"I'm not a fool," contradicted Hallock flatly.
"Any man's a fool who's working his way through college and fails to get the most he can out of every course offered him. I know, because I worked my way through my last two years, neglected my German and had to make it up after I graduated. That thesis will make or mar you as far as your first job goes. Who'd you have your second year German with? If I were you, I'd take a semester of it over again."
"I'd rather never get a diploma than go back to old Rosenthal."
"Mr. Rosenthal," corrected Roger sharply. "Speak respectfully of an instructor."
"Aw," exclaimed Hallock, now evidently angry, "why should I speak respectfully of a beer-guzzling Dutchman who sneers at the girls in the class every time they recite?"
There was sudden silence in the room. Hallock was evidently relieving an accumulation of irritation. "If I had been Miss Anderson this morning I'd have slapped his fat face for him."
"Be careful, Hallock! I can't permit you to talk this way to me about a member of the faculty."
"Then you're no better than he!" shouted Hallock. "The damned Dutch run this college and I'm sick of it."
There was a sudden murmur of agreement from the highly edified audience now grouped behind Hallock. This was an old sore that had existed in Roger's own days under Rosenthal.
"Pshaw, I know all about Mr. Rosenthal's peccadillos, Hallock," he said. "But he's a teacher and scholar of the first water. Girls always take general remarks personally. Miss Anderson had better forget it, whatever it was. Girl hysteria, probably."