by scowling lines.

"There's one thing about you that I remember," he snapped at me. "You
were a Jew--and yet you stood aside and let those little cads take the
book of God and make nasty fun of it--and never raised your hand or even
your voice to stop them. That's the sort of boy you were. And, I
suppose, you're still the same. It'd seem so, anyhow. You probably won
all your college honors through standing aside. And now you have the
audacity to ask me to do the same, lest you be made uncomfortable by the
number of other Jewish boys at your college. You want me to stand aside,
do you? Well, I wish I had a thousand Jewish boys to enter into your
college's next year's class!"

He glared at me. "If you want to know the truth, I can't get a single
boy in my school to go to your college, now. I wish I could. Because I'm
training them to fight like men. They aren't the sort who win honors by
allowing themselves to be classed as exceptions...."

As for myself, I knew that he was half wrong, half right--and that there
was nothing more for me to say. I had learned what I came to learn. So I
got up to go.

"And if there's another such demonstration, next year," he sneered, "you
and your precious honors will have to stand aside again, eh? It must
keep you very light on your feet!"

XVIII

I STAND--BUT NOT ASIDE

Thus it happened that only five Jews enrolled in the entering freshman
class. One of them, of course, was Frank Cohen.

Mr. Levi's accusations had stung deeply. My anger at them was all the
more intense because my heart admitted half their truth. Nevertheless, I
was glad to see that there could be no possible aggravation this year:
surely, with only five Jewish freshmen, the percentage would be small
and unnoticed. It was all very well, that venom of Mr. Levi's--but it
was unreasonable. I would be glad if the Jewish question would never
again be mentioned during my college course.

The opening of the senior year found Frank Cohen and me on the
Palisades, talking eagerly of what his college course would mean to him.
He made me smile, his dreams were so like my own had been when I, too,
was a freshman. Made me wonder, too, how much I had fulfilled those
dreams. Something accomplished, yes--and as much unfulfilled,
disregarded, left undone. Well, perhaps, in this last year, I would
have the chance again--and would not flinch.

The chance came just two days after the opening of college. It came when
Fran