“Go ahead,” begged Phillip. “I can’t see how you could have taken me for an old stager.”
“Well, you looked so kind of don’t-give-a-hang, standing under the tree there, that I thought you were probably a soph. Hope you won’t take that as an insult.”
“No indeed; why should I? I rather wish I was a sophomore, I reckon.”
“Phew! That’s regular treason! Don’t you know that a freshman holds a soph. in the deepest contempt?”
“No, I didn’t know it. Why?”
“Oh—well, just because, I guess. It’s—it’s reciprocal. You have to; it’s part of the game.”
“Oh.” Phillip looked puzzled. They had reached the steps of the recitation hall. “Well, I’m going in here,” he said, hesitatingly.
“So’m I,” answered his new acquaintance. “And say, afterward come over to my room in Thayer with me and we’ll see if we can’t find that other squirrel, eh?”
“Thanks,” answered Phillip; “I’ll look for you.”
“Oh, come on; we’ll get seats together.”
But they didn’t, and so, for a time, Phillip lost sight of the other. But during the next half-hour his thoughts were busy with him. It did not seem extraordinary to him that the blue-eyed youth should have made overtures of friendship as he had. In Virginia one spoke to strangers on the road, and common courtesy demanded a certain disregard of conventionalities. Later, however, when Phillip had seen more of college life and customs, he marveled greatly. Now he wondered what the white E embroidered on the other’s crimson cap meant, and resolved to purchase a cap just like it at once. Also, the stunning shirt of white and green and pink stripes worn by his new acquaintance made him dissatisfied with his own stiff-bosomed affair; and he acknowledged the superiority, from the standpoint of picturesqueness, of knickerbockers and golf stockings over long trousers. He wondered how much such articles of apparel cost and what would be left to him of his present capital after he had made such purchases as now seemed necessary.
He found the crimson cap waiting for him on the steps when he filed out and he ranged his own straw hat beside it. Together the two made their way past University to the farther end of Thayer. Here Phillip was guided into a corner study on the first floor.
On the door a clean, new card was tacked and Phillip read the inscription as he passed:
“Mr. Chester M. Baker.”
He made a mental note to order some like it and throw away those he had, on which his name was engraved in a flowing script which he had heretofore thought very beautiful, but which he now surmised to be sadly out of style.
The study in which Phillip found himself was homelike and well furnished, but in no way remarkable. The pictures were few and good; the rugs and upholsterings were bright and aggressively new; only the cushions in the window-seat and the half-hundred books showed the dignity of usage. But Phillip thought it a very nice room, with its view of greensward and swaying branches through the open windows, and regretted that he had not secured quarters in the Yard. His host tossed the crimson cap onto the table.
“Sit down,” he said. “By the way, you haven’t any recitation for this hour, have you?”
Phillip shook his head, and his host went on:
“All right; let’s see if we can find Raggles.”
“Raggles?” questioned Phillip.
“Yes, the squirrel; I call him Raggles because his tail is all frayed out. And talking of names, mine’s Baker.”
“And mine’s Ryerson,” answered Phillip.
“Now we know who we are,” said Baker. He went to the window and threw some peanuts onto the gravel outside. Phillip followed and, peering over the other’s shoulder, waited for the squirrel to appear. But, although they offered every inducement, Raggles failed to present himself, and they made themselves comfortable on the window-seat and ate the peanuts themselves.
“Would you mind telling me what this E stands for?” asked Phillip, pointing to one of the cushions. “I saw it on your cap, you know.” Baker looked surprised.
“Why, Exeter,” he answered.
“Oh,” said Phillip. “That’s in New Hampshire, isn’t it?”
“Yes.” The host was plainly bewildered at the other’s ignorance. “Where did you prepare?” he asked.
Phillip named a small academy near Richmond, and Baker nodded his head politely.
“You live in Virginia?” he asked.
“Yes, at Melville Court House. It’s about fifty miles from Alexandria. This is the first time I have been so far north, except last spring when I came up for exams.”
“I knew you were a Southerner,” smiled Baker. “You say ‘Ah’ for I and ‘aboot’ for about. It’s great; I wish I could do it. I talk through my silly nose, like all Yankees.”
“I think you talk very nicely,” said Phillip. “I suppose I do pronounce things differently from folks up North here. Do you live in Boston?”
“Save us!” cried Baker. “No, I’m from Rutland, Vermont. When you meet a real, dyed-in-the-wool Bostonian you’ll see the difference. Do you know any folks in town?”
“No. I haven’t any acquaintances at all hereabouts except my adviser. You’re the first one,” he added with a smile.
“Really?” cried Baker. “Well, I know stacks of fellows and I’ll introduce you ’round. My chum’s a chap named Bassett. You’ll like Guy; he’s awfully jolly. We’ll have lots of fun. Only——” his face fell—“only the trouble is that Laurence is here.”
“Laurence?”
“Yes, he’s my big brother; a senior. That makes it awkward, you see, because he’ll think it’s his plaguey duty to keep watch on me. I wanted to go to Yale for that reason, but dad thought it would be better if I came here so that Laurence could guide my trembling footsteps during my first year in the midst of college temptations.” He grinned. “Dad thinks Laurence is a wonder. But if he gets too obnoxious I’ll threaten to tell some of the things I know about him.”
“I should think it would be rather nice to have a brother in college,” said Phillip. “I wish I had.”
“If you had you’d wish you hadn’t. Where do you room?”
Phillip told him.
“I didn’t try for a room in the Yard,” he explained, “because my father went here and he lived outside. We used to talk about it before—before he died, and we decided that I was to get a place outside, too. I reckon if it hadn’t been that father went here I’d have gone to the University.”
“The University?” queried Baker.
“University of Virginia. But father always wanted that I should go to Harvard. Of course, I wished to please him, but if I’d had my choice I’d have gone to the University. You see, I’d have known more fellows there. Up here I only know you and a senior; and I haven’t met him yet.”
Baker looked mystified and Phillip went on.
“Father had a friend in Washington, and when he learned that I was coming up here he wrote to a friend of his, a senior here, and asked him to call on me. But I haven’t seen him yet.”
“What’s his name?”
“North; John North. Do you know him?”
“No, I’ve never met him yet,” answered Baker, “but Laurence is going to take me ’round to see him to-night, I