DAVE slipped into the Malleson household economy without disarranging in the slightest degree its naturally flexible working. He occupied no more space than a shadow, and his goings and comings were accomplished with that unobtrusiveness that he seemed born for. By this time it was clear that Dave could be counted upon never to sprout into one of those impudent youngsters who so often develop from an infanthood of smothered desires. But he was not spiritless; rather was he dominated by what Malleson called a "precocious decency" that made him good company for all except the most boisterous companions. He had a lively, if inarticulate, sense of gratitude, and a love for Emma not far short of idolatry. It was an affection not manifested in dumb mooning; it ran to an alert thoughtfulness that kept vigil to do her constant little favors.

Of Mr. Malleson Dave stood somewhat in awe. It was difficult for him to appraise the man-to-man attitude that marked the intercourse of John and his father.

One Sunday afternoon when the three were out walking, John suddenly ejaculated:

"Dave, are you afraid of this Dad of ours? Sometimes you act like it. Honestly, he's harmless---aren't you, Dad ?"

"When not riled, yes," responded Malleson, with false grimness.

"No, I'm not afraid," returned Dave, flushing, "but I don't always know what to say."

"Well," went on John, "you needn't worry. He's never licked me yet."

"Too much trouble," grunted Malleson. "Here---watch this one-one-two--um----watch it! There. Eleven jumps. Beat that, if you can, kids."

They had stopped on a broad level by the river and were skipping stones across the water that at this point lay dark and steady as a sheet of oil.

"Oh, I'm not scared of lickings, much," boasted Dave; "the only thing that worries me is not knowing how people do things. Nobody ever told me how to act, except the teachers at school, and they don't talk about what goes on outside. You can't make much of that. Say"---he straightened up and turned to Malleson with great earnestness---"do you think a kid that---that started like I did will ever learn to know just what to do, always---like you, or like John here?"

"A masterpiece of irony, if he only knew it," chuckled Malleson to himself. Aloud he answered, seriously:

"You will, Dave, if you learn from the same teacher---that's Mother. You listen to her and you can't go wrong. She keeps us all straight."

The last words had no mockery in them. The man's eyes were brooding over the gray river; the long fingers that held a flat stone ready for hurling grew listless and forgot their play. John glanced up curiously, and for a single instant thought his father looked lonely and old. The boy felt a queer impulse to clutch that relaxed hand, to press upon it the support of his own strength. Some small and arrogant spirit, deep within him, stirred and turned over comfortably to sleep again.

The high school days raced by; the routine of work and play rose imperceptibly in their scale of complexity, never too rapidly for John's adjustment. He grew in mind as he grew in body; trim, alert, and under a hard, cool control.

Rationality sat watch by the sloughs and fires of adolescence, said Yes and No at appropriate times, and rarely lost all voice. Occasionally he plunged into fooleries, but with swift recovery; concretely, he once defied the Principal and the entire school board and was suspended for a month; several times he fought passionately with Mattie, and repented; once he got drunk, and did not repent, verbally, until Malleson, acting as knight for Emma's grief, threatened him with the first sound licking of his life.

In the fall of 1913 he was to enter the State University. The choice of a college had evolved from recurrent roundtable discussions, in which Malleson, Emma and John himself took part, while Dave listened wistfully.

His mother had at first contended for an eastern university.

"John could make the most of himself at one of the places where a fine old tradition has grown up. And if he's to study law he'd do better to choose Harvard than a state college which has to cater to so many students who are looking for vocational training or business courses. Besides---I don't like co-ed schools."

"Aha! Emma," chuckled her husband, "there's your real dread---les femmes. Justified, too, with John such a rakehell."

John squirmed and looked bored. His father continued:

"But the other side of the case is that the best lawyers are the ones who have the biggest variety of social contacts, are sensitive to the feel of all sorts of people. Now there are more kinds of people at our State University than there are at Cambridge or New Haven, even discounting the coeds. By the way, to discount them would be one of the worst mistakes an embryonic lawyer could make. Women are the natural agents of crime; not often guilty themselves, but capable of carrying illegality as some people do typhoid."

"Bunk!" protested his wife laughingly. "Men say that to excuse their own---typhoid. But we're off the subject."

"Seems to me there's a practical reason for my going to State," said John. "If I'm going to practice law in Indiana I'd gain by going to the home law school and getting acquainted with home citizens."

"What a sordid reason! Still, a lawyer must---Dave, what do you advise?"

"Well," said Dave slowly, "John could make the baseball team, I'm sure."

"The first sensible argument yet!" exclaimed Malleson. "That settles it."

As a matter of fact the decision was made in a talk between the parents when banter was left out. John's inclination was a consideration so was the expense. Finally Emma yielded when she reflected how pleasant it would be to have her boy not far from home.

The night before John's departure witnessed the typical domestic drama of trunk-packing, where the spirit of things portentous mingles inextricably with the spirit of things matter-of-fact. Socks, shoes, the warm sweater with the high school monogram, the two dozen new handkerchiefs, the neatly folded shirts, the suits pressed and laid out as for a burial---all there, visible and prosaic, under the familiar light of the home lamps. But there too a pair of hands, folding each garment just so, patting, lingering with careful little touches, meant to he indelible. . .

John could not keep his eyes from his mother's hands. Small hands, but how hard working---how long working for him! He could not remember ever watching those hands before, and yet now they seemed always to have been nearer than his own. . .

Emma rose at last with a sigh from her bending over the trunk.

"Everything in, except your big coat. You'll need it for the football games. See---there's just room enough in the middle tray. Will you get it for me? It's in The Thing that Lifts Up."

The Thing that Lifts Up-the words were a formula that with unintentional magic took John whisking back through old familiar scenes. All his life he had known of The Thing that Lifts Up. When he was small, and as yet unused to the delight of exploration, The Thing had been to him only a mysterious term, important because it applied unmistakably to something under the same roof with himself. Later he was disappointed to find that it was simply a sort of chest, built against the wall under the bay-window in the upstairs hall. It could not properly be just a chest, for it served also as window-seat. The hinged lid justified the lift-up part of the title. Besides holding perpetually such staples as sweaters, goloshes and winter coats, it was the ultimate repository of all lost articles. When one had searched everywhere else, one looked in The Thing that Lifts Up.

John switched on the hall light, took out the coat which lay on the top of a neat pile, and let the lid snap down. He was startled by the vicious, hostile finality of the sound. Past his shoulder the light glinted on the enamel of the cover. The white surface shone with a remote, icy indifference, from which all familiarity had departed. Suddenly his throat felt thick and tight. He turned away, furiously recovered himself---as his father would say, "pulled himself together." Hell! Homesick before he started? . . With unnecessary violence he descended the stairs.

Mrs. Snyder, Wink's mother, had come in, bringing in one hand a loaf of nut-bread for John, and with the other guiding Katherine Jane, a four-year-old daughter. Katherine had caused something like consternation in the Snyder family at the time of her birth. It would not be precisely accurate to say that she was unexpected, but it would be hyperbole to assert that pæans of praise were sung at her coming.

"It's all right," Mr. Snyder had confided to Malleson, looking about him a bit wildly, "it's all right, but somehow---unnecessary. Just finished bringin' up Wilbert when---oh, well---it's all right!"

The baby soon made a place for herself, and to the complete disgust of Wink developed the clearest, most piercing voice in the neighborhood.

"Gawd, how that baby can yell!" he complained to John. "She can even drown out the noise of my lathe, and you know what a racket it makes."

However, age moderates all things, and Katherine at four had at least learned that a judicious observance of silence between outbursts made shouting all the more effective.

"Good evening, John," greeted Mrs. Snyder, puffing industriously, "so you're---off for college. Isn't it---wonderful to think that these children---of ours, Mrs. Malleson, are starting---out into the world. Wilbert has what he calls advance---credit at Purdue. Goes day after tomorrow. It's too bad the boys---can't---go together. They've always been such friends. Why---do you remember, long-before Katherine there was born they---"

"Mamma can y'ave drink---Mamma can y'ave drink--- Mamma can y'ave drink 've wat---Mamma can y'ave drink---Mamma can y'ave drink"---interjected Katherine, who probably did not want a drink, but was merely practising. A glass of water was brought and poured into her, bringing temporary appeasement.

