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 lic in miniature, and his part in it lay over his soul. Once Mr. Banning had said that honor and integrity would be written of Room 13 only as each student brought honor and integrity to it. Praska, pondering that, had never forgotten. He was thinking of Mr. Banning's words now.

In three days the room would elect its officers. Praska's face became grave. To him that election was not a thing of passing moment but an event of epic importance. His studies under Mr. Banning had impressed him with the fact that great causes brought forth great leaders. He viewed his home room—its unity, its ambitions, its loyalty—as a great cause. Would it select a leader who would inspire it to great efforts? For himself he had no ambitions; for the home room he had many aspirations.

Unconsciously he had followed Mr. Banning far. The teacher, an unassuming, apparently commonplace sort of man, influenced much of his thought. One day, in class, Mr. Banning had spoken of the early settlers of the West—of how, though a part of the country, the threads that knit them to the Government at Washington were long and loose. Looking back, Praska told himself that that has been his position in the school. He had been a Northfield man—just that and nothing more. But the home room had


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 gathered him in with others, had made him feel the depth of his association with them, and out of it had sprung the sentiment that suddenly made the school a background of real life and a tower of inspiration. He had been transformed into Praska of Room 13 of Northfield High. So had the unconfined limitless prairies become the bounded States of a great Union.

In the announcement that Room 13 was to elect its officers, Praska had found a thrill of a kind that had never come to him in the heat of play on the football field. The word itself had a sound of solemnity. He viewed elections as something sacred. Men had frozen, starved and died for the right of free expression. But the home room, judged by its actions, was not awed. Instead of serious thought, Praska found clamor and a confusion of rival claims. Each student had his own idea of who should be elevated to the honors. Debates went on heatedly in the corridors, in the cafeteria, and even in the home room itself. Boys, overcome by the fury of argument, daily deserted their candidates and appeared with strange and bewildering choices. Instead of a calm weighing of candidates there was chaos. Consideration was routed by noise.

And then Praska had proposed a formal ballot; a ballot carefully prepared before the elec-

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 tion day. "We need something," he said, "that will give a fellow an idea where he's at." But the home room, enjoying the excitement of expansive, spontaneous debate, would not listen. "The trouble with George," Hammond, the quarterback, had said plaintively, "is that he takes things too serious; you'd imagine we were going to elect a President of the United States." But Praska continued to agitate. He broke into arguments that were going on happily and merrily, and won only scowls or sighs. And then he began to find groups scattering at his approach. His eyes clouded at that, but did not lose their determination. There was something of the bulldog about him.

The train came to Northfield, but he sat at the window lost in his thoughts. Hammond called: "Come on, George; here's the place where we vote." Some of the others laughed. He roused himself, and came down the aisle with his suit case banging against his knees. He was the last of the team to reach the platform. The others were already half-way to the street. He called to Perry; but Perry, waving a hand in mock horror, hurried on.

"Good game, wasn't it?" said an apologetic voice at his elbow. Even when stating facts Johnny Baffin did not seem sure of himself.


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 The guard nodded absently. The game was a thing of the past. "What do you think of a formal ballot?" he asked suddenly.

Johnny squirmed. "It's an awful lot of trouble to go to just for a school election, isn't it? Most of the fellows think"

"What do you think about it?"

"Why, maybe each fellow could just write the names of the fellows he wanted—"

"Now look here!" Praska's muscular forefinger tapped his chest. "You're not thinking straight. That's too much hit and miss. A dozen fellows might be voted for, and one might win just because he happened to get about nine votes. Why didn't Mr. Banning hold this election before? He waited until we got settled and had a chance to size up each other. He wanted us to know what we were doing. And what are we doing? We're running around with everybody talking in a different key. Isn't that so?"

"Why, yes; I guess it is."

"That wouldn't happen if candidates were nominated and their names put on a ballot. We'd know who were candidates. Wouldn't that be better?"

