The young man was soon known at college as one of the leaders of the gay set.  His luxuriously furnished rooms, his expensive suppers and his acquaintance with dancing-girls were talked about, and he soon had a reputation for being one of the wildest youngsters of his class.

“Your son will spend all the money you can make for him,” said one of his friends to Mr. Wickersham.

“Well,” said the father, “I hope he will have as much pleasure in spending it as I have had in making it, that’s all.”

He not only gave Ferdy all the money he suggested a need for, but he offered him large bonuses in case he should secure any of the honors he had heard of as the prizes of the collegiate work.

Mrs. Wickersham was very eager for him to win this particular prize.  Apart from her natural ambition, she had a special reason.  The firm of Norman Wentworth & Son was one of the oldest and best-known houses in the country.  The home of Norman Wentworth was known to be one of the most elegant in the city, as it was the most exclusive, and both Mr. and Mrs. Wentworth were recognized as representatives of the old-time gentry.  Mrs. Wickersham might have endured the praise of the elegance of the mansion.  She had her own ideas as to house-furnishing, and the Wentworth mansion was furnished in a style too quiet and antiquated to suit her more modern tastes.  If it was filled with old mahogany and hung with damask-satin, Mrs. Wickersham had carved walnut and gorgeous hangings.  And as to those white marble busts, and those books that were everywhere, she much preferred her brilliant figures which she “had bought in Europe,” and books were “a nuisance about a house.”  They ought to be kept in a library, as she kept hers—­in a carved-walnut case with glass doors.

The real cause of Mrs. Wickersham’s dislike of Mrs. Wentworth lay deeper.

The elder lady had always been gracious to Mrs. Wickersham when they met, as she was gracious to every one, and when a very large entertainment was given by her, had invited Mrs. Wickersham to it.  But Mrs. Wickersham felt that Mrs. Wentworth lived within a charmed circle.  And Mrs. Wickersham was envious.

It must be said that Ferdy needed no instigation to supersede Norman in any way that did not require too much work.  He and Norman were very good friends; certainly Norman thought so; but at bottom Ferdy was envious of Norman’s position and prestige, and deep in his heart lurked a long-standing grudge against the older boy, to which was added of late a greater one.  Norman and he fancied the same girl, and Louise Caldwell was beginning to favor Norman.

Ferdy announced to his father that the class-honor would be won if he would give him money enough, and the elder Wickersham, delighted, told him to draw on him for all the money he wanted.  This Ferdy did promptly.  He suddenly gave up running away from college, applied himself to cultivating the acquaintance of his fellow-students, spent his money lavishly in entertainments, and for a time it appeared that he might wrest the prize from Norman’s grasp.