Fast Girls

by Elise Hooper

  AFTER DINNER, LOUISE scrubbed the dishes as Mama settled the younger children in bed. The house’s creaks quieted and the sound of crickets floated over her as Papa opened the kitchen door to have his evening smoke on the back stoop. Louise sat at the table, awaiting her allotment of evening mending work. When Mama joined her, she took a few items from her basket, angled herself toward the light, pulled out one of Junior’s shirts, and handed it to Louise, pointing to the spot where a button needed to be sewn on. Mama bowed her head, placed her needle at one end of a tear in Papa’s gardener’s uniform, and began stitching. Moments later, Papa came back into the house, rested a hand on Mama’s shoulder, and looked at Louise.

  “When Dr. Conway arrived home this evening, he mentioned seeing you today. Said you were running along the train tracks like a bear was chasing you.”

  Louise’s hand with the needle froze midair. The last time she had seen Dr. Conway was seven years ago, when she had raced over to the man’s house, frantic to find Papa. Dr. Conway had been working in his home office, and when Louise spluttered out the story of what had gone wrong, he insisted the three of them ride back to the Stokes home in his automobile, but their speedy return was not enough to save little Grace. The tiny girl had spent four days unconscious, burns covering her small body, before she succumbed to her injuries.

  In a flash, Louise could be back in that moment when she entered the kitchen to find flames licking at little Grace’s pretty blue striped pinafore. That awful smell of burning fabric, hair, and skin could return to Louise all too easily and unexpectedly—when she brushed her hair in the morning; when she sat in English class contemplating an assignment; when she set the table for dinner. Each time, grief could still descend upon her with startling intensity that, even seven years later, left her reeling.

  Every night before Louise fell asleep, she replayed the memory of when she had found her sister, matches strewn around her, flames lighting the kitchen floor like fallen stars. She couldn’t help herself. Reliving that afternoon had become part of a sickening ritual for sleep and she couldn’t stop it. If she replayed the afternoon step by step, she slept deeply and dreamlessly, but if she tried to push the memory away, it prowled around the corners of her mind, rearing up and clawing throughout the night as she tried to sleep. Each time, she fixated on the moment when she froze, watching her sister scream. She had been slow to throw the tablecloth over Grace and beat at the flames, and even slower to run for help. Her legs had felt spongy and her feet ungainly as she made her way to Dr. Conway’s house. The panic binding her chest had left her unable to breathe, and she felt sick to her stomach. Why had she been so slow? Would Grace still be alive if Louise had run faster?

  Louise stared at the pale pink puckered burn scar along her left hand, the visible reminder of all that had gone wrong that horrible afternoon. In a flat voice, she said, “I was invited to try out for the Onteora Track Club. Dr. Conway must have seen me running with them earlier today.”

  Mama glanced up from her sewing.

  Her father took a seat at the table. “Did you make the team?”

  “Doesn’t matter because I’m not going to do it. There’s too much to do here.”

  “It’s true, you have responsibilities, but you’ve always loved to run. Is this something you want to do?” Mama asked.

  “No, ma’am.”

  Mama placed her mending on the table and shook out her hands, exchanging a look with Papa. “It strikes me that your sisters and brother are getting old enough to handle themselves a bit . . .” Her voice trailed off. The ticking of the kitchen clock filled the room. “Listen, Louise, what happened with Grace was an accident. It’s too big a burden for a girl your age to carry.”

  “It’s too big a burden for anyone to carry,” Papa said in a low tone.

  Mama bowed her head a moment. When she raised it, her eyes were shiny and she reached for Louise’s hand.

  “Dr. Conway said your running was a sight to behold. What you’ve got is a God-given gift, it is,” Papa said. An unmistakable glow of pride showed on his face.

  Mama’s hands, dry and calloused, gripped Louise’s tightly. “As long as you keep up on your schoolwork, you have our blessing to try this, see what happens. You’ll be going to the high school this fall. Seems like a good time to let your brother and sisters take on more responsibility.”

  “But they—”

  “I’ll handle them. It’ll be fine.”