Malleson and Mr. Reynolds, having finished their cigars, joined the group. The round little man bowed ceremoniously, and blinked like an owl in the light. He combined an old-time punctilio of gesture with extreme plainness of speech, as if he felt that by softening his physical deportment he might without offense express his opinions in all their integrity. All his opinions concerned politics, all were Democratic, and all were fervent. Though he had never held a political office in his life---"partly because of my shape," he used to say-Mr. Reynolds was a power in city elections. Indeed, his editorials in the Journal were so long and so numerous that they had attracted attention throughout the state, and especially during Bryan's campaign of 1896 were felt to have exerted an unquestioned though enigmatic influence upon the tip-state returns.

"You two have been talking politics again," accused Emma, brushing a strand of hair from her hot forehead. "I can tell by your secretive expression. You're worse than we women."

"If you women, and you especially, Mrs. Malleson, would wake up to the influence you can exert toward better---"

"What has the poor Mayor done now, Mr. Reynolds?" asked Emma cheerily. "Maybe I will get after him."

"It's not the Mayor. It's this lazy husband of yours, and he's not done anything---that's just the trouble. Why, do you know"---Mr. Reynolds bent forward in deadly earnestness---"do you know that Malleson here is the one man in this part of the state who could---"

"Sh---Reynolds!" interrupted Malleson, "Mrs. Snyder here is listening and she's a Republican. Don't give the game away. The Republicans don't know that I'm the one man who could."

"Bah!" snorted Mr. Reynolds, throwing up his hands in disgust.

"The Snyders won't be Republicans when you run for office, Mr. Malleson," asserted that lady stoutly. "You---try us and see."

"Well"---began Malleson.

"Mamma let's go home---Mamma---home---home---home----Mamma let's"---exploded Katherine, swollen with her long silence---"home---home---Mamma let's go ho---Mamma---"

Under cover of the storm John had escaped, to say his farewells to Mattie---a proceeding imperative and at the same time delicate. His was the always-interesting rôle of the young-man-going-away, of whom is required simultaneously the hard stare of challenge forward to the world, and the tender, backward look, pity-touched, for the girl left behind. As he walked the half-block to Mattie's home he felt that his heart and his head were balancing nicely. Normally the equilibrium might have held. But not to-night. Mattie was not alone. Comfortably by her side lounged Harry Cameron.

The young-man-going-away had an impulse to single murder, then to double murder, and then beyond both to what he felt would be unappeasable contempt. Immediately the friendly Cameron was exonerated, and became merely an annoyance, like an insect, while Mattie leered at them both from the unspeakable eyes of a coquette. This hard aspect of affairs lasted beyond the few seconds John spent in walking up the pavement to the porch. They greeted him cordially; he greeted them stiffly, and winced to see how confoundedly pretty the girl looked, for all her perfidy.

"Mattie tells me you're starting for college to-morrow," said Cameron, apparently without guile. "Old boy, you're lucky! I'd give anything I've got---or the Old Man's got---if I could go. But no chance."

"Why not?" asked John indifferently.

"Can't scrape up the dough," responded the other cheerfully. "I've two kid brothers and a sister coming along, you know. The Old Man says he has to distribute his cash so that all of us get through high school but he can't help us any further than that. So I'm working---shipping room at Singer's."

"I think that's fine---getting a job so soon," declared Mattie. "Did you know, John, that I've a notion to hunt a job too?"

John was startled. He hated the idea of Mattie's working; it disarranged cherished imaginings in which he figured pretty conspicuously as protector. Furthermore, he was annoyed; he resented the kinship of destiny that would seem to exist between Mattie and Cameron if they both felt obliged to work. It made him an outsider. Yes, by heavens! Worse than that: it made him an idler, stilt dependent upon his parents. And that's what Mattie meant to insinuate by her question! Plain as day! And that's all she could think of to say, the last night before he left. Well, by thunder! And that both of a Cameron! Sitting there showing no signs of moving. And Mattie not caring. Well, by God!

"Sorry, but I've got to run along," he said, rising briskly. "Things to pack, you know. Have to see some people up the street, too. So long, Harry. Good-bye, Mattie."

He shook hands abruptly, and was off with long strides, up Michigan Street, in the direction away from home. He flattered himself that in spite of the fury at his heart his last words had been admirably casual. No such monkey-business as that with him!

There were no people he wished to see up the street. There were no people he wished to see anywhere. Butting furiously through the unoffending darkness, he told himself over and over that here again Dad's philosophy proved itself true. Depend only upon yourself-that's the only way to be sure of peace. Be hard---hard---hard! No-hold on. Dad didn't say be hard. Still, he must have meant that. Probably he'd never been mixed up with a girl like Mattie.

This point in his cogitations coincided with his reaching the third cross-street. His emotions tapered down, as he himself descended the gentle slope toward Leeper Park and the river. By the time he had arrived at the middle of the bridge, where he stopped to look over the rail, his spirit was ready to welcome whatever Byronesque appeasement it might discern in the dark, impersonal tranquillity of the water. His rage had given place to a sort of melancholy, which was no less genuine for all that he felt it to be appropriate. After all, perhaps he had been hasty. It was possible that in all the years Mattie had known him she had not comprehended what manner of man he was. He recalled how she had laughed innocently one day, when he had read her "My Last Duchess," with sympathetic emphasis on the line, "And I choose never to stoop." A man who never stooped would naturally be hard for a simple girl to understand. And then, again---perhaps Mattie hadn't asked Cameron to call, but was too kind to hurt the fellow's feelings by snubbing him.

Mingled with these mitigating considerations, a new annoyance crept in. It occurred to John that his unceremonious departure from the porch might have seemed impetuous rather than devastating. It might have seemed---boyish! He squirmed at the thought and glared down at the river.

Several pedestrians glanced at him curiously. A fat policeman, doubtless morbidly hopeful of a suicide to vary the futility of his night beat, eyed him encouragingly from under the light at the end of the bridge. John finally turned slowly toward home. It was about eleven o'clock. His anger had cooled, and he cursed himself for a fool in having run away. How petty such impulses really were! A fellow of his age . . . starting off to college . . . . Dear little Mattie! He had been cruel. He'd write her a letter the minute he reached Bloomington. His train left too early for him to see her in the morning. That reminded him---he'd better speed up, to get home and catch some sleep.

In spite of his resolution his pace slackened as he approached the Joyce home. All dark; porch-swing deserted and motionless. Mattie had probably gone about, locking the doors, pulling down the blinds, putting things to rights in this little house where she had said she must always stay. Then, creeping up to bed, and to sleep, and then to wake in the morning to the same round of small happenings, the same gentle, homely pursuits. And he, John, to start with the morning forth to a new world! . . . Perhaps poor Mattie was worrying over his cruelty . . worrying and crying, in there, to herself. . . How pitiful! Dear little Mattie!

He had passed slowly in front of the house, and had given it his last, melancholy glance, when the door opened softly, and a slim, black figure raced to the sidewalk. Mattie's arms went about his neck for just an instant, her mouth touched his, her voice whispered "Silly! Silly---good-bye, John!" and with a happy little laugh she was gone. He made a wild leap for the porch, but the door had snapped shut.

HARDLY had the train pulled out of the station in the morning, and the warmth of his mother's kiss died from his face when John found himself heeding the strident voice of the wheels---"Think, John---think---think---John----think . . . . The precept was plain; it could not be otherwise, because he had definitely and self-consciously decided, before he fell asleep the night before, that with the new day he was to drop the ease of boyhood and become a man. He had determined to take up the rôle of college freshman as one might assume a playful masquerade, calculated to reveal a tolerant sophistication. He was ready to conform to all the antic and cublike doings of the traditional freshman so long as he felt sure no one was deceived. "Think-John-think-john-think-John"-reiterated the wheels.

Now, what should he think about? What was farthest removed from the childish problems which had so far occupied him? The need for this profounder ratiocination seemed the more pressing because of his humiliating consciousness that no longer ago than last night he had acted in an absurdly ill-reserved manner. He shook himself angrily out of a pleasant cloud of musing, in which Mattie's sudden hug, his mother's too-gay, farewell face, his father's handshake, and nondescript bits of enervating, going-away sentiment blurred the clarity of his vision. He looked about at his fellow-passengers for practical inspiration.

