures and Julia Crosby, before sunset, was to repent of her
cruelty to Anne.
In the meantime Grace and Tom had skated up to the far end of the pond.
"Well, Grace," said Tom, "how has the world been using you? I suppose you
have been adding to your laurels as a basketball captain."
"Far from it," said Grace a trifle sadly. "Miriam Nesbit is star player at
present."
They skated on for some time in silence. Tom felt there was something
wrong, so he tactfully changed the subject.
"Who is the girl doing the fancy strokes?" he asked, pointing to Julia
Crosby, who, some distance ahead of them, was giving an exhibition of her
powers as a maker of figure eights and cross-cuts.
"That's the junior captain," answered Grace. "I hope she won't fall,
because she's heavy enough to go right through the ice if she should have
a hard tumble."
"Suppose we stop watching her," suggested Tom. "I don't want to see her
take a header, and people who show off on skates always do so, sooner or
later."
They changed their course toward the middle of the pond, while Julia, who
was turning and circling nearer the shore, watched them from one corner of
her eye.
Suddenly Grace stopped.
"Julia! Julia!" she cried. "Miss Crosby!"
"What's the matter?" demanded Tom.
"Don't you see the danger flag over there? She will skate into a hole if
she keeps on. The ice houses are near here, and I suppose it is where they
have been cutting ice."
"Hello-o!" cried Tom, straining his lungs to reach the skater, who looked
back, gave her usual tantalizing laugh and skated on.
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