fully aware that they were now traveling at a speed that had been impossible to them that same morning.
"Stop paddling! Back water! Stop backing!" With deft movements of his own paddle, Dick swung the canoe in gently against the float.
Out of the boathouse near by came Bob Hartwell.
"I've been watching you fellows," he called.
"That's fair enough," Dick answered.
"You're doing some better than you did this morning," Hartwell went on.

"You've almost got our stroke." "Almost ?" repeated young Prescott, raising his eyebrows.

"Haven't we improved a good deal on your Preston High School action ?" Bob Hartwell began to laugh.
"You fellows from Gridley are always world beaters, aren't you ?" he demanded good-humoredly.

"At first, I thought it was all brag on your part, and that you fellows were suffering from enlarged craniums complicated with bragitis.

But now I begin to see that you talk confidently just in order to convince yourselves that you can't be beaten at anything.