Directly in front a huge, pink man nodded sleepily, woke with sudden starts and dozed off again; for a time John found the plump jowls interesting, and wondered how barbers could shave along the creases. Across from him two hard-bit farmers conversed with agricultural gravity, holding their tickets in their hands. A thin-necked young father in a baggy, brown suit staggered unceasingly up and down the aisle, carrying paper clips of water to his young, somewhere in the rear of the car. In the seat behind John a woman was eating oranges, and telling a monosyllabic companion about Harr-ry's wife, who lived at La Paz, and who had been ailing for two years---no, let's see---must be three–no---well, anyway, since Sammy---that's her third child, you know---was born. "Cancer, I'm afraid. Folks, especially women-folks get it so often, and yet do you think I'd breathe a word to Harr-ry or Jen---"

The conductor slammed the front door, and passed condescendingly down the aisle, iron-gray and stern, like a statesman doing a menial task, and impatient to get back to his true sphere. Half-way through the car a pretty girl asked him a question, misunderstood his answer, turned, hushed, and lost courage to try again.

"The young lady up there didn't understand what you said," volunteered John, half out of chivalry and half out of the cringing desire one always has to elicit an informal word from the dignity of officialdom. The conductor eyed him contemptuously, and moved on, more magisterial than ever.

The flat country raced by, smoothing out on either side like a rich carpet, brown and green, with occasional splotches of red from turning maples. Here and there a white stone road, bordered by sandy ditches, flashed and vanished. Far off, where the horizon moved slowly, houses and barns came into view and remained for minutes, gradually edging out. Yellow sunlight streamed over the fields, darted in parallel glitters along stretches of new fence-wire, settled among the lush patches of marsh-grass that grew in the hollows. A hard, dry day, and a receptive, innocent land, good to look upon, even through dirty car windows.

In the towns the aspect was not so fair. Reddish-brown stations with chalk-markings on the walls; baggage trucks piled high with salesmen's trunks, milk cans, tires in burlap wrapping, and crated "parts," marked F.O.B. Detroit; flivvers grinding, backing, sputtering, jumping and darting away; fresh-faced young draymen, chewing, and eyeing the passengers impudently. Across the street from the station, perhaps a restaurant, a square little building, with a cigar sign above the door, yellow crêpe-paper festoons in the windows, and an empty ice-cream tub beside the entrance; perhaps a livery-stable, now converted into a garage, with its filling-tank, and on the end wall tattered remains of posters setting forth the glories of Gentry Brothers Dog and Pony Show.

John looked upon all these things, and felt that from them should spring an idea, the core of some immediate philosophy, for his mind to bite upon. But his fellow-passengers were there in the too-too-solid flesh; he had seen such, all his life; the towns were all of a stripe; the car was close and stuffy, with the odor of dust and smoky plush and oranges. The wheels still ground out their "Think-John-think-think"---but the plea suddenly became irritating and foolish. He dropped the pose of sophistication, and in a half-doze speculated upon his reception at the University.

He had invitations from three fraternities, to visit them during the first four days.

"Don't be in a hurry to decide," Dick Chester, an old Indiana "grad" had advised him; "look 'em all over. Remember you've got to live with them four years."

His father had said, "Do as you please. In general I'm against anything that holds meetings and appoints committees. But you're young. . . My God, boy---how young you are!" The gray eyes softened, grew remote and strange, then narrowed again instantly, with their old, laughing light. "Fraternities are good boarding clubs."

'Didn't you belong?" John had asked.

Malleson smiled reminiscently. "Yes, in a way. For a year, I think. But I quit."

"Why?"

"Well, I suppose because my chapter proved a poor boarding club." John could get nothing more from him.

At one o'clock the train drew up in the Union Station at Indianapolis. John checked his bag and dashed for the lunch-room. The place was crowded. As he hesitated, looking for a table, some one slapped him on the shoulder.

"Hello, Malleson! Going to feed? Good-let us join you. There's a table in the corner---waiter! Three! Come on."

The breezy newcomer, Milt Steffins, whom John had known slightly in high school, was a fat, over-dressed youth, whose legs interfered with each other as he walked. He led the way to the table, crashed into a chair, shot his cuffs over his pudgy wrists, and then remembered to introduce his companion.

"Mr. Smallwood, this is Mr. Malleson, from my home town---Smallwood is this year's editor of the Arbutus---waiter! Another menu. You must have been on the train with me, John---sorry I didn't---gimme braised veal, Lyonnais potatoes, and---uh-uh-what'll you have, Ken?---lettuce salad, French dress---lucky we met, hey Malleson?---go down to Bloomington together---rotten ride--lemon custard pie and uh--uh-warm as hell in here, isn't it?---hot coffee---a pot---train on the Monon at four-fifty, Southern at five---how about ordering something, John?---Monon probably the best bet---make connections at Gosport---oh, yes-bring me a grape-fruit to start with---Malleson's a freshman, Ken---happy days !--uh---I'm hungry as a wolf!"

"Well," remarked John, deliberately, "now that that's past, I'll have some lamb-chops and peas and sliced tomatoes and coffee."

Smallwood chuckled. "Same." He was a tight-lipped, bored looking chap, with broad forehead, and thin, light hair. Steffins' piggish little eyes turned on John with an ugly gleam, but he became jovial again in an instant.

"Suppose you're all dated up at the fraternities, Malleson? Of course sure to be. I can remember, three years ago when I came down---"

"Shut up, Hilt," said Smallwood, briefly. "Are you dated up, Mr. Malleson ?"

"Pretty well," admitted John.

"Oh well, it's easy to break---" began Steffins.

"Shut up, Mitt," repeated his companion, patiently. Then to John:

"Our lodge on the list?" He named his fraternity.

"Mm--well, perhaps you'd care to drop in and see us, between times. If Hilt, here, who lives in your home town, had the brains of a louse, he'd have invited you weeks ago."

"Wasn't in town this summer---didn't know---" rumbled the fat boy.

"Thank you. I appreciate the bid, and I'll make it if I can," replied John.

After luncheon they parted, Smallwood to make a business call on a printer, John to stretch his legs in a walk, and Steffins to "take in a burlesque show." Malleson resisted the urgings for his company.

"Only a block and a half from here---come on, Malleson--- see a little hot stuff before you take up the grind. Say, Ken, got a cigarette? Thanks"---taking two---"You won't come? Well, try to see you at the train. Mustn't miss the finale of the show---Oriental dance, you know--lady wriggles a mean hip. So long." He waddled off, getting in his own way at every step.

"There goes a fool, if ever I met one," mused Malleson. "And that bird's a senior!"

He strolled along Illinois Street, past the small shops, candy stores, shine parlors and cheap movies, turned right on Washington and soon left, emerging on the Circle, centered by the tall shaft of the Soldiers' and Sailors' Monument. Above the plash of the fountain and the chatter of passers-by, heroic gray figures kept watch; far beyond them, limned against the sky, rose the dome of the Capitol. John paused, and drew hack from the path of the crowd. A vague dissatisfaction touched him; an obscure and unboyish impatience with his own triviality. For a mad instant he claimed kinship with those god-like men of bronze; his heart clamored for its splendid, unknown chance. The next instant he was sauntering on, a freshman on his way to college, a freshman who could not resist an interest in the thin, strong figure that was his own image reflected back from the big show-windows.

He walked about awhile, spent some time in a chocolate and soda shop, smoked a cigar in the lobby of the Claypool, and bought a copy of Swinburne's Poems and Ballads. When he returned to the station, the concourse was swarming with students. Everywhere he heard greetings:

"Hello, Matt! How's the old boy? " . . . "Hi! Tom--- what you say, Monon or Southern?". . . "O you football hero! Why in thunder aren't you at Bloomington for early practice?" . . . "Hello, Ruth---Monon? Let me be your porter" . . . "Glad to know you, Miss Adams . . . just entering . . .?"

John's chief concern was to avoid Milt Steffins. Mercifully it appeared that the burlesque lady had prolonged her undulations to so late a minute that the fat boy was destined to miss his train. With a sigh of relief John sank into a seat in the last coach. He chose the Southern because Steffins had recommended the Monon.

That two-hour ride through the September twilight was like a prologue to a play. In a pleasant detachment John was permitted to view the characters, sense the atmosphere and catch accents from the racy idiom of college. His aloofness was voluntary; though no one spoke to him, most of the friendly young fellows who shouted to each other the length of the car or lolled over the seat arms would willingly have struck up acquaintance with this quiet freshman whose reserve had nothing churlish in it. But Malleson let his own mind do the interpreting. And as in all well-arranged prologues, underneath the smooth action suspense developed.

