against the Blue and Gold on
Thanksgiving day. Here and there a fraternity dog, showing his head
between a pair of golf-clad knees, joined the quick, sharp yell of the
people about him with an imitation that raised a laugh. When the
bleachers were still just before a big play, one could hear in the
breathless silence the slap of the canvas suits, the thud of heavy
shoes, the sniffling of men just out of a scrimmage. Far across the bay,
the hills that were cool and blue when practice began, grew luminously
red in the level light of the dying rays; against the fading color of
the west, the power-house chimney rose picturesquely dark; the swift,
elusive twilight of California settled down on Santa Clara's broad
acres, so that Diemann had to stare hard to follow Ashley's play. Then
the whistle sounded, sharp in the still air, and the teams came trotting
to the side-lines to take their sweaters and caps from devoted admirers
and to stroll off, arm over shoulder, with people who minded not in the
least the campus dirt those heroes had been gathering.

Diemann took Ashley's arm. "Let's walk together," he said.

The substitute fullback had been playing hard ball. The gloom hanging
over the first half of the practice had affected him strongly and he had
flung himself into the game, trying to forget, to cast off the foolish
sense of an implied reproach. Diemann could see that he was very tired.
He made him lean upon him, and they started for the Hall. Suddenly he
realized that the football man was not answering questions, that the
weight on his own shoulder was growing heavier. He glanced up into
Ashley's face; there was an absent look in the man's eyes.

"Fred!" whispered Diemann sharply in his ear.

"Yes?" answered the fullback; then he shook himself and said:

"It's chilly, Die, I'm wet. Let's get in."

Some fifteen minutes later, the two came down the corridor toward the
training table.

"Good-night, Ashley."

"Won't you stay to dinner, Diemann?"

"No, I must go down, and you are late as it is. Hurry along in."

"All right. I'm not going stale if I can help it. I just felt a little
faint over there; I got pretty tired."

Diemann stepped up closer to him beside the curving balustrade and
looked the football man steadily in the eyes.

"You are playing more like Blake every day," he said.

"I wish I were."

"We are going to the Springs to-morrow," went on the coach, "and you can
rest. By the way, if I were you I