It was from his friend Clark, who had been so kind to him when he was out there. And now he was still more kind. It was singular that the offer should come just now, on that very day, at that very hour. He would wire back his acceptance that afternoon. "Now, of course, it is too bad to make you stop in the middle of your last year," the letter ran, "but we can't hold it open after the first of January. I know what a big concession you consider it for a New Yorker to come to Chicago, but you know better than to be prejudiced. You know the crowd you'll blow with and the clubs you'll be in, and as the situation is something extraordinary to be offered to so young a man, I hope you'll wire me your acceptance at once. The mature judgment you showed in conducting...." These words came to his heated brain like a cool lake-breeze. This was what he wanted more than anything else in the world just now, to get away from his present surroundings, and to start anew, where he would be his own master, making his own money and disposing of it as it suited him, and responsible to no one for the use he made of it or his time. He wanted to be free. The bell in Old North broke in on him. He looked at the clock on the mantelpiece, and was surprised to see that it was only four, and that it must have been but a half hour since he received those two letters. Then he remembered that he had a lecture at that hour. It made him smile to think of it. But, it occurred to him, it would be a right good idea to go--he would be going to few enough more--anything to get out of the close atmosphere of the room and interrupt the current of his thought. For his thoughts were chasing each other about in a circle, and they would not stop, although he pressed his forehead with both hands, as he used to do during the football season. Lately his brain had taken to behaving in a very queer manner, and a fellow he knew at the College of Physicians and Surgeons had told him that if he did not stop worrying about things he would have neurasthenia or something as ugly sounding as that. As he opened the entry door and stepped out into the open air of the campus, the old bell began throbbing, clear and strong, in his ears. It somehow recalled freshman year and how he used to run to reach his seat before it stopped ringing.