At seven o'clock, when the train reached Bloomington, he was tingling with excitement, though outwardly calm.

At the car step a little fellow seized his bag and hurled it at a hulking companion, who caught it deftly, and began butting a way through the crowd. The little fellow had an air of brisk authority.

"You're John Malleson, aren't you? Know you from a description sent by my paid spies. I'm Doc Nelson, from the Phi Psis, and darn glad to see you. Weren't sure which way you'd come---some of the boys went to the Monon. Let's trail Madox---he's the elephant that's carrying your bag."

A touring car, with cut-out open, was roaring at the edge of the platform.

"Climb in, Mr. Malleson," invited Nelson. "This overgrown youth here is Jim Madox. That crooked looking gent in the back seat is Zeke Phillips. You can't trust either of them. You'd better get in front with me." Madox gave John's hand a squeeze, Phillips grinned cordially.

"Doc has a new car, you see, Mr. Malleson. Can't you spot 'em every time!"

"Sounds good to me," remarked John, as the big machine plunged forward, the powerful lights swinging in an arc to settle on the white road that led to town. "Six real cylinders there."

"Don't suppose you've had any dinner, have you, Malleson?" asked Doc, grazing the hubs of two taxicabs. "We'll make for the house. The steward is on the job these days."

"For a change," drawled Madox.

"Shut up, Jim," cried Doc, over his shoulder, "you'll scare him into another lodge before he's even had a look at us." He turned his keen eyes on John.

"Seen any men from other fraternities?"

"Lunched with a couple at Indianapolis---that's all. Smallwood and Steffins."

"Milt Steffins---of course! You would meet him. One always does. It's one of the most serious problems before the Indiana student . . . . But I mustn't run down other fraternities."

"You damn near ran down a city father, then," warned Phillips, as the car shot across Kirkwood Avenue. "Hey, you!" he roared back at the irate pedestrian, "why don't you do your sleeping in bed?"

The car rolled up Third Street, past fraternity porches crowded with young men, smoking and laughing and waving greetings to new arrivals; past groups of co-eds strolling arm in arm, or guarding pretty "rushees" in tours about the Campus. From all the houses came the sound of music. As the car swung under the porte-cochère of the Phi Psi house, Doc sang out:

"Freshmen! Bag to my room---fourteen!"

"How about my trunk?" asked John.

"We'll send down for it," assured Madox, lumbering out of the back seat. "Just give me your check."

A dozen or so members and several "pledges" of the fraternity trooped down the broad stairway and were rapidly introduced by Doc:

"Mr. Malleson, meet Mr. Carruthers---Nugent---Hamp---Kingsley---Browne---Walton---Platz---Henderson---all right, the rest of you---give us a chance! Malleson hasn't had dinner yet. We'll be up pretty soon." To John, "Don't try to remember the names; you'll see 'em all again. Rush-week introductions are catch-if-catch-can anyway. Let's go in and see what the steward has to offer."

He ushered John into the dining-room, which was low-ceilinged, with mighty oak rafters and paneled walls. Malleson, Madox, Doc and Phillips drew up at a table in the corner where the steward---a student, working his way---fed them to repletion, and "sat in" for coffee and cigarettes. From above could be heard the thump of feet. To the accompaniment of piano, drum and whining saxophone, hearty voices were roaring

and

The noise suddenly stilled, and after a moment of silence a single, thin voice quavered

Whi---i----i---te Wings---They never grow wee-err–ee
They carry---

A roar of laughter stifled the soloist.

For John the ensuing "session" upstairs was a confusion of happy noise, snatches of "introduction" conversation, many cigarettes, football prophecies, and gossip of the fraternities. Twice during the evening he heard mention of studies; once from a "pledge," asking advice on the premedic course, and once from Kempton, a senior, who was conversing in an aside with one of his classmates.

"Hornsby's Philosophy 9 is dynamite in disguise. The old man has to be careful, but he wields some mean irony, and if you're awake you'll be hit by something like the wrath of God."

John did not understand, but he was attracted by Kempton, whose fine, pale face had about it an expression thoughtful and withheld.

It was late before Malleson climbed into bed, in the big attic dormitory. Through the open windows a cool breeze flowed over him. Far off on the Campus the mellow chimes sounded the half-hour after midnight. Somewhere under the beeches a quartette was singing "Gloriana." In his nostrils was the familiar autumn fragrance of burnt leaves---a fragrance that brought intimate memories of home. And as he fell asleep he was wondering if a door had opened, or a door had closed.

JOHN was to go to the Beta House at eight the next evening. At seven, when the after dinner "music" was most thunderous, Doc caught the freshman's arm and led him down the hall to the guest room, ushered him in, and closed the door solemnly. Madox, Phillips and Kempton were talking in low tones that hushed at his entrance. After a moment of portentous silence, Doc spoke, his sharp eyes never shifting from John's face.

"Malleson, I needn't waste words on you. You're better balanced than the average freshman. You've had a chance to look us over; we've had the same chance to size you up. The members of the Chapter have voted for you unanimously---and so here and now we invite you to put on the pledge pin of Phi Kappa Psi."

The eyes of all the men bored into him. He felt that he should regard this as a moment of vast significance, set in its hushed dignity above the common stream of time. But he could not help catching a flippant echo---"They're good boarding clubs."

"How about my dates with the other fraternities?"

"The minute you put on the pin we 'phone them, and they congratulate us and you."

John caught Madox's eye. The big fellow said gravely:

"Ours is a good lodge, Malleson."

The latter nodded, but he was really thinking what a nuisance it would be to move his trunk and trappings about from house to house while he "looked 'em all over."

Suddenly he decided. "All right. Put it on."

Doc pinned the badge to the lapel of his coat, and shook his hand.

During the next few days John became acquainted with the minutiae of fraternity etiquette, partly from observation and partly through definite information given him by big Madox, who was his friend from the first. He learned that initiated brothers might properly refer to the pledge-pin as the "gravy-bowl" but that a pledge-brother had better avoid such lèse majesté. In fact, a pledge-brother had to watch his speech constantly. Little Davidson from Marion narrowly escaped a tubbing, when, wishing coffee, he blandly requested the waiter to "shove him a mug of midnight." On the other hand, too exact diction was discouraged, as a source of general embarrassment. Doc Nelson and Zeke Phillips were the recognized masters of parlance. They had only one superior, Kempton. But Kempton seldom talked in public, while Doc and Zeke seldom refrained. They were virtuosos in repartee, possessing equipment adequate for all ordinary fraternal occasions, where one could be reasonably safe if he had ready the less hackneyed terms of insult and the more animalistic formulas of obscenity. But older members declared that once at a meeting Kempton had cut a picture wire with his sarcasm, so that a portrait of the founders of the fraternity dropped from the wall and lay shattered in adoration at his feet.

John learned from Madox that fraternity spirit was a noble thing, though hard to define; that school spirit was also a noble thing, though hard to define; and that between these two noble things existed a noble relationship, likewise hard to define. Other lessons were that the Fraternity expected every man to excel in some one Campus activity, of which athletics ranked highest and buying dinners for co-eds lowest; that "barbs" were to be considered good fellows, though unfortunate; that the members of this lodge were largely "scissorbills," of that lodge, excellent specimens, with a few pllugs ; of a third, unanimously benighted. A freshman should avoid too frequent dates; three calls a week at a sorority house meant pardonable idiosyncrasy in an upperclassman, but in a freshman indicated catfish and humiliating abandon. Definite data on sororities was at hand; one group of sisters were "policy sharks"; another had a formidable "cellar gang"; a third were lovely gold-diggers; a fourth, "sad birds" but fair sports; a fifth, admirable in all respects, and not the least in their liking for Phi Psis.

At first the freshman was puzzled by some of the technical terms. But he kept his unsophistication to himself and soon knew, for instance, that "policy-sharks" were most active during the rush-week; they could be seen amid the "rushees" on the porches of Sorority Alley, bewitchingly gowned, and smiling ingenuously, with the iron of sororicidal strife in their hearts. At such time the sad birds were kept in the cellar; hence their clan-name. He came to know that the term "scissorbill" always applied to a man, unless the speaker were hopelessly in liquor, or daft through some complicated affectional obsession. A scissorbill might be one of several kinds---he might be a Christer, or a lounge-lizard, or a blatant "s'colleger," or merely an amorphous bore, without any sharply defined faults.

