han before jarred his paper out of focus. He saw
a young fellow of about his own age with a face that would have been
strikingly handsome if it had not also been bold and conceited. He had
large dark eyes set off by long curling black lashes, black hair that
crinkled close to his head in satiny sleek sheen, well-chiselled
features, all save a loose-hung, insolent lip that gave the impression
of great self-indulgence and selfishness. He was dressed with a
careful regard to the fashion and with evidently no regard whatever
for cost. He bore the mark at once of wealth and snobbishness. Howard,
in spite of his newly-acquired desire to look upon all men as
brothers, found himself disliking him with a vehemence that was out of
all proportion to the occasion.

"Don't they have any pahlah cars on this road?"

The question was addressed to him in a calm, insolent tone as if he
were a paid servitor of the road. He looked up amusedly and eyed the
stranger pitingly:

"Not so as you'd notice it," he remarked crushingly as he turned back
to his paper. "People on this road too busy to use 'em."

But the stranger did not crush easily:

"Live far out?" he asked, turning his big, bold eyes on his seatmate
and calmly examining him from the toe of a well-worn shoe to the crown
of a dusty old hat that Howard was trying to make last till the end of
the season. When he had finished the survey his eyes travelled
complacently back to his own immaculate attire, and his well-polished
shoes fresh from the hands of the city station bootblack. With a
well-manicured thumb and finger he flecked an imaginary bit of dust
from the knee of his trousers.

Howard named the college town brusquely.

"Ah, indeed!" Another survey brief and significant this time. "I don't
suppose you know any people at the college." It was scarcely a
question, more like a statement of a deplorable fact. Howard was
suddenly amused.

"Oh, a few," he said briefly. (He was just finishing his senior year
rather brilliantly and his professors were more than proud of him.)

Another glance seemed to say: "In what capacity?" but the elegant
youth finally decided to voice another question:

"Don't happen to know a fellah by the name of Cloud, I suppose? Al
Cloud?"

"I've met him," said Howard with his eyes still on his paper.

"He's from my State!" announced the youth with a puff of importance.
"We live next door in California. He's a regular guy, he is. Got all
kinds of m