Free The City of Gold and Lead (The Tripods) by John Christopher Page B

it took my mind off my own prospects. He jumped well, and it was clear that there were only two others who might match him. They were before him in the order, and on the first jump there was a matter of inches between their marks, with the rest out of the running. On the second jump their results were much the same, but this time Beanpole outdistanced them to take the lead. I saw him walk back from the pit, brushing sand from his leg, and thought: he has it now.
    One of the others fell badly short on the final jump. But the second, a gangling freckle-faced boy whose hair sprouted in bright ginger tufts through the silver mesh of the Cap, did much better and his jump put him in the lead. The difference was nine centimeters—about four inches by our English measurement—which was not much in itself but disheartening at this stage. I watched Beanpole tense himself, run down the grassy track, hurl his body through the humid air. A cry went up: it was quite clearly the best jump of the day. But the cry turned to a groan of disappointment as the judge’s flag was lifted. The jump had been disqualified, and the ginger-headed boy had won.
    Beanpole went off by himself. I followed him, and said, “It couldn’t be helped. You did your best.”
    He looked at me with a blank expression. “I steppedon the board. I haven’t done that since the early days of training.”
    “You were putting too much effort into it. It could happen to anybody.”
    “Was I?”
    “Of course you were.”
    Beanpole said, “I wanted to win. And also I was frightened about what came next. I thought I was trying.”
    “We could all see you were.”
    “In the High Jump,” he said, “I went to pieces at the crucial moment. And this time I got myself disqualified quite stupidly and unnecessarily. I thought I was trying, but was I?”
    “What you’re saying is stupid. You were just trying too hard.”
    The blankness had turned to misery.
    “Leave me alone, Will,” he said. “I don’t want to talk at the moment.”
    • • •
    The boxing finals were early in the afternoon, and my section provided the second contest. The boy I was fighting was a North German, a fisherman’s son, smaller even than I was, but compact and well muscled. I had seen him box and knew that he was good, a fast mover and a hard hitter.
    For the first minute we circled each other warily. Then he came in at me with a quick left and right, which I parried, and I counterattacked, forcing him to the ropes and getting in a right cross to the ribs whichmade him grunt as breath was forced from his lungs. But he got away before I could do any further damage. We fought at a distance again, but in the last thirty seconds I carried the fight to him and scored a few times. It was my round, I thought.
    I went out confidently for the second. He backed away, and I followed. He was almost on the ropes. I threw a left hook at his jaw. It did not miss by much, but it missed. And the next thing I remembered was lying on the canvas, with the referee standing over me, counting.
    “. . . Drei, vier, fünf  . . .”
    It was an uppercut, Beanpole told me later, which did not travel far and caught me under the chin, lifting and dumping me. All I knew then was that I was simultaneously floating in a haze of pain and rooted to the hard boards beneath me. I supposed I ought to get up, but I did not see how I was going to set about it. Nor did there seem much urgency. There appeared to be long intervals between the words that were being chanted, at once close above me and from an echoing distance.
    “. . . Sechs, sieben  . . .”
    I had lost, of course, but I had done my best, at any rate. Like Beanpole. I saw his set, bitter face through the haze. “I thought I was trying, but was I?” And what about me? I had been hit because I had dropped my guard. Had something at the back of my mind wanted to do that? Was there even now the beginning of a feeling: you did your best and lost, so no