IN spite of the trainer's autocratic rule, the life of the team while in training was not just one long grind, without any recreation to break the monotony. Reddy, it is true, prohibited theaters and kindred amusements, because they necessarily meant late hours, and late hours, as the trainer well knew, meant decreased efficiency, both physical and mental. Nevertheless, he had no objection to the athletes playing quiet games of an evening, provided they were well up in their studies, and sometimes even contributed to the general enjoyment by spinning some yarn culled from his own vast store of "past performances." Whenever the members of the squad found him in a reminiscent mood, all other amusements were suspended, and they would listen attentively to the little trainer's reminiscences of victories won on field and track. In his day Reddy had taken part in almost every branch of sport, and could tell stories about them all. For some time this particular evening he had not uttered a word, however, and had sat listening to the conversation of his charges with a faraway look in his twinkling blue eyes. The boys had been talking of motorcycling, and had been discussing Bert's record-breaking run across the continent. In a lull of the conversation he spoke up. "Motorcycle racing is all right in its way," he said, "but for real sport on two wheels give me the old bicycling days. Why, we had more fun then at one meet than you guys have now in a whole season. I call to mind one time----" Reddy stopped to light the pipe that he had been carefully packing with rather rank tobacco, and there was a general movement toward him while he was taking the first few puffs. Feet and chairs scraped, and by the time he had his pipe pulling satisfactorily there was a ring of interested faces gathered about him. "I suppose you think I'm going to spin ye a yarn now, ye good-for-naughts, don't ye?" he inquired, with a ferocious glance around the circle. "If you back out now, Reddy," laughed Bert, "after getting us worked up this way, we'll all swear to throw the next game we play, just to get even with you." "Well, I suppose I'll have to satisfy you, that bein' the case," said Reddy, his assumed ferocity of demeanor melting down into a broad grin, "although 'tis not much of a tale at that." "'Twas in the palmy days of the bike, when everybody that could possibly scrape the price together owned one. A bicycle race in them days meant somethin', let me tell you, and people for fifty miles around would organize parties to go see it. "Well, I had the fever just like everybody else, and after a while, when I'd saved up enough, me and a friend bought a tandem machine. It cost a pretty penny all right, but it was a well-built machine, and had better stuff in it than most bikes you see nowadays.