He had regular features, and clear, glowing cheeks, with handsome eyes, and dark hair, whose clustering waves even the exigencies of football could not persuade him to wear at more than conventional length. He was two years younger than Alden, and a class below him in school. Their intimacy had been the surprise of the year. When the principal heard of it he said, "Well, if anything can make a man out of Seton Harris, it is to room with Mark Alden. I am delighted with the arrangement, though I confess I do not understand it." Others felt in the same way, and perhaps the most thoroughly astonished person in the whole academy was Seton Harris himself! He had come to Blackwood the year before with an obliging disposition, no strongly settled principles, and more spending-money than was good for him. As a natural result, the sort of boys who voted him "a jolly good fellow," and with whose doings he soon became identified, was not the sort most likely to make his academy career a success in the eyes of his teachers. His great lack was persistence. He hated to face opposition or to keep steadily at work on anything that was disagreeable. Still he had plenty of energy when he chose to exert it, and everybody liked him, even the principal. He was the fastest short-distance runner in school, and when they made him "half-back" on the football team he became the "star" of the eleven. His occasional fits of application had results sufficiently brilliant to save him from hopeless disgrace in his studies. But he lived under a chronic state of reprimand for general conduct, his miscellaneous offences ranging from noisiness in his room during study hours to absence from the building after proper time at night. In fact, he had so many executive sessions with the principal that new-comers were usually informed he was "Doctor Walker's private secretary." Rumor stated that a member of the entering class was accustomed to lift his hat when Seton spoke to him! Even at football the boy could not be depended upon. In practice and in minor games his play was wonderful. But he was likely to lose his nerve in a close struggle. It was not that he was actually afraid. He had physical courage, only his confidence did not meet the requirements of a "forlorn hope." Once start him with the ball, and he was all right, seemed perfectly reckless of himself, made those "phenomenal rushes" that capture a grand stand by storm. But he seemed unwilling to run after he had failed once or twice to gain ground. When sharp work was needed, he was not sure of catching the ball, and might even trip himself up in getting under way. Besides, the managers continually complained that he was irregular about training. This was Buck Harris at the time when steady-going, self-contained Mark Alden first showed an interest in him. Buck never told exactly how it happened, and no one ventured to ask Reddy.