“Oh you hot chocolates!” taunted the leaders, laughingly.
And then, still apparently for no reason, Frank sent his sled, which was on the right of Ned’s, diagonally across the course, in front of the sled behind, a rather dangerous proceeding.
“What’s he doing that for?” cried Ned. “Brakes there, Jerry, or we’ll run into him!”
Jerry jammed down the brakes, and only just in time, for their bobsled seemed suddenly to acquire new speed, and it almost crashed into the one ahead.
There was a scraping in the hard snow, which flew up in a shower behind, and several of the girls screamed. Then Ned cried:
“All right! Off brakes! Now we’ll beat him!”
For Ned saw on the course Frank had chosen to abandon, a long stretch of hard, icy snow, and he knew that his vehicle could acquire speed and momentum over there.
In a moment he steered for it, so that the positions of the sleds were reversed, Ned’s being on the right hand side going down.
On and on raced the sleds. That of the three chums was rapidly overtaking the rival coaster.
“Frank thought he’d get on an icier place by cutting across that way,” said Ned to Bob. “But he missed his guess. We’re going to win now.”
And as Bob and the others behind him looked, they saw Ned skillfully hold to the icy course. It gave them more speed, which seemed to be constantly on the increase. They were now so close to Frank’s bob that he dared not cut across again, had he so desired.
“Here we go!” cried Ned, as, having passed over a place where loose snow retarded them a bit, they shot out on to a spot that was solid ice. “Here’s where we win!”
And win they did. For a moment later the bottom of the slope was reached with Ned’s bobsled well in advance, and as there was only a straight course left on which to bring up, there was no chance for Frank to acquire further speed.
“We win! We win!” cried the boys on Ned’s vehicle, as they got off when the sled came to a stop. “We win!”
“Oh you hot chocolates!” shrilled the girls at their less lucky companions.
“Does whipped cream go with it, Bart?” asked one of the winning girls.
“Well, seeing that you whipped us, so to speak, I guess it does,” admitted Frank’s chum. The latter said nothing, but there was a glum look on his face as he got up from the steering wheel. He was a poor loser.