went on very gently. "You're in college.
Let's fight it out on those lines if it takes all summer."

He looked up into her face and loved her better than ever for the frank
kindliness that shone in her eyes.

"All right, if you say so," he vowed.

"I do say so," she said. "I like to see men stick it through in college if
they begin. I like to see people finish up every one of life's jobs that
they set out on."

"But I'm coming to see you in town, you know," he went on with great
apparent irrelevance.

She laughed merrily.

"Yes, surely. You must promise me that.--No," she stopped and looked
thoughtful, "I'll tell you what I want you to promise me. Promise me that
you'll come once a week or else write me why you can't come. Will you?"

"You can't suppose that you'll ever see my handwriting under such
circumstances--can you?" Jack asked.

She laughed again.

"Is it a promise?"

"Yes, it's a promise."

Oh, joy unmeasured in the time of spring! No other February like that had
ever been for them--nor ever would be. The drive came to an end, the day
came to an end, but the good-nights, which were good-bys, too, were not so
fraught with hopelessness as he had dreaded, for the promise asked and
given paved a broad road illuminated by the most hopeful kind of stars,--a
broad road leading straight from college to town,--and his fancy showed him
a figure treading it often. A figure that was his own.

CHAPTER EIGHT - THE RESOLUTION HE TOOK

That first meeting was in February, you know, and by the last of April it
had been followed by so many others that Burnett remarked one day to his
chum:

"Say, aren't you going a little faster than auntie'll stand for?"

Jack turned in surprise.

"I never went so straight in my life before," he exclaimed, not in
indignation but in astonishment.

"I didn't mean that," said Burnett. "Perhaps instead of 'auntie' I should
have said 'Betty.'"

Jack hoisted the colors of Harvard, and was silent.

"I warned you at first that that was Tangle town," his friend went on.
"Don't suppose I'm saying anything against her--or against you; but she's
just as much to ten other men as she is to you, and they all are old
enough to carry lots of weight."

"And I suppose I'm not," Jack answered, going over by the fireplace. "I
know that as well as anyone, of course."

"_Natuerlich_," said Burnett, with conclusiveness that was not meant to be
cruel, yet cut like a two edged knife.