  Louise considered how she had felt leading the pack as she raced past Coach Quain. For those few minutes, the pit of sorrow and guilt she carried had dulled. The self-consciousness she felt about her dark skin had eased. Her mind quieted and she existed only as a body in motion, powerful and free. She wanted to feel that way again.

  She nodded. “I’ll try it.”

  THE CHICAGO EVENING STANDARD

  July 30, 1928

  “Dispatch from the IX Olympiad: What’s the Matter with the Americans?”

  Amsterdam—American athletes have always run roughshod over the rest of the world in track and field events, but in the most stunning reversal in Olympic history, the men from the United States are experiencing one setback after another. Before shoving off from New York, Major Gen. MacArthur insisted his American team had nine gold medals “all sewn up,” but that prediction appears to be unraveling as three of those nine events have already been won by other countries. At this rate, the American flag won’t be waved from the winner’s podium once. Team managers and coaches are quick to point out that Amsterdam does not have its facilities ready, and the team is stuck living aboard the S.S. President Roosevelt and contending with everything from a leaky pool to tennis courts of differing sizes to a swampy track. Dutch engineers are busy at work fixing the venues.

  When Olympic officials advised the women’s swim and dive teams to train in the harbor, they headed to Paris on a shopping excursion. “If they think I’m dipping a toe into that icky water,” said perky fourteen-year-old swimming champion Miss Eleanor Holm of California, “they have another think coming!”

  The dreary weather is also being blamed as less than ideal for peak performances, but all nations are training under the same sky, and rain clouds do not appear to be targeting only the American athletes.

  Team managers have been grumbling about the lack of recovery time for the athletes. “With the Olympic trials a mere couple of days before departing for Europe, our fellows had to work too hard to qualify and now they’re out of steam,” explains one coach. And it is not just the men. Uncle Sam’s fleetest sprinter, Miss Elta Cartwright of California, is sick, leaving the door open for one of Canada’s speedy lady runners to win gold.

  But aside from unfinished facilities, bad weather, and illness, reports are surfacing that the main problem for American athletes might be that they are spending too much time in the buffet line aboard the S.S. President Roosevelt. It seems our athletes have been under the false impression that pie eating has been added as an Olympic event! In fact, the ship’s supply of ice cream ran out midway across the Atlantic. At last check with the team’s coaching staff, eating dessert does not count as training.

  When asked if he wanted to revise his initial prediction about the team’s success, Major Gen. MacArthur responded, “We have not come three thousand miles to lose gracefully, but rather to win, and win decisively. Just wait and see.”

  Well, we’re waiting.

  5.

  July 1928

  Fulton, Missouri

  DR. McCUBBIN HADN’T BEEN JOKING WHEN HE TOLD Helen that her summer would be quiet. She felt like she had been stuck in bed forever. Through the languid days of July, Helen read The Boxcar Children. She read it so many times, she started creating her own stories about Henry, Jessie, Violet, and Benny in her head, but one morning Ma left The Missouri Daily Observer next to Helen’s bed, and she picked it up. The paper was a couple weeks old, but it was something different.

  Helen thumbed through the sections until she noticed an artic
le titled “Chicago’s Betty Robinson to Sail for the Olympics,” and read about a sixteen-year-old girl from Chicago who could run so fast that she was being sent to Amsterdam, a small city in the Netherlands, to compete against athletes from every far-flung country on earth. Argentina, Estonia, Egypt, India, Japan, New Zealand, Rhodesia, South Africa—yes, everywhere, it seemed.

  Helen reached to her dresser and pulled her beloved globe onto her lap. Mama often quizzed her on the locations of various countries and cities and Helen had won a school geography bee the previous year. She spun the globe so the United States faced her and then she leaned in. She found Chicago and traced the letters of its name crawling across the blue of Lake Michigan. Slowly, she rotated the globe, sliding her index finger across the wide expanse of the Atlantic until she reached the coast of Europe and the huge green expanse of France. Just north lay a tiny blob of yellow marked Belgium and, above that, there was a splotch of pink labeled Netherlands. Quite a distance separated Chicago from the Netherlands. What would it be like to get on a ship and travel so far from home?