Scholarship was important. It was drummed into Malleson by many repetitions that the Phi Psis had led all fraternities in scholastic honors for a vast though indefinite stretch of time, and that he, as an intelligent young man, must see the practical benefits of such regularity.

"Keeps us solid with the Faculty," remarked Zeke, "besides giving us something of an air-eh what, Doc?"

"Tin gods on wheels," agreed Doc.

The days immediately preceding registration were full of noise and confusion at the House, and free from all discipline. This was rush-week; the period of winnowing, when "good" candidates were "spiked" and "pledged," and failures passed on to rival fraternities, or tactfully released into the great, unorganized mass of "barbs." Fraternity "pledges" lolled and smoked and talked high with the gravest of the seniors. But after registration came a change.

"Freshmen out! Meet the House Committee in the smoking room. Hurry up! Tear tails!" rang the command through the dormitory, early Saturday morning. After a short session in the smoking room the nine pledge-brothers emerged, with sheepish nonchalance, to fall furiously to work with brooms, mops and dust cloths, putting the big house in order, under the critical eyes of the House Committee.

John washed windows with a will, finding a feline pleasure in stretching his long muscles, after the stuffiness of much hobnobbing. He was impatient to get under way; in some manner, in any manner, to plunge into the exhilarating swirl of life that bubbled and eddied over the Campus. He had decided not to try for athletics until spring, when he would go out for freshman baseball. He was a bit light for football, and his big bones needed the maturing that a couple of years would bring. Furthermore he wanted to stow away the fifteen "hours" of scholastic credit necessary to initiation into the fraternity.

Meanwhile there was plenty of physical activity to keep him in shape. During the first week of the term, guerrilla warfare of haircutting raged at night between sophs and freshmen. Individuals and groups were set upon in the dark places of the Campus, and unless their resistance proved too powerful, were ruthlessly clipped, to appear in class the next day bald as eggs, or with bizarre fringes bordering clean swathes from forehead to nape of neck.

Peace between sophs and freshmen came after the Class Scrap. The Scrap took place on Jordan Field, before bleachers gay with co-eds and the jeering upperclassmen. Eight huge bags, stuffed with straw, were placed at intervals along the center line of the field. At the crack of the pistol, four hundred freshmen charged from one end against three hundred sophs, rolling in from the other; dust and hay shot up in clouds; roars and shrieks and bellowing rose above the crunch of grinding feet; sharp rips indicated that underneath the surging mass, clothing was being shredded. The bags disappeared, and isolated platoons of fighters clutched and groveled frantically over torn strips of canvas, in the effort to drag the trophies toward their respective goals; tears and sweat-drops filled the air; shouts dwindled to gasps and grunts. The closing pistol shot rang out; slowly the masses untangled; first-aid men rushed upon the field. Several figures, naked save for strips not well distributed, lurked behind their more fortunate brethren, then cut and ran for the Gym, white flesh flashing past the delighted bleachers. Then the freshman cheer of victory, the race to the showers, and the anointing of bruises.

Tired and sore, but in deep content, John lounged that evening with a dozen others in the big living room. Soft radiance from the sconce lights fell over the deep brown of the leather chairs, glinted from the silver honor-cups ranged on the mantelpiece. A haze of tobacco smoke hovered cozily over sleek young heads. Besides John's own classmates, who were as yet too new to "step out," several of the older men---the Bachelors Club---were present. Little Doc Nelson prided himself upon having attained the rank of junior without having been afflicted with a love affair. Madox, too, was there. During the fall and winter he plugged away over problems of the "Medic" course, to be free of "conditions" in the spring. He was catcher on the Varsity, and a wonderful comfort to nervous young pitchers. Zeke Phillips had treacherously deserted the Bachelors the preceding spring, when he had too often looked into the eyes of a blonde lady from Terre Haute. He was now mourned as lost, and when the Bachelors gathered, Doc was wont to speak of his comrade as dead. Kempton was there, too, but apart from the group. Far in the corner, by the bookcases, he bent his pale face absorbedly over his reading, like a frail acolyte, worlds removed from the banter and nonsense of the others. There was something at once very, very old and very, very innocent about Kempton. A tranquil but indomitable spirit, in love with thought; silent for the most part; never swerving a hair's breadth to court popularity, he yet commanded the respect of every man in the Chapter. Perhaps it was the attraction of idiosyncrasy, but however that may be, Kempton inspired a fanatical confidence. Madox phrased it quaintly:

"Old Kemp lives behind a veil, and every once in a while some of us smart Alecs try to rip it away. Christ! Might as well try to puff over Gibraltar!"

"Is he a grind?" asked John.

"No! Don't get the idea he's reading lessons. Not Kemp. Don't believe he cracks a textbook from the start of a course to its finish. Doesn't need to---he just knows! If I had a tenth of the old boy's brains I'd not have to quit every session at ten o'clock to bone over Anatomy," the big fellow concluded with a groan.

"Well," persisted John, "then why does he stick over there in the corner by himself? I'll admit I like him a lot. I'd like to know him better, even though I am only a freshman. Is he unfriendly?"

"No!" ejaculated Madox, impatiently. "That's not it. You just wait, kid---you'll get to know him. You'll have to take your English 7 themes to him before you turn 'em in---he's Scholarship Committee, you know."

"I'm going to get to know him," declared John.

The rules of the Bachelors Club did not forbid conversation about girls. Indeed, its members, repressed in their instincts for philandering, were all the more likely to take it out in talk. At the moment, Doc was warning Tapley, a handsome "pledge," against the wiles of a certain college siren.

"You, Tapley, my buck, have a Grecian nose. Look out for Micky Sullivan! That lady wrings Grecian noses. Furthermore, you look prosperous---like a Saturday Evening Post Wallingford. Worse yet---Micky'll be rounding you up for dinners and between-class feeds at the Book Nook. If you ever start buying her food, your shekels will fade. Eat? She's got a hollow leg!"

The little fellow nodded sagely, and eyed his spick-and-span sport shoes.

"Try my system, if you must buy," advised Henderson, a plump chap with a comical face. "When I get among those wise virgins of the Book Nook, I take my date to a corner booth, plank down a dime and say 'I'll have Coca Cola---what'll you have?'"

"Yeh---that's what makes you so popular," observed Madox, filling his pipe. "Two dates in the last eighteen months."

"I don't see you cutting a swath," retorted Henderson.

"Shucks! I'm an athlete," grinned big Madox. "I can't fritter away my time with skirts. But when I do step out. . . . You know me, boys---strong right arm!"

Doc started threateningly, but sank back, muttering---"No -it won't do. Where would we put the body?"

"See---here come the lizards!" shouted Henderson.

The troop of "daters" clattered in, discarding hats and top-coats, and were greeted with hisses and cries of scorn from the Bachelors---"Any luck? What you say, Bill---did she ?"---"How's the moonlight?"---"Been at the Book Nook, eh! That's good---look at the mud on his shoes!"---"Too bad, Tim---you say Dunn Meadow was crowded ?"---"How about the Stone Wall"---"Ah-yah !---snakes!"

"Where's Zeke ?" demanded Doc, rousing to look for the traitor.

"Saw him last 'bout ten, out the North Pike," grunted Tim Platz, pulling a chair from under a "pledge" and dropping into it.

"Moving south?" queried Doc anxiously.

"No---moving north, without a compass. Steering by the stars, I guess, but making slow progress. With his feet, I mean."

Doc tossed up his hands in abysmal disgust. "A good man, too, in his day," he muttered. "Passed beyond now, body and soul."

The new arrivals, all upperclassmen, gradually took over the meeting, puffing their pipes sapiently, and tossing through the smoke their sophisticated jargon. Malleson felt a bit out of it. He glanced over at Kempton, whose absorption was unbroken. The freshman longed to speak to him, get his recognition, enter somehow into the man's romantic isolation. But he lacked the courage.

"Come on, Tap!" he ejaculated suddenly, "I'm full of smoke. Let's chase down to the Book Nook and get a drink. Come on-stretch your legs!" Tapley rose obediently, pulling his green cap from his pocket.

"Well, your scalps're safe, to-night, freshies," grunted Madox, "but don't get lost."

John's weariness had diminished, but his ribs and shoulders were sore from the afternoon's battle.

