at the State University for special work in European History. The
year before he had heard the head of the department lecture for
some charity, and resolved that even if he were not allowed to
change his college, he would manage to study under that man. The
course Claude selected was one upon which a student could put as
much time as he chose. It was based upon the reading of
historical sources, and the Professor was notoriously greedy for
full notebooks. Claude’s were of the fullest. He worked early and
late at the University Library, often got his supper in town and
went back to read until closing hour. For the first time he was
studying a subject which seemed to him vital, which had to do
with events and ideas, instead of with lexicons and grammars. How
often he had wished for Ernest during the lectures! He could see
Ernest drinking them up, agreeing or dissenting in his
independent way. The class was very large, and the Professor
spoke without notes,—he talked rapidly, as if he were addressing
his equals, with none of the coaxing persuasiveness to which
Temple students were accustomed. His lectures were condensed like
a legal brief, but there was a kind of dry fervour in his voice,
and when he occasionally interrupted his exposition with purely
personal comment, it seemed valuable and important.
Claude usually came out from these lectures with the feeling that
the world was full of stimulating things, and that one was
fortunate to be alive and to be able to find out about them. His
reading that autumn actually made the future look brighter to
him; seemed to promise him something. One of his chief
difficulties had always been that he could not make himself
believe in the importance of making money or spending it. If that
were all, then life was not worth the trouble.
The second good thing that had befallen him was that he had got
to know some people he liked. This came about accidentally, after
a football game between the Temple eleven and the State
University team—merely a practice game for the latter. Claude
was playing half-back with the Temple. Toward the close of the
first quarter, he followed his interference safely around the
right end, dodged a tackle which threatened to end the play, and
broke loose for a ninety yard run down the field for a touchdown.
He brought his eleven off with a good showing. The State men
congratulated him warmly, and their coach went so far as to hint
that if he ever wanted to make a change, there would be a place
for him on the University team.
Claude had a proud moment, but even while Coach Ballinger was
talking to him, the Temple students rushed howling from the
grandstand, and Annabelle Chapin, ridiculous in a sport suit of
her own construction, bedecked with the Temple colours and
blowing a child’s horn, positively threw herself upon his neck.
He disengaged himself, not very gently, and stalked grimly away
to the dressing shed…. What was the use, if you were always
with the wrong crowd?