"I—I didn't say it wouldn't be; I didn't say anything against it. Yes; I guess it would be." The boy backed away gingerly. "I must hurry


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 home. I haven't thought much about it, but I guess you're right. I—Well, so long."

Praska shook his head. Even "Me, too, Johnny," made haste to get away from him. Laughing ruefully, he shifted his suit case to the other hand and went his way down the long station platform.

Three mornings later Room 13 assembled to report for a new school day. A contagious restlessness communicated itself along the rows of desks. The long-drawn-out argument over candidates—an argument that solved nothing and got no place—had begun to produce an impatient and nervous uncertainty. Mr. Banning had watched these symptoms develop not without inward anxiety. He knew the danger. At any moment there might be a reaction. Listlessness might take the place of feverish animation, and instead of being interested in candidates the students might become indifferent and languid. He determined to turn their minds into other channels.

"What I have to say," he said, "must be said hurriedly. The first period bell will ring in a moment. To-morrow we are to hold an election of far-reaching importance to this room. Thus far not a word has been said about the machinery by which this election should be carried out."


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 "He hasn't heard George," said Hammond in an audible undertone.

"Has somebody been discussing the subject?" the teacher asked innocently. "Good! Then you'll be prepared to handle the problem intelligently. Suppose we meet here after classes to-day and decide how the election shall be conducted? It that agreeable to you? Speak up if it isn't. Fine! This afternoon then. There goes the bell."

Praska's first period took him to the basement for manual training. As he worked at his lathe there were times when his mind wandered far from the pattern before him. On the way out of Room 13 he had caught some of the students looking at him curiously, and some of them had been smiling. Johnny Baffin had worn his characteristic air of baffled indecision.

Praska's mind was suddenly made up. Judging by the sentiment he had found, the plan he would offer would have no chance. But he determined now to offer it. He felt that he was right, and refused to be silenced by the spectre of defeat. This much settled, his attention came back to the work in hand.

During lunch hour in the cafeteria, Perry King approached his table and spoke in a guarded undertone.


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 "You're not going to talk prepared ballots and all that rot, are you?"

The guard nodded.

"I wouldn't if I were you. You've been a three-ringed pest on this thing, George, but a lot of the fellows are going to vote for you for class president. You'll just about kill your chances if you sing that song again to-day."

Praska ate in silence. Perry, construing this as acceptance of his own logic, was intensely gratified.

"I thought you'd be sensible about it," he said.

"How do you know a lot of the fellows are going to vote for me?"

"How do I know? Now, that's a question, isn't it? Haven't I been campaigning for you? Haven't I lined up about enough votes to put you over? I've done a job on this, I'll have you know."

"Getting to be a regular politician, aren't you?"

Perry swelled out his thin chest. "I'm going to make the talk in favor of having everybody just write his choice."

"I'm afraid I'll have to fight you on that. I'm still for a formal ballot."

The wind of optimism was knocked from Perry in a breath. His eyes, incredulous, searched his


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 friend's face. There could be no mistaking its single purpose.

"That's a fine way to treat me after what I've been trying to do for you," he cried indignantly, unconscious that his voice had risen above the babble of the diners. "You're making a goat of yourself if you want to know what I think. You'll kill your chances. Everybody'll be saying you're just a pig-headed pirate."

Praska, used to these temperamental outbursts, shook his head patiently. "I haven't been a candidate. Anyway, if I believe ballot is the only way"

But Perry, after the manner of one whose best efforts had been shamefully flouted, walked away among the tables in dudgeon.

After classes that day the home room gathered. The students brought books with them and carried their hats to their seats. Plainly they felt that they were of one mind, and that the business they were to transact would take but a moment. The meeting moved briskly. In the absence of regular officers, Mr. Banning was delegated to act as chairman. There were whispered calls of "Perry! Perry! Make it snappy." Perry addressed the chair.

