Many times Waters had brought word to Dick that Taylor had asked to see him, and Dick had as many times answered that he would go over to Waters’s room as soon as he found time. But he took good care never to allow himself opportunity. Trevor told him he was a brute. Dick growled. On the Saturday afternoon preceding the entertainment the varsity and second crews met for their first tussle on the water, and the result was surprising even to the varsity. The two boats raced from the down-stream end of Long Isle up the river for a half mile, and the varsity’s victory was too decisive to allow of its being explained by crediting the second with unusually slow work. In fact, even the second made favorable time for the course, while the varsity, which finished twelve lengths to the good, came within a few seconds of equaling the best record. But this was a fact known only to Kirk, Dick, and Keene, for the former pointed out dryly that it wouldn’t do them any harm if their rivals at Marshall continued to believe them in poor shape. “It may lead to overconfidence on St. Eustace’s part,” said Kirk, “and overconfidence is usually a winning card--for the other side.” But, despite the brightening prospects, Dick was not happy. In fact, he didn’t remember of ever having been so utterly miserable and out of humor with himself. He didn’t pretend to misunderstand the cause; he was, he told himself savagely, at least honest with Dick Hope, no matter how much of a scoundrel he was in reality. He knew that if he went to Roy Taylor like a man and absolved him from the promise so villainously extorted, he would, in a measure at least, recover his self-respect. He tried at first to justify his conduct to himself by craftily pointing out the fact that he had used Taylor’s own weapons; that if Taylor had not acted like a thief there would have been no call for Dick to act like one; and that, when the matter was observed dispassionately, he had only taken advantage of his opportunity to work for the good of the crew and the school. But the pose of disinterested public benefactor didn’t satisfy him, and, although he ground his teeth and knit his brows and doggedly determined to hold on to the vantage he had gained, he was not happy, but, on the contrary, loathed himself heartily, hated Trevor because that youth insisted upon thinking him a high-minded hero, detested Taylor because the latter was primarily to blame for it all, and lost his appetite, didn’t half know his lessons, and was, in short, at odds with the whole world.