"The opportunity to meet the fellow who gets the grind of life—to understand what he thinks of himself, and especially what he thinks of those above him. I won't have many more chances to see him on the ground floor, and some day I've got to know him well enough to convince him. See? By the way, it would be a good college course for a lot of you fellows if you got in touch with the real thing also."
"Are you a socialist?" said Stover, who vaguely associated the term with dynamite and destruction.
"I may be, but I don't know it."
"I say, Tom, do you go in for debating and all that sort of thing?"
"You bet I do; but it comes hard as hen's teeth."
Stover, who had waited for an opportunity to volunteer advice, finding no opening, resolved to take the dilemma by the horns.
"Tom, I think you're wrong about one thing."
"What's that?"
"Holding aloof so much."
"Particularly what?"