"We'll be stiff as boards in the morning," prophesied Tapley, as they swung along down Third Street.

"Uh-huh. But it'll do us good to get out a bit. To tell the truth, Tap, I get just a little tired of hearing that line." He nodded back over his shoulder toward the fraternity house. He was still thinking of the silent Kempton.

"Doc Nelson's a great little kidder, isn't he? Say, John, d'you suppose a fellow really has to be as careful about girls as he made out?" Tapley's voice was earnest.

"Only fellows with Grecian noses---and coin, I guess," chuckled Malleson. Then, with sudden gravity, "I tell you what, Tap---I'm not here to be made a fool of by anybody, man or woman. But that's not the main point. I can already feel . . . Can't you feel that somehow a fellow has a lot of elbow room here, for perhaps the first time in his life? Oh, I know there're lots of fool rules about freshmen and green caps and dousing in the Jordan River and non-date nights and all that---but I mean a real chance to be his own man, to-to-find---"

"To do as you damn please, you mean?"

"No-o--not exactly. Not so much doing, as-well, thinking yourself out," John finished lamely. He was not satisfied with his explanation, but he knew there was something to explain.

They loafed about the Book Nook for half an hour, chatting and drinking "cokes" with other freshmen, in celebration of the outcome of the Class Scrap. When the party broke up, John and Tapley sauntered along the Campus path to Kirkwood Hall, and round the corner to the Board Walk, more and more slowly, under the majestic arch of the big trees.

In the deep heaven a red moon hung low, shedding over the beeches a hot translucence, like fragrance changed to light. Romance sighed and laughed in the dappled shadows on the Board Walk, seeming not of this modern day and this bashful, thunderous west; passion rather of an old, old, tranquil world, lying perhaps beyond Cathay, certainly beyond all but youth's imaginings. Beneath this moon of ancient wizardry the two boys wandered, twinging under the caress of beauty that neither knew how to greet. With speech that was desperately casual, they chopped the silence to endurable lengths; it would never do to drift voiceless into any such fantastic maze. Yet even as he talked, Malleson felt the words meaningless; somewhere, far beneath, strong and challenging, the stream of life was rolling on. He saw himself, pausing at the brink, half relieved and half regretful that his plunge was not yet due. Four years longer--- Meanwhile, here was College, her spirit incarnate in Tap and himself, her freedom in their loitering steps, her voice in the midnight chimes!

JOHN'S determination to force an intimacy with Kempton proved unnecessary. Kempton met him half-way. As Scholarship Committee, he made it his business to look over the freshmen's themes before they were handed in each Tuesday and Thursday.

"This is the customary assignment, Malleson," he said, reading the subject given for the first paper of the season "'Who I Am and Why I Came to Indiana.’ Idiotic. Let's see what you've written." After a brief scrutiny he nodded.

"Good enough. No grammatical errors, and all the vital statistics are there. Of course it doesn't tell who you are." He smiled quizzically. "That assignment is particularly futile, because only a dunce or a great genius could do justice to it."

"You mean I ought to turn myself inside out---do a psychological portrait?" asked John.

"Not to satisfy the requirements. But to answer the question you'd---look here! Are you really interested in writing?" Kempton shot out the question like a challenge.

"I could be," answered John cautiously, "but from what I hear, English 7 is pretty superficial."

"It is. Has to be, because it's only meant to teach what ought to have been taught in high school. Like a shelf full of safe toys, all within reach of baby hands. But you needn't play with all of them. Snedden's your instructor, isn't he? Well, Sned'lI go with you as far as you like, and weep tears of joy to find a soul undamned."

"How about you? Don't you write?" asked Malleson boldly.

"No!" It was almost a shout. But Kempton's smile followed, and he added softly, "I used to try, and later on I shall try again. At present I'm in the inhibited state."

"Know too much and yet not enough?"

"Exactly." The older boy's fine eyes rested upon John with a gleam of real interest. Suddenly he announced, "Lesson's over! But remember what I said about Snedden---and let's have more talks."

They did have more talks and Malleson ceased to regard Kempton as merely a dreamer. He found him shrewd in all the practical ways of college and alert to the thousand and one activities of the Campus, from which his aloofness was that of a well-informed spectator. Kempton's quietness had no snobbery in it; it was merely a well-bred sophistication. He never treated John as a freshman. Indeed, his unspoken authority in the fraternity seemed to have nothing to do with seniority, but lay without discrimination over members of all classes. He was one of those curious birds who somehow belong both to the faculty and to the student-body, moving with equal assurance in both spheres. Presumably he "took courses," but nobody ever caught him studying the prescribed texts, and nobody ever thought of grades or credits in connection with him.

Encouraged by Kempton's advice, John set about enlisting the friendship of Snedden. The instructor was a bulky, blond man of about forty-five, familiarly known as the Mysterious Stranger. Doc Nelson explained the title.

"It's because of his whiskers. They're never the same. Just now he happens to be clean-shaven. Next term he'll probably have a goatee, or maybe merely a mustache. One never can tell. When I first came here he had a full beard. It's not so much the variety of foliage as it is the quick changes. Any one can graduate from a bare upper lip to a fringe. But Sned doesn't do that. He'll appear one day smooth as an egg, and the next time you see him, so help me God, he'll look like Birnam Wood moving to Dunsinane. Nobody can explain the phenomenon. We've held consultations, and called in experts, but we can't find any satisfactory motive."

Kempton had an ingenious explanation.

"I think it's one of two things. Either he does it to break the monotony of academic life---excitement, you know ---or else it's Sned's way of expressing contempt for the rest of mankind. He thinks, 'What fools these people are. What a farce life is. The best one can do is to don motley, for one's own amusement. Therefore, I shall made faces at the world and its people; it shall be my true life's work.'"

At first John found no inspiration in English 7. The instructor himself gave the course a lugubrious send-off:

"Ladies and gentlemen, this will be deadly. But it is required of freshmen. The Faculty says so."

After the fourth meeting, Malleson asked Snedden pointblank why he assigned such foolish theme-topics. After a searching stare the instructor nodded, and broke out:

"God bless you! I was afraid the Section was going to prove barren. Not one student in a hundred wants to write. So I assign little, puling topics which are harmless, so that the matter may go by with as little fuss as possible. Then if one person in the Section rebels against the imbecility, I know that person is worth watching."

After this, Snedden gave John more attention. He encouraged him to try short stories, and labored with him over plot and technique. The man was sensitive, behind his bluff. defense. Somewhere in him quivered the wounded animus of the artist who finds his hands unequal to the task his heart has set. Snedden wanted desperately to write; instead he skimmed shudderingly over the banalities of Unity, Coherence and Emphasis, and did the least he could to mar the indifference of his pupils.

He was hard to please. Story after story he tore to shreds, more grieved than John. He spent hours outlining, arranging "dramatic conflict" and "action that reveals character." There came a time when Malleson exclaimed in desperation:

"Mr. Snedden, let me do this one on my own! I've got an idea. Let me work it out without help and then you can lambaste it."

A week later John brought in his story. It was a careful transcription of a yarn told him years ago by his lather, about a colony of renegades who once lived in the great marshlands of Florida and were ruled over by a girl called the Spitfire Queen. Snedden read it absorbedly, his stubby fingers pressing the paper hard, a stern set to his patient face. When he had finished he walked slowly to the bookcase, and stood with his hack to John.

"How is it, Mr. Snedden ?" queried the latter, after waiting in vain for the instructor's verdict.

"Good." Snedden's voice sounded muffled. "Much, much better. There's life in it . . . . And---you did it without help, didn't you?"

"Somehow I believe I can do anything better when I do it alone." It was a boastful speech, but not intentionally so. In his exultation at having cut a few of the tough fibers of his problem, Malleson uttered the words out of sound conviction.

When he told Kempton of his luck, the older boy looked thoughtful.

"I'm glad for you, but it hurt old Sned. Not your fault, of course. He told me all about it last night. He was in the dumps. 'Great God! Kempton,' he said, 'am I a failure even in my theories?' But don't worry---he'll get over it.

The football season drew to a pseudo-triumphant close. By some logic, difficult to the outsider but obvious to the Indiana rooter, the frequent defeats of the Crimson team had been, in fact, victories. The cold figures on the official scoreboard were not to be taken as more than mere symbols which were grossly misleading in that they revealed nothing of the spiritual triumphs of the conquered. These spiritual triumphs were emphasized in the editorials of the Daily Student and at mass-meetings arranged by the Boosters Club.

