THE TENNIS MATCH
On their way to the Hall to wash and rest after their rather strenuous
exercise on the lake, Jo and Sadie encountered Nan, racket in hand,
just leaving the courts.
Nan's face was flushed and she was smiling with some secret enjoyment.
"Girls, I'm glad you came back," she greeted them eagerly. "I've the
funniest thing to tell you."
She waited to divulge "the funniest thing," however, until they had
reached the privacy of their own room. Then Nan threw her racket on the
bed and pirouetted gleefully about the room.
"What do you suppose Kate Speed has done now?" she cried, stopping
before her astonished chums.
"Anything for the K. of D. to get excited about?" asked Jo, eyebrows
raised.
"Not yet," chuckled Nan. "She's challenged me to a tennis match, to
find out who's the better man--I should say, girl."
"I could tell her that without any old tennis match," said Sadie
loyally, and in her exuberance Nan hugged her.
"Well, but it will be a lark!" she cried. "I'll enjoy nothing
better than licking Kate Speed properly in the open--with the whole
school--more or less--looking on."
"Sure," said Jo. "But suppose you get walloped yourself, Nan? What
then?"
Nan snapped her lingers airily.
"I refuse to consider impossibilities," she retorted haughtily, then
giggled and hugged them both again. "Oh, girls, it will be fun! This is
my chance to put that conceited Kate Speed out of the running for good
and all!"
Although they were passionately loyal to Nan, the other girls were not
so sure that their chum was a match for Kate Speed on the courts.
There was one thing Kate Speed could do exceptionally well--and that
was play tennis. She was, they considered, a more brilliant player than
Nan, although Nan was steadier and could keep her head much better in
emergencies.
While it would be a great triumph if Nan should win--how would they
feel if she lost?
"There would be no living in the same school with Kate Speed then,"
said Jo, as she discussed this unpleasant possibility with Sadie. "All
in all, Sade, I'm not overanxious for the match day to come."
"Nor I!" agreed Sadie ruefully.
But as the day of the match had been set for Saturday, then only three
days distant, the girls had scant time, fortunately, to nurse their
gloomy forebodings.
The school was all agog over the coming clash between the two who had
been rivals on the tennis courts almost since the opening day of the
year at Laurel Hall.
Popular sentiment was in Nan's favor. The majority of the students
wanted her to win. But there were some--faithful satellites of the rich
girl--who were rooting against her.
As Saturday approached one thing became certain--that, no matter which
side they favored, practically all the students of Laurel Hall would
turn out to see the match.
Saturday morning Jo and Sadie woke up with a terrible weight of anxiety
on their hearts.
Not so Nan. Usually the most modest of girls, in this instance she
seemed absolutely sure of herself. There appeared not a doubt in her
mind but what she could "wallop" Kate with the greatest ease.
Saturday morning fled by. Luncheon came, was over. Two o'clock--the
time set for the match--approached.
Jo and Sadie tried gamely to hide their trepidation from Nan, but they
were so nervous during the last hour that they ran away and hid until
it should be time to accompany Nan to the courts.
They came back five minutes before the time to find Nan testing her
racket and confidently smiling.
"Where have you girls been keeping yourselves?" she asked as they came
in. "I've been waiting for a quarter of an hour. All set? Let's go."
They went, and at the edge of the campus were met by a group of Nan's
friends and loyal adherents. By these they were borne triumphantly to
the courts.
Kate was there before them, engaged in animated conversation with a
group of her followers.
She frowned as she saw Nan, though Nan nodded and smiled with the
friendliness of one sportsman to another. For the moment Kate was not
Kate to Nan--an enemy whom it would be a joy to defeat. She was for the
time only a worthy antagonist against whose undoubted ability she was
testing her own.
The school had turned out for the occasion. The court was surrounded by
girls eager to see the fray. Some of them were standing, but for the
most part they were seated crosslegged on the ground, hugging their
knees and gleefully discussing the possibilities of the coming match.
The two girls most concerned approached the contest in
characteristically opposite manner.
Nan came on the court smiling, the racket in her left hand, her right
extended to clasp Kate's across the net.
Kate, on the contrary, made no motion to meet Nan half-way. She scowled
and ignored the outstretched hand of her antagonist.
Nan flushed and quickly lowered her hand.
There was an angry buzz about the courts, and one or two of Nan's
supporters cried out:
"For shame! Do you call that sportsmanship?"
