The masked waterman glanced a look behind as if to
calculate his advantage, and then bending again to his pliant oar he
spoke, loud enough to be heard only by him who pressed so hard upon his
track.
"Thou hast deceived me, fisherman!" he said--"there is more of manhood
in thee yet than I had thought."
"If there is manhood in my arms there is childlessness and sorrow at the
heart," was the reply.
"Dost thou so prize a golden bauble? Thou art second; be content with
thy lot."
"It will not do; I must be foremost or I have wearied my old limbs in
vain!"
This brief dialogue was uttered with an ease that showed how far use had
accustomed both to powerful bodily efforts, and with a firmness of tones
that few could have equalled in a moment of so great physical effort.
The masker was silent, but his purpose seemed to waver. Twenty strokes
of his powerful oar-blade and the goal was attained: but his sinews were
not so much extended, and that limb which had shown so fine a
development of muscle, was less swollen and rigid. The gondola of old
Antonio glided abeam.
"Push thy soul into the blade," muttered he of the mask, "or thou wilt
yet be beaten!"
The fisherman threw every effort of his body on the coming effort, and
he gained a fathom. Another stroke caused the boat to quiver to its
centre, and the water curled from its bows like the ripple of a rapid.
Then the gondola darted between the two goal-barges, and the little
flags that marked the point of victory fell into the water.
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