"Dudley, the football captain!" "What the devil!" "For the love of heaven!" "Why, Dudley's the best in the world!" "Sure he is." "It's a shame." "An outrage." "They've done it just to show they're independent." Across the campus toward Vanderbilt, Allison and the last Bones man, in tandem, were streaking like water insects. Le Baron, holding on to Stover, was cursing in broken accents. But Dink heard him only indistinctly; he was looking at Dudley. The pallor had left his face, which was a little flushed; the head was thrown back proudly; and the lips were set in a smile that answered the torrent of sympathy and regret that was shouted to him. The last elections to Keys and Wolf's-Head were forgotten in the stir of the incredible rejection. Then some one shrieked out for a cheer, and the roar went over the campus again and again. Dudley, always with the same smile and shining eyes, made his way slowly across toward Vanderbilt, hugged, patted on the back, his hand wrung frantically by those who swarmed about him. Stover was at his side, everything forgotten but the drama of the moment, cheering and shouting, seeing with a sort of wonder a little spectacled grind with blazing eyes shaking hands with Dudley, crying: "It's a crime--a darned crime! We all think so, all of us!" For half an hour the college, moved as it had never been, stood huddled below Dudley's rooms, cheering itself hoarse. Then slowly the crowd began to melt away. "Come on, Dink," said Hungerford, who had him by the arm. "Oh, is that you, Joe?" said Dink, seeing him for the first time. "Isn't it an outrage?" "I don't understand it." "By George, wasn't he fine, though?" "He certainly was!" "I was right by him. He never flinched a second." "Dink, the whole thing is terrible," said Hungerford, his sensitive face showing the pain of the emotions he had undergone. "I don't think it's right to put fellows through such a test as that." "You don't believe in Tap Day?" "I don't know." Their paths crossed Regan's and they halted, each wondering what that unusual character had thought of it all. "Hello, Tom." "Hello, Joe; hello, Dink." "Tough about Dudley, isn't it?" "How so?" "Why, missing out!" "Perhaps it's Bones's loss," said Regan grimly. "Dudley's all right. He's lucky. He's ten times the man he was this morning." Neither Hungerford nor Stover answered. "What do you think of it--Tap Day?" said Hungerford, after a moment. "The best thing in the whole society system," said Regan, with extra warmth. "Well, I'll be darned!" said Stover, in genuine surprise. "I thought you'd be for abolishing it." "Never! If you're going through three years afraid to call your souls your own, why, you ought to stand out before every one and take what's coming to you. That's my idea." He bobbed his head and went on toward Commons. "I don't know," said Hungerford solemnly. "It's a horror; I wish I hadn't seen it."