you."

"Well?"

"We've only got a few days more in the old place. I don't want to go
out with any hard feelings for anybody, do you?"

"No."

"Let's call it off! Shake hands."

Stover listened breathless, hearing little more, understanding only
that a feud had ceased, that two enemies on the verge of the long
parting had held each other's hands, slapped each other's backs with
crude, embarrassed emotion, for the sake of the memories that lived in
the shadow of a name. And something like a lump rose again in Dink's
throat. He no longer thought of his loneliness. He felt in him the
longing to live as they had lived through the glorious years, to know
the touch of a friend's arm about his shoulders, and to leave a name
to stand with the names that were going out.

He raised his fists grotesquely, unconsciously, and swore an oath:

"No, I won't give up; I'll never give up. I'll come back. I'll fight
it out!" he said almost aloud. "I'll make 'em like me. I'll make 'em
proud of me."

X

_My father sent me here to Lawrenceville,
And resolved that for college I'd prepare;
And so I settled down
In this ancient little town,
About five miles away from anywhere._

_Five miles away from anywhere, my boys,
Where old Lawrenceville evermore shall stand.
For has she not stood since the time of the flood.
About five miles away from anywhere?_

The school was returning after the long summer vacation, rollicking
back over the dusty, Trenton highway, cheering and singing as they
came.

Jimmy, on the stage, was swallowed up in the mass of exultant boyhood
that clustered on the top like bees on a comb of honey, and clung to
step and strap. Inside, those who had failed of place stuck long legs
out of the windows, and from either side beat the time of the
choruses.

"Next verse!" shouted Doc Macnooder as leader of the orchestra.

_The First Form then I gayly entered,
And did so well, I do declare,
When they looked my record o'er
All the masters cried "Encore!"
About five miles away from anywhere._

"Chorus!" cried Macnooder. "Here, you legs, keep together! You're
spoiling the effect."

Dink Stover sat quietly on the second seat, joining in the singing,
but without the rollicking abandon of the others. He had shot up
amazingly during the vacation and taken on some weight, but the change
was most marked in his face. The roundness was gone and with it the
cherubic smile. The o