Lambert forged ahead, filthy and wet. The steam, like vapour from an overworked animal, wavered about him. The Baillys and the Alstons pushed close to George and Goodhue, who were in Lambert's path, pressed there and held by the anxious people.
At sight of Betty, Lambert paused and stretched out his hand. She was, George thought, whiter than ever.
"You'll say hello even to an Eli?"
She gave her hand quickly, the colour invading her pallor. For an instant George thought Lambert was going to draw her closer, saw his lips twitch, heard him say:
"Don't hold it against me, Betty."
Certainly something was understood between these two, or Lambert, at least, believed so.
Betty freed her hand and caught at George's arm.
"Look at him," she said clearly, indicating Planter. "You're going to take care of him next fall. You're not going to let him laugh at us again."
George managed a smile.
"I'll take care of him, Miss Alston."
Lambert's dirty face expanded.
"These are threats! And it's – George. Then we're to have a return bout next fall. I'll look forward to it. Hello, Dick. Good-bye, Betty. Till next fall – George."
He passed on, leaving an impression of confidence and conquest.
"Why," Betty said, impulsively, in George's ear, "does he speak to you that way? Why does he call you George like that?"
For a moment he looked at her steadily, appealingly.
"It's partly my own fault," he said at last, "but it hurts."
Her voice was softer than before.
"That's wrong. You mustn't let little things hurt, George."
For the first time in his memory he felt a stinging at his eyes, the desire for tears. He didn't misunderstand. Her use of his first name was not a precedent. It had been balm applied to a wound that she had only been able to see was painful. Yet, as he walked away with Goodhue, he felt as if he had been baptized again.
XV
Wandel, quite undisturbed, joined them.
"You and Dicky," the little man said, "look as if you had come out of a bad wreck. What's up? It's only a game."
"Of course you're right," George answered, "but you have to play some games desperately hard if you want to win."
"Now what are you driving at, great man?" Wandel wanted to know.
"Come on, Spike," Goodhue said, irritably. "You're always looking for double meanings."
George walked on with them, desolately aware of many factors of his life gone awry. The game; Lambert's noticeable mockery, all the more unbearable because of its unaffectedness; Dalrymple's adjacence to Sylvia – these remembrances stung, the last most of all.
"Come on up, you two," Goodhue suggested as they approached the building in which he lived, "I believe Dolly's giving tea to Sylvia Planter and her mother."
George wanted to see if the photograph was still there, but he couldn't risk it. He shook his head.
"Not into the camp of the enemy?" Wandel laughed.
Of course, George told himself as he walked off, Wandel's words couldn't possibly have held any double meaning.
He fought it out that night, sleeping scarcely at all. In the rush of his progress here he had failed to realize how little he had really advanced toward his ultimate goal. Lambert had offhand, perhaps unintentionally, shown him that afternoon how wide the intervening space still stretched. Was it because of moral cowardice that he shrank from challenging a crossing? The answer to such a challenge might easily mean the destruction of all he had built up, the heavy conditioning of his future which now promised so abundantly.
He faced her picture with his eyes resolute, his jaw thrust out.
"I'll do it," he told the lifeless print. "I'll make you know me. I'll teach your brother not to treat me as a servant who has forgotten his place."
The last, in any case, couldn't be safely put off. Lambert's manner had already aroused Betty's interest. Had she known its cause she might not have resented it so sweetly for George. There was no point in fretting any more. His mind was made up to challenge at the earliest possible moment.
In furtherance of his resolution he visited his tailor the next day, and during the evening called at the Baillys'. He came straight to the point.
"I want some dancing lessons," he said. "Do you know anybody?"
Bailly limped up, put his hands on George's shoulder, and studied him.
"Is this traceable to Wandel?"
"No. To what I told you last summer."
"He's going to Betty Alston's dance," Mrs. Bailly cried.
"If I'm asked," George admitted, "but as a general principle – "
Mrs. Bailly interrupted, assuming control.
"Move that table and the chairs," she directed the two men. "You'll keep my husband's secret – tinkling music hidden away between grand opera records. It will come in handy now."
George protested, but she had her own way. Bailly sat by, puffing at his pipe, at first scornful.
"I hate to see a football player pirouetting like a clown."
But in a little while he was up, awkwardly illustrating steps, his cheeks flushed, his cold pipe dangling from his lips.
"You dance very well as it is," Mrs. Bailly told George. "You do need a little quieting. You must learn to remember that the ballroom isn't a gridiron and your partner the ball."
And at the end of a fortnight she told him he was tamed and ready for the soft and perfumed exercise of the dance floor.
He was afraid Betty wouldn't remember. Her invitation had been informal, his response almost a refusal.
On free afternoons Goodhue and he often ran together, trying to keep in condition, already feeling that the outcome of next year's big games would depend on them. They trotted openly through the Alston place, hoping for a glimpse of Betty as a break in their grind. When she saw them from the house she would come out and chat for a time, her yellow hair straying in the wind, her cheeks flushed from the cold. During these brief conferences it was made clear that she had not forgotten, and that George would go up with Goodhue and be a guest at his home the night of the dance.
George was grateful for that quality of remoteness in Goodhue which at first had irritated him. Now he was well within Goodhue's vision, and acceptably so; but the young man had not shown the slightest interest in his past or his lack of the right friends before coming to Princeton. At any moment he might.
The Goodhue house was uptown between Fifth and Madison avenues. It was as unexpected to George as Wandel's green study had been. The size of its halls and rooms, the tasteful extravagance of its decorations, the quiet, liveried servants took his breath. It was difficult not to say something, to withhold from his glance his admiration and his lack of habit.
There he was at last, handing his hat and coat to one who bent obsequiously. He felt a great contempt. He told himself he was unjust, as unjust as Sylvia, but the contempt persisted.
There were details here more compelling than anything he had seen or fancied at Oakmont. The entire household seemed to move according to a feudal pattern. Goodhue's father and mother welcomed George, because their son had brought him, with a quiet assurance. Mrs. Goodhue, George felt, might even appreciate what he was doing. That was the