“This is my unhappiness,” said Sam--and he pointed to a name on the passenger list. It was: “The Earl of Deptford, and valet.” “And because he is on board!” Anita Flagg gazed with interest at a pursuing sea-gull. “He is not on board,” she said. “He changed to another boat.” Sam felt that by a word from her a great weight might be lifted from his soul. He looked at her appealingly--hungrily. “Why did he change?” he begged. Anita Flagg shook her head in wonder. She smiled at him with amused despair. “Is that all that is worrying you?” she said. Chapter 2. THE GRAND CROSS OF THE CRESCENT Of some college students it has been said that, in order to pass their examinations, they will deceive and cheat their kind professors. This may or may not be true. One only can shudder and pass hurriedly on. But whatever others may have done, when young Peter Hallowell in his senior year came up for those final examinations which, should he pass them even by a nose, would gain him his degree, he did not cheat. He may have been too honest, too confident, too lazy, but Peter did not cheat. It was the professors who cheated. At Stillwater College, on each subject on which you are examined you can score a possible hundred. That means perfection, and in, the brief history of Stillwater, which is a very, new college, only one man has attained it. After graduating he “accepted a position” in an asylum for the insane, from which he was, promoted later to the poor-house, where he died. Many Stillwater undergraduates studied his career and, lest they also should attain perfection, were afraid to study anything else. Among these Peter was by far the most afraid. The marking system at Stillwater is as follows: If in all the subjects in which you have been examined your marks added together give you an average of ninety, you are passed “with honors”; if of seventy-five, you pass “with distinction”; if Of fifty, You just “pass.” It is not unlike the grocer's nice adjustment of fresh eggs, good eggs, and eggs. The whole college knew that if Peter got in among the eggs he would be lucky, but the professors and instructors of Stillwater 'were determined that, no matter what young Hallowell might do to prevent it, they would see that he passed his examinations. And they constituted the jury of awards. Their interest in Peter was not because they loved him so much, but because each loved his own vine-covered cottage, his salary, and his dignified title the more. And each knew that that one of the faculty who dared to flunk the son of old man Hallowell, who had endowed Stillwater, who supported Stillwater, and who might be expected to go on supporting Stillwater indefinitely, might also at the same time hand in his official resignation.