“You’ll never make anything if you talk like that,” answered shrewd Mike. “You’re as bad as Jason, only the other way round. Jason thinks he’s everything when he isn’t anything, and you tell people you aren’t anything, and they believe you! You tell it and act it both. That’s not the way to do.” And Hardie, being an open-minded youth, accepted this wisdom from the lips of a babe, and resolved immediately that he wouldn’t act the incapable any more, even if he must needs remain such. He didn’t tell Mike so, however; that would be throwing improper encouragement to small boys who criticised their betters. Instead, he gave a sudden jerk to the visor of the boy’s cap that brought it forward on his nose, and said reprovingly: “There’s one thing certain, Mike, _you’ll_ never suffer from over-modesty. Now don’t say anything more about the football captain. Horr’s elected, and we’re all going to help him the best we can.” “Sure!” answered Mike, as he calmly restored his cap to the proper place. “Don’t you suppose I know enough for that? I wouldn’t say what I did to any one but you.” Dunn went to his first Friday in high feather, picturing to himself in advance the conquests he should make. Dancing, he felt, was his strong point. But Trask and Wilmot, the head ushers for the day, had laid strict commands on their subordinates, and Jason was introduced to none but “pills.” He did not suspect this fact until the afternoon was two-thirds gone, when after beseeching three ushers in succession to present him to Molly Randolph, a much talked-of “queen,” and being put off with flimsy pretexts, he at last discovered that there was a plot against his dignity. After that he sulked in the corner to which ungallant youths retired when the attractive partners were taken and only pills remained disengaged. Hardie, blest beyond his deserts, made the acquaintance of numerous favorites and danced the german with Helen Talbot, who amused him with a vivacious narrative of certain disputes with Joe, in which, with the help of her older brother, she came out victorious. Miss Helen vanquished Roger also, for she got him to promise her a football hatband, which, as she frankly confessed, “Joe would never give me in the world.” ----------------------------------------------------------------------- CHAPTER XVII A KINDLED AMBITION