Were such contacts possible in a serviceable measure without success in that selfish, headlong race? Was it practicable to draw the attention of the eager, half-blind runners to one outside the sacred little groups? Football would open certain doors, but if there was one best club he would have that or nothing. It might be wiser to stand brazenly aloof, posing as above such infantile jealousies. The future would decide, but as he left the place of the elections he had an empty feeling, a sharpened appreciation of the hazards that lay ahead.
Goodhue would be pointed for the highest. Goodhue would lead in many ways. He was elected the first president of the class.
The poor or earnest men, ignorant of everything outside their books, come from scattered homes, quite friendless, gravitated together in what men like Rogers considered a social quarantine. Rogers, indeed, ventured to warn George of the risk of contagion. As chance dictated George chatted with such creatures; once or twice even walked across the campus with them.
"You're making a mistake," Rogers advised, "being seen with polers like Allen."
"I've been seen with him twice that I can think of," George answered. "Why?"
"That lot'll queer you."
George put his hand on Rogers' shoulder.
"See here. If I'm so small that that will queer me, you can put me down as damned."
He walked on with that infrequently experienced sensation of having made an advance. Yet he couldn't quite see why. He had responded to an instinct that must have been his even in the days at Oakmont, when he had been less than human. If he didn't see more of men like Allen it was because they had nothing to offer him; nothing whatever. Goodhue had——
When their paths crossed on the campus now Goodhue nodded, for each day they met at the field, both certainties, if they escaped injury, for the Freshmen eleven.