  Helen placed the globe on the bedspread next to her and clutched the newspaper closer, scanning the article to find where it described how athletes from countries all over the world would convene to participate in a series of competitions. All thoughts of The Boxcar Children paled next to the cast of characters described in the newspaper article. Boxers. Cyclists. Gymnasts. Equestrians. Soccer and field hockey players. Most of the athletes would be men, but a small group of women would also be competing, including Betty. This would be the first time women could compete in track and field events.

  A grainy photograph of the girl from Chicago caught Helen’s eye. A man stood next to her. Even in the black-and-white image, anyone could plainly see how tightly his arm wrapped around the girl’s shoulders, how wide his smile stretched. According to the article, the man was the girl’s father and it quoted him saying, “Without any sons, I never imagined I’d have a girl competing in athletics. I couldn’t be prouder of her.”

  Helen read his quote over and over. She couldn’t imagine her stern-eyed father ever saying something similar. Frank Stephens didn’t believe in spending time on doling out compliments. His life was one of singular focus: farming. He believed in operating his 140-acre farm the old-fashioned way: with guts and muscle. No newfangled John Deere machines for him, thank you very much. Even at ten years old, Helen understood that part of Pa’s disdain for tractors and threshers stemmed from his inability to pay for the equipment. He farmed his land with a horse and plow and dismissed what he called “the easy way to a dollar.”

  In the photo of Betty, her short blond hair curled to frame her face. Her grin glimmered off the page as if she hadn’t a care in the world. Helen smiled back at the image. She tried to forget the birthmark staining her forehead, her unruly hair, enormous feet, and clumsy limbs, but her smile slackened thinking of how her classmates taunted her with Helen the Huge and Smelly Hellie.

  She sighed, folding the article so the picture of Betty disappeared from view. Helen could run fast—none of the boys at school would dispute that—but being someone like Betty Robinson felt about as achievable as becoming Queen of England. Still, she opened the newspaper again to view the article once more.

  Could Betty really win?

  Helen pulled the page with Betty’s story from the newspaper and tucked it under her bed, vowing to keep her eyes out for more updates. She needed to see what would happen next to this girl.

  6.

  August 1928

  Amsterdam

  ABOARD THE FERRY ON HER WAY TO CENTRAL STATION, Betty drummed her fingers along the window’s railing. Clouds scudded low overhead, the morning’s downpour having done little to rid the air of humidity. It was the day of the 100-meter finals and she was the only American woman left competing. She wrapped her arms around her belly to stop the flip-flopping sensation inside her. Deep inhalations would help, but who wanted to breathe in the putrid stench of the canal’s brackish water?

  When Betty and her teammates arrived at the stadium, they exited the bus and stood on the sidewalk, shifting their weight from foot to foot, awed by the throngs of spectators bustling past and the honking from snarled traffic.

  Caroline reached out and squeezed Betty’s hand. “Good luck. Knock ’em dead.”

  Betty thanked her as the rest of the girls crowded round, rubbing her shoulders and slapping her back. Mrs. Allen brushed Betty’s hair off her forehead. “Go get changed and I’ll meet you in the locker room after settling the girls in some seats.”

  Betty said goodbye to her friends. They strolled away giggling about something and Betty watched them, twisting the edge of her Peter Pan collar between her fingers. She squared her shoulders and entered the long corridor to the locker room. The thud of her heels striking the ground echoed with each step she took. A metallic-smelling mixture of rainwater and newly poured cement wafted over her.

  She entered the locker room and found three Canadians gathered between a row of lockers, talking and laughing. In the next row, two Germans sat on the bench between the lockers, their expressions serious as they cleaned dirt from their running spikes. Betty passed them, found an empty row, dropped her bag on a bench, and slumped down next to it, gnawing on the cuticle of her index finger.

  Never had she felt so alone.

