It was a splendid field; Clint had to acknowledge that; and for a time the thought of playing football on it had almost dispersed his gloom.  But the after-reflection that for all he knew his services might not be required on the Eleven, that very possibly his brand of football was not good enough for Brimfield, had caused a relapse into depression.  Thrice he had told himself that as soon as the plodding horse reached the further turn he would get up and go back to his room, and thrice he had failed to keep his promise.  He wondered who his room-mate was to be and whether that youth had yet arrived, but his curiosity was not strong enough to get him up.  Now, however, the mower was again traversing the opposite end of the field, and again approaching the further corner, and once more he made the agreement with himself, really meaning to live up to it.  But, as events proved, he was not destined to keep faith.

From around the corner of the stand furthest from the Row appeared a boy in a suit of light grey flannels.  The coat, hanging open, displayed a soft shirt of no uncertain shade of heliotrope.  A bow-tie of lemon-yellow with purple dots nestled under his chin and between the cuffs of his trousers and the rubber-soled tan shoes a four-inch expanse of heliotrope silk stockings showed.  A straw hat with a particularly narrow brim was adorned with a ribbon of alternating bars of maroon and grey.  He was indeed a cheerful and colourful youth, his cheerfulness being further evidenced by the jaunty swinging of a stick which he had apparently cut from a willow and by the gay whistling of a tune.  On sight of Clint, however, the stick stopped swinging and the whistling came to an end in the middle of a note.

“Hi!” said the youth in surprised tones.

“Hello,” answered Clint politely.

The newcomer paused and viewed the boy on the stand with frank curiosity.  Then his gaze wandered across to the mower, which was at the instant making the turn at the further corner, over by the tennis courts.  Finally,

“Bossing the job?” he asked, nodding toward the mower.

Clint smiled and shook his head.  “No, just—­just loafing.”

“Hot, isn’t it?” The other pushed the gaily-ribboned hat to the back of his head and drew a pale lavender handkerchief across his forehead.  “Been moseying around over there in the woods,” he continued when Clint had murmured agreement.  “Studying Nature in her manifold moods.  Nature is some warm today.  There’s a sort of a breeze here, though, isn’t there?”

Clint agreed again, more doubtfully, and the boy who had been studying Nature seated himself sidewise on a seat below, drawing his feet up and clasping his hands about his knees.  He was a good-looking, merry-faced chap of seventeen, with dark-brown eyes, a short nose liberally freckled under the tan and a rather prominent chin with a deep dimple in it.  His position revealed a full ten inches of the startling hose; and, since they were almost under his nose, Clint gazed at them fascinatedly.