llows employed at the boathouse.
While it lay in the water, before I got in and took my place,
anyone stooping over it might unobserved have passed his hand under
it and have pushed the nail through.

"I never said anything about it. I had been beaten; there was no
use making a row and a scandal over it, especially as I had not a
shadow of proof against anyone; but I was certain that he was not
so fast as I was, for during practice my time had been as nearly as
possible the same as that of the man who beat him with the greatest
ease, and I am convinced that for once I should have got the better
of him had it not been for foul play."

"That was shameful, Captain Mallett," Bertha said, indignantly. "I
wonder you did not take some steps to expose him."

"I had nothing to go upon, Bertha. It was a case of suspicion only,
and you have no idea what a horrible row there would have been if I
had said anything about it. Committees would have sat upon it, and
the thing would have got into the papers. Fellows would have taken
sides, and I should have been blackguarded by one party for hinting
that a well-known University man had been guilty of foul practices.

"Altogether it would have been a horrible nuisance; it was much
better to keep quiet and say nothing about it."

"I am sure I could not have done that, Captain."

"No, but then you see women are much more impetuous than men. I am
certain that after you had once set the ball rolling, you would
have been sorry that you had not bided your time and waited for
another contest in which you might have turned the tables fairly
and squarely."

"He must be hateful," the girl said.

"He is not considered hateful, I can assure you. He conceived a
grudge against me, and has taken immense pains to pay me out, and I
only trust that our paths will never cross again. If so, I have no
doubt that I shall again get the worst of it. At any rate, you see
I was not without justification when I said that though I did not
believe in the Mal Occhio, I had reason for having some little
superstition about it."

"I prophesy, Captain Mallett, that if ever you meet him in the
future you will turn the tables on him. Such a man as that can
never win in the long run."

"Well, I hope that your prophecy will come true. At any rate I
shall try, and I hope that your good wishes will counterbalance his
power, and that you will be a sort of Mascotte."

"How tiresome!" the girl broke off, as there wa