e so because, owing to his weeks of
strict training and his virtual isolation of the year before, it was
all strange to him. And at that period what is forbidden, dangerous
and, above all, untried, must be attempted at least once.

Now, owing to the foresight of a wise father, Dink had never been
forbidden to smoke. Of a consequence when, at an early age, he
practiced upon an old corncob pipe and found it violently disagreed
with him, the desire abruptly ceased and, as the athletic ardor came,
he consecrated his years to the duty of growing, with not the
slightest regret.

But between smoking under permission and squeezing close to a cold-air
ventilator, stealthily, in the pin-drop silences of the night, with
frightful risks of detection, was all the difference in the world. One
was a disagreeable, thoroughly unsympathetic exercise; the other was a
romantic, mediaeval adventure.

So when Slops Barnett, who roomed below and was the proprietor of a
model air flue with direct, perpendicular draught, said to him with an
air of mannish _insouciance_:

"I say, old man, I've got a fat box of 'Gyptians. Glad to have you
drop in to-night if you like the weed."

Dink answered with blase familiarity:

"Why, thankee, I've been aching for just a good old coffin-nail."

He slipped down the creaking, nervous stairs, and found Slops
luxuriously reclining before the ventilator, on a mattress re-enforced
by yellow and green sofa pillows, that gave the whole somewhat of the
devilishly dissipated effect of the scenes from Oriental lands that
fascinated him on the covers of cigarette boxes.

Slops made him a sign in the deaf-and-dumb language to extinguish the
light and creep to his side.

"Comfy?" said Slops, whispering from the darkness.

"Out of sight!"

"Here's the filthy weed."

"Thanks."

"Always keep the cig in front of the ventilator," said Slops, applying
his lips to Dink's ear. "Get a light from mine. Talk in whispers."

Stover filled his cheeks cautiously and blew out after a sufficient
period.

"You inhale?"

"Sure."

"Inhale a cigar?"

"Always."

"It's awful the way I inhale," said Slops with a melancholy sigh. "I'm
undermining my constitution. Ever see my hand? Shakes worse'n jelly.
Can't help it, though; can't live without the weed. I'm a regular cig
fiend!"

Stover, holding his cigarette gingerly, keeping the sickly smoke at
the end of his tongue, looked over at Slops' stupid little face,
flashi