Kansas University Weekly.
323
ADDITIONAL LITERARY.
The Malleability of Jack Walker.
He was a nervous, fastidious little man, this Jack Walker, with a smooth shaven face, firm rather than handsome. His clear cut features and deep brown eyes made every one think him a clever fellow. He dressed well, sang a little, was an entertaining talker and altogether an interesting fellow to meet. In his own opinion his good qualities were not few. He was thoroughly conscious of his own superior ity, giving unasked, his opinions in an abrupt and decided manner. He prided himself upon his ability to read character from the face. Some people were always being taken in, but not he; he knew very well when anyone was trying to impose upon him.
Morever he liked nothing better than playing the part of a peacemaker; to fix up disagreements between his friends was his special delight. So when he heard that Dorothy Holmes was at the Fair he at once made up his mind to smooth over the quarrel she and Ned Allan, an old school friend who was rooming with him, had had during Ned's last year in college. It was a silly affair anyway, he thought, a misunderstanding about a dance, and it was all owing to Ned's pride or stubbornness surely, for Dorothy was a charming girl.
Dorothy was a charming girl indeed. She was small and slender, with brown hair, clear gray eyes, straight brows and laughing mouth, which helped to make her face attractive. She was never called pretty but always "very interesting." She had a way of making every man she talked to think he was the only one she cared for. There were always half a dozen University fellows vieing with each other to do her favors. She had been particularly kind to Ned Allan; she had invited him to call, had taught him to dance and had literally "brought him out."
The first opportunity he had, Jack broached, rather fearfully, to Ned, the subject of the disagreement. They had just gotten off the car together and were walking slowly toward their hotel. Jack looked down critically at his patent leather shoes, stopped to wipe off on the grass a speck of mud from the toe and said carelessly: "By the way Ned, I saw Dorothy Holmes today at the Fair—She's a mighty fine girl; I wish you'd make up that silly quarrel."
"Call it a silly quarrel, if you want to," growled Ned. "I've told you a dozen times Jack Walker, that it is all her fault. I haven't done anything, if she wants to be mad, why let her, I don't care."
"But Ned," remonstrated Jack, "think of what good friends you've been and what she has done for you."
"I could hardly forget that," sneered Ned. "From my Freshman year until that miserable party three months before my commencement I was meekly paying my obligations and elbowing other fellows who were waiting for chances to pay their's. She is smooth, no doubt, but she is insincere and I am tired of being one of those who wiggle-waggle to her caprices."
Then Jack straightened himself up and said stiffly, "I do not believe Dorothy Holmes is that kind of a girl."
They had reached the hotel now and as they entered Ned laughingly said, "Well maybe I am mistaken old fellow; try her yourself and see."
They said no more about Dorothy. But Jack, in thinking the matter over came to the conclusion that it was her place to make the first advances since Ned so persistently declared the fault was not his. So he decided to be as kind to her as possible and incidently find out how she felt towards Ned.
Jack met Dorothy several times at the Fair. And when one morning she expressed a desire to go to the matinee, he said he would be delighted to take her. As they were boarding some distance apart, she suggested meeting him that afternoon at two o'clock, at Forty-seventh Street, where they both changed cars. He