A mammoth meeting took place in the Gym the night before the Purdue game. The President of the University, the President of the Indiana Union, and all the best spellbinders from the student-body, together with the team, occupied camp-chairs on the stage. Crimson sweaters with the big white "I" were everywhere, the rickety old Gym shuddered to the shouts and the thumping of feet. Co-eds filled the galleries, and joined in the songs. The University band struck up "Gloriana." John, torn out of his habitual calm, roared at the top of his voice:

The President of the University, in a short address, roused his audience to frantic enthusiasm by pointing out that the Athenians excelled the Spartans in savoir-faire, and that an oligarchy is often short-lived. The President of the Indiana Union significantly declared that football is the sport of giants; the band played "Indiana, My Indiana," and the head cheer-leader turned handsprings down the center aisle. The members of the team were then called upon to stand, and if possible to speak. Only the captain succeeded. He said:

The chairman of the Boosters Club, a stocky, red-haired chap, rushed to the front of the stage, as if about to hurl himself over the footlights, stopped with a galvanic jerk, and began shouting. His face moved continually in a small circle as if he were boring his way into the feelings of his hearers.

"Men of Indiana! And you women, too---for this is everybody's fight---I want to add just a little to the inspiring words you've heard this evening. To-morrow when that old team runs out on old Jordan Field to meet the Boilermakers there's just one thing to remember-the old Indiana spirit can't lose! It can't! Look about you now, and see how many men here in this hall are wearing the Big Crimson Sweater with the Big White I! What does that mean? It means that every last one of those fellows has given the best he's got, in brains and muscle, somewhere on some field to bring home the bacon to old LU.! And when that old team runs out on Jordan Field to-morrow every one of those fellows, whether he's in the game or not, is going to be on their toes pulling to see that the old I.U. banner doesn't bite the dust! What do we care for Purdue! When the old pigskin starts rolling they won't cut much ice! Right now I can see Captain Walker going through the line like-like-like a bull through a china-shop! I can see Janney there picking off a forward pass like peaches off the trees! And when Purdue strikes back I can see that old Cream and Crimson team, every man-jack of 'em, pile up like a stone wall, rightside up or upside down or any way! And I can see you rooters, men and women both, doing the same! A stone wall built of everybody in college! This is everybody's game. Why? Because the old Indiana spirit can't lose! And to morrow when that old teams runs out on Jordan Field---"

The meeting broke up in a pandemonium of cheering, whistling, and thumping of feet, with the band frenziedly blaring out "Gloriana." The next day Purdue beat Indiana 21 to 7. After the game Madox took John down to the locker-room. Captain Walker was methodically lacing a shoe.

"How come, Jim?" asked Madox quietly.

"Up against a better team," grunted Walker, without looking up. "But wasn't our mental attitude superb

Malleson did not make the trip home at the Thanksgiving vacation. Instead, he wrote a newsy letter to his mother, with special sections for his father and Dave, and a somewhat different missive to Mattie. In both letters he mentioned the shortness of the Thanksgiving recess, and promised to be home on the first possible train for the two weeks at Christmas. Then he packed his bag, and went over to eat turkey with Tapley, who lived in Spencer, a few miles from Bloomington.

True to his promise he was at home the evening of December 18th. When he entered with a hearty "Hello!" the family were in the living-room, toasting themselves before the blazing coals. John felt that only a few minutes had elapsed since his first going forth. When he came to recount his experiences he realized that ages had passed. It was startling-this telescoping of time.

His father asked casually:

"How about the law? Doing anything? And---er---the women?" Malleson affected an evil leer, and dropped his voice to a whisper that his wife could just overhear. But John's training at the Chapter House had hardened him.

"The law-so-so. Preliminary stuff, you know. And the women---" Smiling, he held up three fingers. "Just that many dates the whole term. Twice, fraternity dances. Compulsory. And once I was called in to substitute for a friend."

"Tell it to Mattie !" scoffed his father.

"I will---to-morrow. And now tell me what's happened here. Of course I got your letters. Bless your heart, Mother, you gave me all the dope on what's what at the Malleson corner. Appreciated your notes, too, Dad---'enclosed find check' . . . . Dave, what've you been up to?"

"Oh, I've been plugging away," replied Dave, with the slight flush that he never seemed able to check when talking about himself. "You know the things they give you in freshman high school."

"That's not all he's doing, John," exclaimed Emma, warmly, "Dave works every afternoon for the Journal, after school."

"Aw well--" protested the younger boy, embarrassed.

Later Emma explained. "He insists upon earning something to help pay his way. It's only carrying papers, and some of the boys make fun of him, but he sticks to it. Your father takes part of the money and pretends to turn it in on household expenses, but he really puts it on deposit for Dave, later on."

The holidays were pleasant, in much the same old fashion. John took Mattie to three dances, and spent several evenings with her in the parlor of the little house up the street. She listened raptly to his tales of college, her hand nestling in his. He thought she looked pale and thin; at times an unquiet glow came and went in her steady eyes. It was not until the last evening before his return to Bloomington that he suspected the reason. Mattie had been asking about the coeds.

"You are the one best bet, sweetheart," he whispered.

"Not one can compare with you. I want you to be planning, though it is a bit soon, to come down for the junior Prom."

"Oh, that'll be---"

To his amazement her voice broke in a little sob, and she hid her face against his sleeve.

"I'm a fool," she faltered. "I don't do this---ever! But if you knew how I want to go to college . . . to learn something . . ." After a moment she smiled up at him.

"Well, anyway ... I do a lot of reading, at night. And that helps---doesn't it?"

When Malleson returned to Bloomington he looked forward to the next few months as a rather monotonous stretch to be traversed before the excitement of baseball. His interest in writing had waned somewhat, though he still did stories and essays for Snedden, and discussed literary theories with Kempton.

In February he received an unexpected honor; he was chosen a member of the Writers Club. This organization, composed of two dozen students and sponsored by Snedden, met one evening every two weeks, in the English Office, read original contributions, and criticized freely and without rancor. At nine-thirty manuscripts were pushed aside, and the members brewed tea and consumed sandwiches provided by the lady authors. Kempton belonged, just as he belonged to everything.

"When do you read your story?" demanded John, as they climbed the stairs in Biology Hall.

"When it's properly hatched, mon enfant. But to-night there'll be something better. You know that queer duck, Brunetti? He's to read a poem. Snedden says the fellow is irrepressible. Freshman, like yourself, but pushing as the devil, He may have the stuff, Sned thinks, though it's been a little sour in class, so far. This is his first time at the Club, too."

John was nervous. He read his story badly, but found it "took" fairly well. He had not outgrown the tyro's inclination to range far and wide for material. But he had the sense to be pretty sure of the customs and superficial aspects of the people and places he wrote about, so that his yarns had the similitude of realism.

Two other contributions were heard, and then came Brunetti's turn. He was a dark, scowling fellow, with a wild mop of hair. Taking the center of the room he delivered his poem without manuscript, and in a husky, impassioned voice:

Brunetti remained rigid a moment after the close, then bowed and sat down. After a silence Instructor Snedden said, with a slight shudder:

"Naturally this concludes the program of the evening."

Even before the first call for baseball candidates, John had been limbering up in short work-outs with Madox. The two donned heavy sweaters and put in an hour each afternoon tossing the ball back and forth in the vacant lot behind the Chapter House. It was hard for Malleson to hold himself in; his arm was in splendid shape and he longed to "put something on the ball." But big Madox was like a watchdog; at the first faint sting of his palm as the ball spanked into the mitt he would break out into bitter snarls.

"Cut it out! Cut it out! This is March, remember. Damn you ignorant freshmen! If you speed it up now or twist 'em you'll have a crockery arm when the season opens. Ease 'em over."

Although Conference rules forbade freshmen to play on the Varsity, every yearling with baseball aspirations reported on Jordan Field when the call went out. From ninety initial candidates the squad was reduced in the next two weeks to some fifty. No final cut took place, because the "rhinies" were to serve chiefly as meat for the Varsity and a plentiful supply was demanded. John's early practice and Madox's coaching stood him in good stead. When, late in March, the yearlings faced the Varsity for the first full game, he pitched five innings, and to his delight held the regulars to four scattered hits. As he reached the bench after the first inning, Fuller, the freshman coach, said:

"Pretty good, Malleson. But listen: you're slowing things up by that deliberate action of yours. It's all right to take your time, but don't take too much. Waiting may work on the batter's nerves, but remember your own men in the field have nerves too. Don't let 'em talk themselves out. And another thing---keep that fast one high and close."