"I believe," Perry said easily, "that I express the sentiment of the room when I say that we'd


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 like a rule giving each student permission simply to write his pick for each office. In that way they will have perfect freedom of choice. If I think John Jones is the best we have for president or secretary, or sergeant-at-arms I simply vote for him for the office I think he ought to have. That is the only way to have the election take the widest and freest range."

Praska, watching Perry, envied him the confident, casual way he spoke. Perry had in him, he thought, the making of an orator. But he shook his head slightly at his friend's reasoning.

"We think," Perry went on, "in a case like this we ought to have a chance to vote for whom we please and not be tied down by tickets. We want an election, not red tape."

His gaze, as he sat down, went over to Praska. Somebody chuckled, and then the sound was lost in a round of applause. Plainly, the room was with Perry. His gaze, going to Praska again in triumph, was stayed by the sight of the big guard rising somewhat ponderously from his seat.

"Mr. Chairman."

A subdued, good-natured groan ran about the room.

"Mr. Praska," Mr. Banning said gravely.

"I, for one, am opposed to the plan that—that has just been offered." Praska was having


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 trouble with his words. "The United States has been doing business for a good many years, and I think if we try to improve on the Government we're not going to get very far. The trouble with Perry's plan is that it—it—it's too uncertain. Nobody knows who's a candidate. The votes will be scattered all over. A lot of fellows may just vote for friends, and then somebody may walk in as president merely because seven or eight fellows happen to agree on him. That won't be—" Praska was plainly stuck for the right word.

"Representative government," somebody suggested.

"Representative government," Praska accepted earnestly. "It will be minority government. I don't know whether I'm right or not, but I think the United States has the regular printed ballots so that the voters will know just who are seeking the office and can study their qualifications. That's getting right down to real candidates. This thing that Perry wants to do is like shooting in the dark. It's a grab bag. I think we ought to have candidates file petitions, and not to accept petitions unless they have at least five signers."

This last proposal was new to the room. There was a moment of shocked surprise.


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 "Why five signers?" Hammond asked belligerently.

"Well" George hesitated. "If a fellow can't get five students to sign his petition he wouldn't get five votes. That means he'd simply clog up the ballot and take strength from the real candidates. This election is a big thing for Room 13 and I'd like to see it go right."

There was no applause as he sat down, but now two or three of the students appeared thoughtful. Perry, not quite so sure of himself as he had been before, asked Mr. Banning to express an opinion, but the teacher smiled and shook his head. His policy, he told them, was to let them handle their own affairs without interference so long as he could. But even as he said it, his glance, with its fire of idealism, went to Praska and lingered.

The football guard had no false conceptions of what was to follow. No one offered another plan, and the matter went to a vote.

"All those who are in favor of the method as outlined by Mr. King" Mr. Banning began, and there was a clatter and rattle of seats as the students came to their feet. Johnny Baffin hesitated until he saw the overwhelming sway of sentiment, and then joined the crowd.

Nine boys remained seated, stoically unmind-


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 ful of nudges and whispers from their companions. Praska's heart leaped. Nine who saw it as he did! He had lost his cause, but he had made converts. He had made progress. Next year, as time for the election drew near, there would be ten instead of one to talk in favor of a formal, regular ballot.

"Mr. King's plan carries," said Mr. Banning, "52 to 10."

There were cheers for the result, and some humorous banter for Praska. He sat unmoved. After that the meeting decided to vote next day during the luncheon hour. A committee of three was named to count the votes. Praska was selected as chairman of this committee and scarcely took note of the honor. He was still thinking of those nine recruits.

Out in the street Perry reproached him openly and bitterly. "Didn't I tell you if you stuck up your head you'd get a good licking? Do you think a defeat like that will help your chances for president?"

"I wasn't thinking of president."

"And then, all this talk of grab bags"

"How many fellows have a chance to-morrow?" Praska interrupted.

"How should I know?"

"Then it will be a grab bag. Nobody knows


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 what surprises may come out of it. Why, somebody that three-quarters of the fellows have never given a thought may bob up as the winner."

"Rats!" Perry said in disgust. "This thing has gone to your head. Your wheels are loose."

