My heart gave a great bound of hope at these last words.

“Professor Grant’s students—­about two-thirds of them—­have enrolled in his classes, because she’s there.”

And then I went cold with jealousy and with despair ... one so popular could never see me ... if it were only later, when my fame as a poet had come!

* * * * *

“Vanna has to be waited on hand and foot.  I don’t mind though,” continued Alice, “I hang up her clothes for her ... make her bed ... sweep and dust our rooms ... it makes me happy to wait on anything so beautiful!” and the face of the homely girl glowed with joy....

* * * * *

I was poor and miserable.  I bent my head forward, forgetful of my determination to walk erect and proud, with a pride I did not possess.

Langworth was coming behind me.  He slapped me on the back.  I whirled, full of resentment.  But changed the look to a smile when I perceived who it was....

“Why, Johnnie, what’s the matter? you’re walking like an old man.  Brace up.  Is anything wrong?”

“No, I was just thinking.”

* * * * *

The first cold blasts of winter howled down upon us.  No snow yet, but winds that rushed about the buildings on the hill, full of icy rain, and with a pushing strength like the shoulders of invisible giants out of the fourth dimension ... we men kept on the sidewalks when we could ... but the winds blew the girls off into the half-hardened mud, and, at times, were so violent, that the girls could not extricate themselves, but they stood still, waiting for help, their skirts whirling up into their very faces.

It was what the boys called “a sight for sore eyes.”

They stood in droves, in the sheltered entrances of the halls, and occasionally darted out by ones and twos and threes to rescue distressed co-eds.

* * * * *

Down in the room over the tin and plumbing shop in which I lived, I found it cold indeed.  I could afford no heat ... and, believing in windows open, knew every searching drop in the barometer.

But never in my life was I happier, despite my secretly cherished love for Vanna.  For I assured myself in my heart of certain future fame, the fame I had dreamed of since childhood.  And I wore every hardship as an adornment, conscious of the greatness of my cause.

Isolation; half-starvation; cold; inadequate clothing;—­all counted for the glory of poetry, as martyrs had accepted persecution and suffering for the glory of God.

My two hours of daily work irked me.  I wanted the time for my writing and studying ... but I still continued living above the din of the shop that I had grown accustomed to, by this time.

Rarely, when the nights were so subarctic as to be almost unbearable, did I slip down through the skylight and seek out the comparative warmth of the shop ... and there, on the platform where the desk stood so that it could overlook all the store, I wrote and studied.