After the fifth inning Dan Gerhardt, the Varsity coach, came over to the freshman bench and spoke to Fuller. The latter nodded and called to John.

"That's enough, Malleson. Hike to the Gym and get your rub-down. On hand at three to-morrow."

"Did he yank me because I was rotten?" John asked Madox that night.

"Nope," responded the catcher promptly, "because you looked good. Freshmen're sure to throw their arms away early in the season if somebody doesn't stop them. Old Man Gerhardt may need you next year."

"What was the final score?"

"Ten-four, Varsity. Not bad."

"What did you think of my benders ?" persisted John, hungry for praise.

"So-so."

"Missed three of 'em yourself, didn't you?" added John slyly. A grin spread over Madox's broad face. "I sure did, kid."

After this Malleson was matched pretty frequently against the regulars. He kept his eyes open, when on the bench, watching every move of the Varsity pitchers. In particular he took pointers from Lutz, a wiry red-head who had done the heaviest box-work for the Crimson the preceding two years. Lutz hadn't much weight, but he shot the ball over with terrific speed, because he put his whole body into the swing. He had also a baffling cross-fire. But chief of all, as Fuller pointed out in the Ohio State game, Lutz never forgot to think. Two men were on bases; two were out. As the batter, a determined little chap, approached the plate, his cheek was seen to he enormously swollen. He swung viciously at the first ball, a wide out curve, missed, and spun completely around. As he settled himself for the second delivery, a startled, aghast look flitted over his face---and the swelling had disappeared.

Gerhardt nudged Fuller excitedly, and John heard him whisper:

"Look! Look! He's swallowed his chew! Let's see if Lutz is wise to it."

Lutz was. The batter's discomfort was now apparent. The lanky pitcher stalled about, laced his shoe, and, taking the utmost allowable time between deliveries, threw the next three halls wide of the plate. By this time the man from Ohio State was very, very sick; his knees were unsteady and his face a greenish hue. Then, with three balls against him, and one strike for him, Lutz hurled the next two across the plate at fearful speed, under the swimming eyes of the little chap, who swung wildly, and staggered back to his bench.

"Red Lutz has one fault that he's too old to correct," Madox confided to John. "Can't bat. And why? Because he's a pitcher, everybody'll say. That's only half true. Pitchers could bat as well as anybody else if they practised as much. So you take your little turn with the stick every chance you get."

Later Madox's lesson was driven home to John with tragic force. Malleson was given a spectator's place on the Varsity bench during the Illinois game, that he might benefit by Gerhardt's between-inning instruction. In the eighth, with two out, two men on base, and the score two to one against her, Indiana looked to Lutz for a hit. The latter, indomitably cool, let the first ball pass.

"Strike one!"

John was sitting near the peppery old coach. At the umpire's words, Gerhardt's grizzled jaw slid forward the eighth of an inch.

"Two!" Lutz had let another fast one pass. Gerhardt's under-jaw moved forward another notch. John could feel the silent prayer going up from the squat figure.

The Illinois pitcher studied his opponent. Malleson felt the conviction that, bad as it usually is to put the third ball across without ''wasting'' any, the Illinois man would do it.

He did. With no curve, but with whistling speed, the ball cut the platter. Lutz stood motionless.

"Three---batter out !"

Coach Gerhardt's jaw receded, his shoulders drooped, and through the cheering of the Illinois bleachers, John heard him mutter, as from a heart weighted with sorrow:

"Young–strong---handsome---from a fine old family---but my God!---blind!"

Through the spring term baseball was John's engrossing concern, but other influences were in the air. Spring was the "dating" season, of course. "Cases" which had existed through the winter with only a comfortable warmth now became incandescent. Confirmed women-haters were metamorphosed over night, and wore their shoes out trotting across the Board Walk to Sorority Alley. On non-date nights students left the Library early, with austere expressions on their faces and conspicuous armfuls of books. A statistician---or the Dean of Women--would have been struck by the singularly even division between male and female of these early goers. And a second-hand book man could have realized a small fortune on the volumes found lying about in secluded places of the Campus, along the Stone Wall, or in Dunn Meadow.

The Bachelors Club kept jealous watch over its members, for this was the period of great trial. Each night at eleven, Doc Nelson inspected the Club to see that no fraternity pins were missing. With profound feeling he would exhort and encourage.

"Men, don't weaken. Remember, this is the devil's hunting season. So far our ranks are unbroken. But just look about you at the pitiful sights---strong, upstanding, promising fellows, caught by the awful plague and reduced to miserable insects. Don't trust even yourselves; your wills may be secretly softening. Whenever you feel the slightest wish to start prowling, come to me and I will pray with you. Remember Zeke, last year. We thought him pure, and before we knew it he had gone balmy."

"What's the harm in a date or two?" asked John one evening. "Aren't there girls in school that are just good company ? Not slushy---or---''

"Plenty of 'em," retorted Doc. "Most of them, in fact. And they're more dangerous than the professional lovers. Don't get the idea that I'm warning you just against the courses in Applied Anatomy. The worst case of all does not feature pawing and nuzzling, but---er---intellectual communion, affinity stuff, you know. At least, at first. Look at Smallwood, editor of the Arbutus. He and his dame go about reading Maeterlinck to each other, but I doubt if they even hold hands."

"What's wrong then?"

"Well, they read Maeterlinck, don't they? And Maeterlinck isn't going to subscribe to the Arbutus!"

Malleson's intimacy with Kempton and Snedden put him in the way of influences he might not have found otherwise, and which may have touched him in ways not to be realized until long after. The two were insatiable readers. Snedden, a prey to inner dissatisfaction, read much in the modern literature of unrest, perhaps finding in the passionate rebellion of other men vicarious relief for his own sense of self-wastage. He was greatly stirred by Max Nordau's tome, Degeneration, in which most of the idols of literary and artistic genius were shown to have been mentally and physically unsound.

Snedden was also a student of abnormal psychology, and at a time when the name of Freud meant little in amateur circles the eccentric instructor found magic in his pages. Kempton, on the other hand, considered most of Snedden's masters on the lunatic fringe, and was himself fascinated by the individualism of certain latter-day prophets. Through Kempton John first met H. G. Wells; more tremendous still, he first fell foul of Nietzsche. He sat up nights, in spite of baseball, blurring his eyes and brain with the utterances of that inspired madman, and often after he had crawled into bed the voices of supermen reached him above the snores of his brethren in the big dormitory.

When it came to discussing these doctrines, he was shy. Not only were the tenets formidable in themselves; they also defied enunciation in the unacademic language proper to a fraternity house, from a freshman's point of view. John felt that if he vented to the best of his linguistic ability his sentiments and conjectures, he would inevitably precipitate a scene, from which he stood a first class chance of emerging only after a cold tubbing. But at Snedden's apartment things were freer. Many a night Malleson formed one of a select circle that met there, drank beer and talked endlessly. And the ruthless Nietzsche ended by patting him approvingly, and whispering, "That's it, my boy. Man's high duty is to be equal in himself to all that can happen to him from the earth or from the skies." This may have been Nietzsche; it was unmistakably Malleson the elder, talking to his son. And the son profoundly believed.

"What place does your doctrine leave for God?" asked Kempton, one night.

"It leaves no place," answered the freshman boldly.

The mental excursions with Kempton sometimes led over formidable depths. The necessity for faith, the vulgarity of creeds, the free will of man, and a dozen other thumping riddles were passed in review, along with behavioristic psychology, case study of sexuality, and the OEdipus Complex. From the welter John emerged pop-eyed, but with a reinforced conviction that the noblest gesture a man can make in this muddled world is that of finger to nose, particularly against all religions that can be preached from pulpits. This conclusion, if not this gesture, was in the grand manner, safe enough, but while it aligned him with his father it bitterly crossed the sentiments of his mother. And Mattie, and her old-fashioned mother? . . . It soothed him to reflect that they were women. Nietzsche said nothing about superwomen. Or did he? . . . Oh well, at home these things needn't be talked about.