"Possibly," Praska said mildly. He was looking toward the school entrance where "Me, too, Johnny" was just coming out. "Possibly," the guard said again, but this time merely because the word lingered on his tongue. He continued to stare absently after Johnny as that boy walked up the street; the germ of a bewildering and startling idea had begun to turn and twist itself slowly through the recess of his mind.

That night, after much thinking, the germ developed into a plan.

Next morning he came to school subtly and mysteriously changed. The habitual air of seriousness that marked him was gone, and in its stead was a gay, bubbling quality that suggested that he was filled with some inward vision of mirth. To one of deep and sharp penetration, it would have been apparent that the rollicking mood was forced—but Perry, who met him outside the high school building, was neither deep nor sharp.

"Believe me," he said with feeling, "I'm glad to see your old sober-sides looking human. I was


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 beginning to think you'd keep up that election argument all through the semester. I'm a friend of yours and all that, George, but you are a tiresome old pest when you start reforming and that's flat."

Praska merely glanced at him and smiled contemplatively.

"What are you looking at me that way for? What's the joke?"

Praska looked about him guardedly. Perry's interest was quickened.

"What's it all about, George? Something good? Something in the wind?"

Praska spoke in an undertone. "Want to have a laugh out of this election? Oh, nothing that will spoil it; just something that will get the whole crowd?"

Perry was eager. "What is it?"

"Vote for 'Me, too, Johnny' for president."

"Johnny Baffin!" Perry's voice was incredulous.

"Johnny Baffin," Praska said calmly.

Perry, usually deft with words, was for the moment speechless. But as the thing he was asked to do broke upon him he began to shake his head.

"I'm going to vote for you. Why should I throw away a vote?"

"But nobody is going to win this election by


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 one vote. You know that. What difference does one vote make?"

Older persons than Perry have been fooled with that same question. He waivered. There might, he thought, be something in what the guard said. And then Praska leaned closer.

"Can't you picture it, Perry? Just one vote in the whole box for Johnny. It will be a scream. The whole room will be flabbergasted. 'Me-too-Johnny' voted for president. Good night!"

All at once Perry shook with laughter. Lines that had formed themselves in Praska's forehead—lines of apprehension—began to clear.

"Won't it be rich, though? I'll do it; one vote won't matter. Wait until I tell"

Praska's hand closed on his arm. "Tell nothing. Do you want to spoil it? You'll tell somebody, and he'll tell somebody else, and then everybody'll know it. Then what's left of our joke? Just you and me, Perry, and we'll sit back and watch the room when the vote is announced. It will be as good as a circus."

"I won't tell a soul," Perry promised. Me, too, Johnny'—Boy, I just want to sit back and watch them. Circus? It will be a riot."

In the lower corridor Praska mixed with the crowd, talking and laughing more than he usually did. He set more than one passing group into a


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 roar by hurling some unexpectedly humorous comment at some one of them. Whenever he stopped to talk to any boy, he left that individual chuckling. Hammond fairly shouted at something Praska had said. "Old George is actually getting funny," the football captain explained. And Praska continued to laugh and joke—with sober eyes.

At noon Miss Quigley, domestic science teacher in charge of the cafeteria, expressed the opinion that there was "Something the matter with those Room 13 boys." They ordered scanty lunches, ate rapidly, and at once departed. Somebody had brought a hat box that morning, and Praska and his assistants had slit a hole in the top and had placed it on Mr. Banning's desk to serve as a ballot box. Perry was the first student to vote. He slipped his ballot through the opening and winked at the football guard. Just at that moment it dawned on him that if Praska merely wanted to see only one vote cast for Johnny Baffin he could have cast the ballot himself. He went back to his seat a bit perplexed.

Then came a deluge of folded papers dropped through the slit in the box. The students, crowding in line, filed past and voted as their names, were checked. In fifteen minutes the last ballot had been cast. Mr. Banning looked at his watch.


