"Oh, yes, I love her. I have always loved her!" And silently, deep in his heart, a little frightened almost to set the thought to words, he made a vow that his life from now on should be earnest and inspired with but one purpose, to win her respect and to win the right to ask her for his wife.
With the resolve, all the fret and fever went from him. He felt a new confidence and a new maturity.
"When I speak again, I shall have the right," he said solemnly. "And she shall see that I am not a mere boy. That I will show her soon!"
When he came again into the domain of the college, he suddenly felt all the littleness of the ambitions that raged inside those self-sufficient walls.
"Lord, what have I been doing all this time--what does it count for? Brocky is right; it isn't what you do here, it's what you are ready to do when you go out. Thank Heaven, I can see it now." And secure in the knowledge that the honors he rated so lightly were his, he added: "There's only one thing that counts--that's your own self."
It was after the dinner hour, and he hesitated; a little tired of his own company, longing for the diversion another personality would bring, and seeking some one as far removed from his own point of view as possible, he halted before Durfee, and sent his call to the top stories:
"Oh, Ricky Ricketts, stick out your head."
Above a window went up, and a fuzzy head came curiously forth.
Presently, Ricketts's bean-stalk figure came flopping out of the entry.
"I'm back too late for supper. Come on down with me to Mory's and keep me company, and I'll buy you a drink."
"Did I hear the word 'buy'?" said Ricketts, in the manner then made popular by the lamented Pete Dailey.
At Mory's, two or three men whom he didn't know were at the senior table. Le Baron and Reynolds, prospective captain of the crew and chairman of the News, respectively, men of his own society, gave him a hearty, "Hello, Dink," and then stared curiously at Ricketts, whose general appearance neither conformed to any one fashion nor to any two. Gimbel, the politician, was in the off room with three of the more militant anti-sophomore society leaders. The two parties saluted in regulation style.
Stover, sitting down, saw Gimbel's perplexed glance at his companion, and thought to himself: