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Show THUNDER FROM M ft f) T STAND S Hughes' car. And i they hadn't but what was the use of thinking think-ing that now! It was too late. The sharp intake of her breath, the shriek of fright as the small car swerved, were in his ears; the taste of blood was salty on his lips.- He laughed shortly; it was not blood on his lips, of course, but perspiration. And Lefevre was stiil dancing on the other side of the court like a satyr grinning Len could do nothing with the ball. His racquet had gone dead and heavy. He could not control his motions. Legs and arms were listless. Lefevre was constantly pushing him to the base line, bombarding bom-barding him with scorching drives. And the insufferable sing-song voice from above kept up its chant in French: "Monsieur Lefevre's game. Monsieur Lefevre leads one love in the third set." The ball came back toward him and he slashed it back at Lefevre's feet, the force of the drive knocking knock-ing the French player off balance. His next service was deadly, with more spin than any previous service ser-vice in all his career. He crossed over to the opposite side of the baseline, poised and again served. Vainly Lefevre strained to reach the ball and failed. Two successive success-ive aces "Monsiuer Rollins' game. Score in games two-all in the third set. Monsieur Lefevre leading in sets, two-love." (To be continued) CHAPTER IX Synopsis Icn Rollins, tennis nee, dream-ai dream-ai betmr on the Davis Cup rf? Then he Ml in love with !f'"e Worlhlndton, but Grace JooWn't marry a man who re-lied re-lied tennis as his life's work. E Kve up his cherished an.bi-'"Jlparllv an.bi-'"Jlparllv because of his love r Grace, partly because of bad jurv o hi. ankle-and they ; " re' married. But when his re- " erv was complete his old love moved too strong and he joined he Davis Cup team, in spite of Grace's threat to leave him if he goes abroad. As Len walked off the court, Swanstrom, Hughes, Clark asd Frank Wheatley came rapidly forward for-ward faces beaming, congratulatory congratulat-ory Through lips tightly set he murmured: "That's number one!" ud though the others did not altogether al-together understand, they laughed and slapped his shoulders and told nlm how splendidly he had played. The next day he sat silently between be-tween Clark and Swanstrom and watched the French doubles team vanquish Hughes and Wheatley in a torrid five-set struggle. In the clubhouse Hughes was slowly undressing; Wheatley seated seat-ed on a bench looked up as they approached and there were tears In his eyes. "Tough luck," Swanstrom Swan-strom said truthfully, with kindness. kind-ness. "The sort of match either , team might have won. They had I the breaks." Neither of the doubles dou-bles players spoke. The captain ! slapped Wheatley on the back. From further down the hall came I the cheerful, exultant voice of the victors. France now only needed one more match to keep the Davis Cup from being taken across the sea to America. Len received two letters that night. He opened the one from Dan Worthington first. Enclosed within a plain sheet of paper was a check for fifty thousand dollars. dol-lars. Automatically he put it in his wallet. Then he slit the lavender laven-der envelope, slowly opened the folded sheets and read:- "Len, Father has arranged for a speedy divorce. Richard has asked me to marry him on the second of August, his birthday, and I see. no reason rea-son ..." Slowly, tenderly he folded the letter and put it in his pocket. Tears, hot and stinging, shamelessly shame-lessly burned his cheeks. He thought: "I must show them I'm a good sport, a good loser. I'll send them flowers. Yes, I must not forget that to send Grace flowers. And also send back that check tomorrow." Clark, covered with perspiration, perspira-tion, eyes wild but happy, came through the door. "Got him!" he said breathlessly, and fell heavily heav-ily into the chair next to Len. "That's fine," Len said, without enthusiasm. "Now," said Clark, still breathing breath-ing hard, "if you can do what no one expects . you can possibly do " he paused abruptly. "Didn't you sleep any last night?" Swanstrom added. "You look wrecked. I'm almost inclined to send Wheatley out there in your place." Len smiled grimly and went toward to-ward the door. "I'm all right," he said,, arid went out. At another time he would have been conscious of the full weight of his responsibility. But on this particular day, at this particular time, he felt free from it all. He was just going out to play a couple cou-ple of sets of tennis. He would do the very best he could. There would, he knew, be little dash or fire to his performance; it would be the cold, mechanical play' of a man who had been trained to be accurate. So there had been a baby. Perhaps Per-haps a boy. And he was would have been the father. But it was dead. Dead because The sun was terribly hot and there was little air. The stands remained re-mained strangely, ominously quiet. Soon he realized that Lefevre, white teeth gleaming against dark skin, was before him offering . a hand. awe-inspiring, as they changed courts. "I love you, Len, terribly." And the way she quivered when he held her close to him. How difficult diffi-cult it was, after all, to peer into the future. That first time they ever had been each other, did either believe then that their lives would turn out like this? Another game was over and the Frenchman, smiling slightly as they passed each other, led four to one. Yet somehow it did not seem important; it did not matter much whether he won or not. He returned return-ed the smile automatically. And that idyllic week, they had known together in sunny Florida. Shoulders touching as they sat on the beach overlooking the blue-green blue-green water, trembling. He had loved her very much then and always would. He did not knefw the ball had passed iim. It was the wind in his eyes, of course, that blurred his vision. But there was no wind. Grimly he gritted his teeth and stood waiting, but something some-thing was wrong. At last he realized that