expect at their worst."
The junior set his teeth savagely. "I tell you, sometimes I hate him for it.
That's a fine heritage for a father to give his son, isn't it? Nothing but
trouble and disgrace."
His cousin spoke softly. "He's paid a hundred times for it, old man."
"He ought to pay. Why shouldn't he? I've got to pay. Mother had to as
long as she lived." His voice was hard and bitter.
"Better not judge him. You're his only son, you know."
"I'm the one he's injured most. Why shouldn't I judge him? I've been a
pauper all these years, living off money given us by my mother's
people. I had to leave our home because of what he did. I'd like to
know why I shouldn't judge him."
Jeff was silent.
Presently James rose. "But there's no use talking about it. I've got to be
going. We have an eat to-night at Tucker's."
Part 2
Jeff came to his new life on the full tide of an enthusiasm that did not
begin to ebb till near the close of his first semester. He lived in a new
world, one removed a million miles from the sordid one through which
he had fought his way so many years. All the idealism of his nature
went out in awe and veneration for his college. It stood for something
he could not phrase, something spiritually fine and intellectually strong.
When he thought of the noble motto of the university, "To Serve," it
was always with a lifted emotion that was half a prayer. His professors
went clothed in majesty. The chancellor was of godlike dimensions.
Even the seniors carried with them an impalpable aura of learning.
The illusion was helped by reason of the very contrast between the
jostling competition of the street and the academic air of harmony in
which he now found himself. For the first time was lifted the sense of
struggle that had always been with him.
The outstanding notes of his boyhood had been poverty and
meagerness. It was as if he and his neighbors had been flung into a lake
where they must keep swimming to escape drowning. There had been
no rest from labor. Sometimes the tragedy of disaster had swept over a
family. But on the campus of the university he found the sheltered life.
The echo of that battling world came to him only faintly.
He began to make tentative friendships, but in spite of the advice of his
cousin they were with the men who did not count. Samuel Miller was
an example. He was a big, stodgy fellow with a slow mind which
arrived at its convictions deliberately. But when he had made sure of
them he hung to his beliefs like a bulldog to a bone.
It was this quality that one day brought them together in the classroom.
An instructor tried to drive Miller into admitting he was wrong in an
opinion. The boy refused to budge, and the teacher became nettled.
"Mr. Miller will know more when he doesn't know so much," the
instructor snapped out.
Jeff's instinct for fair play was roused at once, all the more because of
the ripple of laughter that came from the class. He spoke up quietly.
"I can't see yet but that Mr. Miller is right, sir."
"The discussion is closed," was the tart retort.
After class the dissenters walked across to chapel together.
"Poke the animal up with a stick and hear him growl," Jeff laughed
airily.
"Page always thinks a fellow ought to take his say-so as gospel," Miller
commented.
Most of the students saw in Jeff Farnum only a tallish young man, thin
as a rail, not particularly well dressed, negligent as to collar and tie. But
Miller observed in the tanned face a tender, humorous mouth and eager,
friendly eyes that looked out upon the world with a suggestion of inner
mirth. In course of time he found out that his friend was an
unconquerable idealist.
Jeff made discoveries. One of them was a quality of brutal indifference
in some of his classmates to those less fortunate. These classy young
gentlemen could ignore him as easily as a hurrying business man can a
newsboy trying to sell him a paper. If he was forced upon their notice
they were perfectly courteous; otherwise he was not on the map for
them.
Another point that did not escape his attention was the way in which
the institution catered to Merrill and Frome, because they were large
donors to the university. He had once heard Peter C. Frome say in a
speech to the students that he contributed to the support of Verden
University because it was a "safe and conservative citadel which never
had yielded to demagogic assaults." At
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