But Nan was smiling again gayly.
On her toes she danced back to her end of the court, taking her
position about eight feet back of the net and to the right. For Nan
was essentially a net player; although she had been known, in doubles
with a partner who was also a net player, to cover the line with great
success.
Now, however, she chose the more familiar position, for she was
determined to beat Kate Speed.
"All right, Kate!"' she cried, swinging her racket. "First serve yours!"
"She's foolish," cried Jo. "Here she starts with the sun full in her
eyes and gives Speedy Kate first serve."
She half rose to her feet as though to remonstrate with Nan, but Sadie
pulled her back again.
"Let her alone," she cried. "Nan knows what she's doing."
"Let's hope so!" muttered Jo, and, frowning, sat back on her heels to
watch the play.
Kate Speed accepted the generosity of her adversary without protest--as
the Kate Speeds of this world will always accept as their right any
advantage offered them.
Nan waited, alert, half-turned from the net, both feet planted firmly
on the ground, her racket ready.
Kate tossed the ball and with the weight of her body behind the stroke,
sent a smashing service into the far left-hand corner of the court.
Running swiftly, Nan was there before the ball, and, with a lightning
stroke slashed it over the net and almost at Kate's feet. Kate, dancing
nimbly backward, struck at the ball, but not quite quickly enough. It
fell into the net, and a triumphant cry came from Nan's supporters.
"Love fifteen!"
Kate's face burned a dull red. She would not look at Nan as she
retrieved the ball.
From that on action was swift and furious.
Nan served and Kate smashed the ball back over the net to be met by
a clever backhand stroke from Nan that sent Kate scurrying toward
her base line. On her toes Kate reached for the ball and got it. Her
smashing return caught Nan off guard. Her racket twanged with the
impact of the ball, but the shot was low.
"Fifteen all," said Kate, and treated her adversary to a glance of
triumph.
The sun was worrying Nan. She wished that she had brought her eyeshade.
Jo saw the swift motion of hand across sun-dazzled eyes and was on her
feet in an instant.
"I'm going up to the room for something," she explained to Sadie.
But when she returned, Nan's sun shade dangling, Jo found she was too
late. Kate, playing like one inspired, had won three points in rapid
succession and with them had captured the first game.
Joe ran to Nan with the eyeshade, which her chum accepted gratefully.
"Thanks, Jo," she said, with a rueful smile. "I should have had this
during the last game!"
But even the eyeshade failed to turn the tide. Kate was in better form
than they had ever seen her. She seemed all over the court at once. She
developed an uncanny accuracy in placing her shots where her adversary
was not!
Nan appeared confused, dazzled by Kate's brilliant play. The score now
stood 4-0 in favor of Kate.
Kate's cronies were jubilant; Nan's friends correspondingly
downhearted.
"Kate's sort of cast a spell over her," Sadie worried. "I wish we could
do something to wake her up."
"Never mind," said Jessie Robinson, who had come up and seated herself
beside the chums. "Just watch out for a big comeback!"
This prophecy was soon, to some extent, justified. Nan drew herself
together and, with lips set doggedly, wrenched the next two games from
Kate.
They were won by "the skin of her teeth," as she afterward admitted.
But they were won, and they certainly made the score look a little
better. It stood now 4-2, in favor of Kate.
"Go it, Nan! Go it!" cried her friends from the sidelines, and Nan
waved her racket at them cheerfully.
But their pleasure was short-lived. Kate won the next two games swiftly
and with apparent ease.
"Game and set!" she cried, and triumphantly flung her racket over the
net.
In changing courts it was necessary for Nan to pass close to the spot
where Jo and Sadie and Jessie were seated.
"Nan," Jo cried in a pleading voice, "don't let Kate win! You can beat
her!"
"Jo," said Nan, turning a set face to her chum, "let me tell you a
secret. I'm going to!"
As Nan passed on Jo sank back on her heels again and gripped Sadie's
hand hard.
"She's riled, Sade! Watch out now! I bet we see some fireworks!"
And they did!
Nan possessed one great asset, and that was that she played best when
losing. Something stubborn and indomitable rose up in her and refused
to submit to defeat.
As she faced Kate for the first game of the second set, Jo and Sadie
saw this change in her. Their eyes shone.
"She's caught her stride!" Jo whispered. "Now, Speedy Kate, look out!"