  If only Caroline or Elta was there with her. Even Dee would have been better than being alone. Her heel jiggled up and down, but she pressed on it to stop. I cannot be nervous anymore. I’ve got a job to do. She repeated these two sentences over and over. Each time she recited them, her mind cleared a little from the anxiety swirling inside it. She stood, shook out her legs, and hopped up and down a few times. Her shoulders dropped, the jitters in her belly settled. She closed her eyes, raised her hands above her head, and pictured herself leaning into the finish tape. Yes! Opening her eyes, she smiled, bent over her bag, and pulled out her white shorts and top, along with her navy-blue sweat suit.

  Once she’d changed, she sat down to put on her track shoes. First, she slid her foot into her left shoe and laced it, listening to the guttural sound of the German athletes talking.

  She started to slide her right foot into her other shoe, but her toe jammed inside.

  Perplexed, she lifted the shoe for closer inspection. Her breath caught.

  It was a second left shoe.

  Two left shoes! How had this happened? Panic rose inside her. She spun toward her bag, rummaging through it to find a shoe for her right foot. Nothing. She blinked. Could she run barefoot? Even if officials allowed it, which she doubted, the sharp surface of the track would ruin her feet. Clutching the shoe to her chest, she ran, limping unevenly on one shoe, toward the door of the stadium. With each step, the roar of the crowd became louder and louder. As she lunged for the doorknob, it opened toward her. Mrs. Allen stepped into the locker room, squinting as her eyes adjusted to the dim lighting.

  “Heavens, Betty, you nearly gave me a fright.” She raised a hand to her chest. “Are you ready, dear?”

  “I have two left shoes. I . . .” Betty stammered. “I own two pairs of track shoes and somehow I grabbed only the left ones this morning.” Saying the words out loud made her predicament real and she blinked back tears. “What am I going to do?”

  “All right, all right, don’t panic. You stay here. I’ll hurry down and speak with Coach Sheppard to see what he thinks. You go back and sit down.”

  “But what about my race? Doesn’t it start soon?”

  Mrs. Allen inspected her wristwatch. “Yes, dear, it does. Sit tight. I’ll be back in a jiffy.”

  Betty’s hands dropped to her sides and she returned to her bench and sat, her head falling into her hands. The Canadians passed by on their way to the doorway, looking curiously at her. Betty’s face burned. Somewhere nearby, a leaky faucet dripped, each drop echoing through the otherwise silent room. Her throat tightened and tears burned at the corners of her eyes, but she blinked them away. T
his was not the time to fall apart.

  From a distant corner of the locker room, a door slammed. Footsteps slapped along the floor, getting louder and louder. “Betty? Betty? Where are you?” Caroline rounded the corner and stopped, panting. “Whew, that was close. Here’s your shoe, but there’s no time to put it on now. Officials are checking racers into your event. Come on!” She thrust Betty’s right shoe at her.

  Betty grabbed it and chased after Caroline. “How in the world did you get this so quickly?”

  “You better forgive Dee for all her snoring. You know how she was planning to catch a later ferry?” Caroline pushed out of the locker room door and studied the track below. “It looks like the judges are taking a quick break—put on your shoes now, but hurry. Before she left our cabin, Dee noticed two right shoes and had the presence of mind to figure out what you had done and take one for you. She found us in the stadium and gave it to me. What a lucky break, huh?”

  Crouched down, lacing up her shoes, Betty sucked in her breath, amazed. Around her, colorful flags waved and cigarette smoke clouded over the crowd. People sang and called out to the athletes in languages she couldn’t understand. The noise was deafening, so loud that it became meaningless. A background roar. She peered through the thicket of people surrounding her, knowing the track lay somewhere below. Within minutes, she would be racing and the outcome would be decided. She just needed to push forward.

  “Let’s go,” urged Caroline, turning toward Betty, her eyes wide with worry.

  An odd sense of calm descended over her. “I’m ready.”

  BETTY TOOK HER position at the start, bent over, and dug into the cinder with a trowel the way Coach Price had shown her, to create two small indentations that would hold her feet in place when she assumed her crouched starting position. When the divots were in place, she sat back to survey her work; the spacing between the two appeared acceptable. She laid down her trowel, eyeing her competitors. The two German girls bobbed up and down in place to warm up. The three Canadians stretched their quads. All the women wore serious, grim expressions.