ing at his fellows, now bending forward above the
table, heedless of his cooling plate, the while he harangued his
companions with a facility which seemed to Scott the acme of brilliant
eloquence.

At Reed's elbow, Scott followed each inflection of the persuasive
voice, his lean face glowing with appreciation at every point his idol
scored. For the time being, awkwardness was lost and all
self-consciousness. Why think about himself, when he could have the
chance to watch Reed Opdyke and to listen to him? Scott's nature
thrilled in answer to the alien touch, unconsciously as that touch was
given. It never once would have struck Opdyke that he was becoming an
object of idolatry to this gaunt starveling to whom, as he expressed
it, he had tried to be a little decent. It was quite within the limits
of his comprehension that he could step down now and then to Scott. It
never would have occurred to him, at that epoch of his experience, that
Scott could try to clamber up to him. Save for the minutes when he
consciously gave his attention to the ungainly young waiter, he
disregarded him completely.

The other boys, however, were quick to take in the situation and to
comment on it. "Reed's parson" they called Scott, and they chaffed
Opdyke mercilessly, when Scott's back was turned. Scott, had he heard
the chaff, would have been wounded to the death, a death he would have
met far, far inside his shell, regretful that ever he had come out of
it. Opdyke, however, merely laughed and stuck to his original position.

"A fellow with such eyes is bound to have it in him. He's never had a
chance," he said to his chaffing mates. "Wait till he finds himself,
and then see what happens."

"Nothing," came the prompt reply. "He won't ever find himself, Reed. He
has found you, and that's as much as such a fellow as he is, can ever
assimilate."

And the reply was by no means wide of the mark. For the present, Scott
Brenton was finding it all he could do to assimilate Reed Opdyke.
Indeed, it was only in the very end of all things that fulness of
assimilation came.

As the time went on, partly in defiance of the chaffing of his chronies,
partly on account of it, Opdyke lent himself more and more to the
assimilating process. He sought out Scott more often, had him in his
room, taught him to fill a pipe and smoke it after the fashion of a
gentleman, dropped into his ears specious hints regarding manners, and
about the efficiency of one's mat