Lefevre must have won the first set and that he was standing foolishly at the baseline awaiting the serve. He walked slowly to the table and sucked a lemon; washed his face with a towel though the perspiration, perspira-tion, despite the heat, was slight. He had not yet cabled the flowers. flow-ers. Perhaps he should have done so before coming here to the Stade. He must remember to attend at-tend to it immediately after the match was over. They -were playing again now and the Frenchman was pressing the advantage he had gained by Would Justin still give him that manager's job in Indianapolis if he wanted it? In New York it was only early morning. Let's see, the match had started at 2:30; it must be shortly after three now. Why, in New York it was only seven o'clock. Plenty of time. Plenty of time to cable Justin and Grace. She still loved him. More than she did Whyte. Of that he would be sure, always. Perhaps if he but it was too late. Yet was it? Why not feign sudden illness ill-ness and no, he could not, must not, do that. It was well, it just wasn't what the English called cricket. Yet he might, during the next change, jot down two messages mes-sages and have the boy send them. He might. But he knew he never would. In motion pictures, perhaps, per-haps, things were done that way, but not in real life. Real life was different. Conventional, inexorable, inexor-able, cruel. Zing zing zing sound of perfectly timed racquet meeting a white fuzzy ball. Lefevre dancing on legs that were spry and tireless; tire-less; himself, long-limbed, cool, deliberate, moving back and forth, up and down, arm making arcs and circles as the ball shot off his racquet. Perspiration was beginning begin-ning to come only now, and vaguely vague-ly he wondered at it. His country's coun-try's cause should stir him to greater efforts, but there were other things other things which crowded all else out of his mind. He won the next two points. Lefevre frowned. If ne had gone out to Easthamp-ton Easthamp-ton after her at once, they'd never ne-ver have gone for that ride in He walked to the far end of the court and as the ball came toward him stroked instinctively. He was responding without volition. voli-tion. But the racquet met the ball squarely, evenly, and sent it spinning spin-ning over the net within the boundaries boun-daries of the other white-chalked area. How long they warmed up he did not know. The referee's voice came questioning ques-tioning from above. Len did not move. Then suddenly, Lefevre, like a bird in flight, was rising on one toe and his racquet made an arc in the air. The ball missed the service box. "Fault!" came from above in French. Again Lefevre Le-fevre was up on one toe and again the ball came toward Len. This time it landed inside the white line and mechanically he swung at it. The gut meeting the soft ball seemed to vibrate through his entire en-tire body the switch which electrified elec-trified him into action. . . Len remembered how Grace had come to him from the train the evening she had left home. To live on twenty dollars a week with him. Incredible! Wasn't that bravery? brav-ery? Why, she was the most courageous,, cour-ageous,, the loveliest he swung but the ball seemed suddenly heavy hea-vy and landed in the net. "Monsieur "Mon-sieur Lefevre? leads,' came ' the shrill, voice from above, "one, love; change, please." One love, One love. It reverberated reverber-ated through his brain. One love was all he would ever know. Grace. Except, of course, this other and (as she claimed) greater great-er love Oh, yes, it was his service. ser-vice. He threw the ball above his head. The racquet was light in his hand as he swung. The ball hit the ground on the other side and twisted sharply. Lefevre, off balance, bal-ance, knocked it outside. Len felt suddenly elated and as quickly depressed. de-pressed. . So she was being married today. to-day. Today of all days. To Richard Rich-ard Whyte. By the time he walked walk-ed off the court, in victory or defeat, de-feat, she would no longer belong to him. He felt a- soft, small hand trembling on his arm as the paternal, pa-ternal, kindly minister read from the Bible; ami outside it was raining. rain-ing. It was raining., drumming against the window panes and the radio played on The racquet swept the ball toward the spot; Lefevre reached it but could not 1 return the ball with strength. He went to the net and smashed, slanting ft off at a sharp angle, j There was sudden thunder from the stands and the boy was handing hand-ing three balls to Lefevre. Were they even up in games then? She was being married. And he was here in Europe, playing tennis. ten-nis. "Father has arranged for a speedy divorce." He, Len Rollins, was worth fifty thousand dollars now, if he cared to be. Well, he could do a lot with fifty thousand dollars. Travel, keep on playing without worry about the future. There it was again, damn it! Tennis. Always tennis! Grace had left him because be-cause of It. And now she was marrying mar-rying Richard Whyte. The ball sped back and forth across the net, Its soft hardness against the gut causing the racquets rac-quets to sing. And then it was past him and there was a roar from the stands which continued, short but winning the first set. His attack was relentless, his recoveries magnificent. mag-nificent. Only Len's service saved him from rapid annihilation. That and his occasional net play. But it was impossible for him to concentrate concen-trate long upon the little white sphere Lefevre kept persistently returning to him. Always a picture pic-ture of Grace's face smiling and radiant, or a bit frightened and tearful intervened. He chased back, back, after a long lob, hit it from over his shoulder. shoul-der. Lefevre at the net "killed" the sensational return. "Monsieur Lefevre leads in the second set, two games to one." Two games to one! That all the margin of difference? Oh, yes, and there was one set already to the Frenchman's credit. But what matter? mat-ter? Eventually he, Len Rollins, would win or lose. He'd much rather ra-ther win, of course, but if he lost |