The sensations of the theater were still new to Stover, nor had his fortunate eye seen under the make-up or his imagination gone below the laughter. To parade down the aisle, straight as a barber's pole, chin carefully balanced on the sharp edge of his collar, on the night of his first day as end on the Yale varsity, delightfully conscious of his own startling importance, feeling as if he over-topped every one in the most public fashion, to be absolutely blushingly conscious that every one in the theater must, too, be grasping a copy of that night's _Evening Register_, that every glance had started at his arrival and was following in set admiration, was a memory he was never to forget. His shoulders thrown up a little, just a little in accentuation, as behooved an end with a reputation for tackling, he found his seat and, dropping down quickly to escape observation, buried himself in his program to appear modest before the burning concentration of attention which he was quite sure must now be focused on him. "Dobbs and Benzigger, the fellows who smash the dishes--by George, that's great!" cried McNab, joyfully running over the program. "They're wonders--a perfect scream!" "Any good dancing?" said Hungerford, and a dozen answers came: "You bet there is!" "Fanny Lamonte--a dream, Joe!" "Daintiest thing you ever saw." "Sweetest little ankles!" "Who's this coming--the Six Templeton Sisters?" "Don't know." "Well, here they come." "They've got to be pretty fine for me!" Enthroned as lords of the drama, they pronounced their infallible judgments. Every joke was new, every vaudeville turn an occasion for a gale of applause. The appearance of the "Six Templetons" was the occasion of a violent discussion between the adherents of the blondes and the admirers of the brunettes, led by the impressionable McNab. "I'm all for the peach in the middle!" "Ah, rats! She's got piano legs. Look at the fighting brunette at this end." "Why, she's got a squint." "Squint nothing; she's winking at me." "Yes, she is!" "Watch me get her eye!" Stover, of course, preserved an attitude of necessary dignity, gently tolerant of the rakish sentimentalities of the younger members of the flock. Moreover, he was supremely aware that the sparkling eyes under the black curls (were they real?) were not looking at McNab, but intensely directed at his own person--all of which, as she could not have read the _Register_, was a tribute to his own personal and not public charms.