e conversed over the 'phone.

"Hello!... Yes!... Yes!... Oh! Good evening!... Yes.... Yes....
No-o-o--it won't be possible!... No, I've just come in and I'm pretty
well 'all in.' I have a lot of studying yet to do to-night. This is
exam. week, you know.... No, I'm afraid not to-morrow night either....
No, there wouldn't be a chance till the end of the week, anyway.... Why,
yes, I think I could by that time, perhaps--Friday night? I'll let you
know.... Thank you. Good-by!"

The listeners looked from one to the other knowingly. This was not the
tone of one who had "fallen" very far for a girl. They knew the signs.
He had actually been indifferent! Gila Dare had not conquered him so
easily as Bill Ward had thought she would. And the strange thing about
it was that there was something in the atmosphere that night that made
them feel they weren't so very sorry. Somehow Courtland seemed unusually
close and dear to them just then. For the moment they seemed to have
perceived something fine and high in his mood that held them in awe.
They did not "kid" him when he came back to them, as they would
ordinarily have done. They received him gravely, talking together about
the examination on the morrow, as if they had scarcely noticed his
going.

Bill Ward came back presently with his arms laden with bundles. He
looked keenly at the tired face on the couch, but whistled a merry tune
to let on he had not noticed anything amiss.

"Got a great spread this time," he declared, setting forth his spoils on
two chairs alongside the couch. "Hot oyster stew! Sit by, fellows! Cooky
wrapped it up in newspapers to keep it from getting cold. There's bowls
and spoons in the basket. Nelly, get 'em out! Here, Pat, take that
bundle out from under my arm. That's celery and crackers. Here's a pail
of hot coffee with cream and sugar all mixed. Lookout, Pat! That's
jelly-roll and chocolate eclairs! Don't mash it, you chump! Why didn't
you come with me?"

It was pleasant to lie there in that warm, comfortable room with the
familiar sights all around, the pennants, the pictures, the wild
arrangements of photographs and trophies, and hear the fellows talking
of homely things; to be fed with food that made him begin to feel like
himself again; to have their kindly fellowship all about him like a
protection.

They were grand fellows, each one of them; full of faults, too, but true
at heart. Life-friends he knew, for there was a cord binding their four