The next day Lester and David walked together to the meeting of the class in English composition. They took their seats; Lester’s seat was immediately behind David’s.
Professor Worthington opened a theme. “Usually,” he said, “I acquiesce in the wishes of those who ask that their themes be not read to the class. But I shall venture to disregard one such request for the reason that the writer of the theme has taken a subject that is not in any way personal and that is of general undergraduate interest. I hope that he will not object. The title of the theme is ‘The Place of Athletics in College Life’.”
Lester’s brain swam; he felt faint and sick. Instinctively he tried to appear impassive, and when the reading began and David in the seat in front sat up with excitement and then turned and let his eyes rove questioningly over the faces of those behind him, Lester’s countenance was unmoved. But David’s eyes did not rest on Lester; with their puzzled and indignant expression they swept back and forth, but they did not so much as glance at any of his friends. Finally David turned and settled down into his seat while the reading proceeded.
Slowly Lester rallied from his mental collapse. What was he to do now? David would go to the desk at the end of the hour and tell Professor Worthington that he was the author of the theme. Expulsion from college was the penalty for cheating in examinations; expulsion from college was probably the penalty for stealing another fellow’s theme. To be expelled for any misdeed was bad enough, but to be expelled for cheating and theft—what could be more terrible! Lester felt that his mother and his father could not bear it; he could not go home to them branded in such a way by the college. He must somehow keep David from telling Professor Worthington about that theme.
The reading of it went on. At the end Professor Worthington said: “That is the kind of theme I should like to get more often than I do. It deals with a subject that is of undergraduate interest and one on which you must all have done some thinking and talking. The reader feels that it is written with a certain authority, that the writer, either from his close observation of athletics or participation in them, knows what he’s talking about. The first requisite to writing well about a thing is to know the subject thoroughly. There is no doubt that the writer of this theme knows athletics thoroughly.”
Professor Worthington let his glance fall on Lester with an approving and encouraging smile. He then took up another theme and resumed his reading.
Lester felt for an instant that Professor Worthington’s glance and smile had identified him for the class. Then he knew that this could not be, especially when the man on his left murmured to him, “Mighty good theme; wonder who wrote it.”
As the hour dragged on, Lester, inattentive to the reading and to the instructor’s comments, tried to formulate in his mind the appeal that he should make to David, turned from it in disgust, thought with bitterness of the cruel mischance of which, after having safely passed all the perils that had threatened him, he was now the victim, and turned again to the framing of his excuses and his plea.