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 "We have thirty minutes before the first afternoon period," he said. "It is your desire to have the vote counted now or after classes?"

"Now," came a chorus from the seats.

Praska, as chairman of the tellers, picked up the box; flanked by his two committee members, he walked from the room. The door closed after him. There was a moment of dead silence.

"They ought to be back in about ten minutes," said a voice.

But ten minutes passed, and there was no sign of the committee. Perry, secure in the knowledge of the thunderclap that was soon to come, first smiled and then began to chuckle. A vote for "Me, too, Johnny!" And who would be more surprised than Johnny Baffin himself? He pictured the blank amazement of the others, and began to chuckle again—and then the chuckle stopped. The door had opened, and the tellers were coming in with the result.

One look at their faces, and Perry sat bolt upright in his seat. Two of the tellers were plainly dazed. One of them, catching the eye of a friend, threw up his hand in a tragic gesture of despair. Praska, with the vote tabulation in one hand and the hat box under the other arm, alone of the three seemed placid and serene. Watching him, Perry felt a sudden shaft of icy apprehension.


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 "Mr. Banning," said Praska, "the committee asks you to announce the result."

Mr. Banning took the tabulation. The room was still. The teacher of civics looked at it, stared, looked again and held the paper a bit closer to his eyes. Then his gaze came up to survey the class. Twice he coughed as though to clear his throat.

"For president of Room 13," he said, "John Baffin received 15 votes, George Praska 13, Frank Hammond 7"

Perry heard no more. All at once the plan dawned on him. Why, Praska had asked a lot of fellows to vote for "Me, too, Johnny." The stillness had now become a profound and breathless silence.

Mr. Banning was reading the vote for the other offices; but now nobody heard him. The tension was broken by a choking sound. A murmur ran through the room like an unexpected wind rustling through startled reeds. It grew, died, and grew again. Mr. Banning finished reading, folded the paper slowly and laid it on his desk. His glance went to Praska. The football guard looked the other way. And then Mr. Banning understood.

The room was beginning to recover. It was a room athrob with consternation, but it had its


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 sense of loyalty. A voice cried the summons for a cheer. It started as a weak straggle, gained volume, and finished with a burst of sound. A cry went up for "Speech! Speech!" This was followed by the chant "We want Johnny Baffin! We want Johnny Baffin!"

Johnny stumbled to his feet. If consternation was the portion of the others, stupefaction was his. He looked blank, abashed, almost frightened. The fingers of one hand played nervously with the buttons on his coat.

"I think," he began with trembling voice, "that there must be a mistake"

"Not a bit of it," roared a voice. Oh, but the room was rising to scratch beautifully.

"There is a mistake," Johnny cried, for once in his life positive. "I don't want to be president. I wouldn't know how to do things. This is all Praska's work. He came to my house last night, and he got to talking about ballots—you know how he is when he starts talking something like that—and he said it was a mistake because anybody might win, and I said I knew I wouldn't win because I wouldn't even vote for myself because I'd mess everything if I were president. And then he said he could go out and get me enough votes to elect me. I didn't know what he would do, and I was afraid he might do something, and I told


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 him if he got me all the votes I wouldn't be president."

Johnny had run out of breath. The room, leaning forward so as not to miss a word, waited for him to go on.

"Then Praska said 'You don't think you could get a vote. Now, if I got you a lot of votes wouldn't that prove that the way this election is being run, fellows could cook up something and win with a secret candidate?' I said yes, I guessed that would prove it. He said none of us wanted that kind of an election, and I said no, we didn't. And he asked me if he could try to get votes for me just to show how things can happen. I told him he could, but I only told him that because I didn't think he'd get any, and I told him I wouldn't be president if he did get me the votes.

"He went away then, and came back after a while, and said perhaps he ought to drop it because he was going to get votes by making the fellows think they were playing a joke on me and maybe that wouldn't be square to me. I told him I didn't care what he did because he wouldn't get any votes anyway. And then he went away again."

"That was like George," Perry reflected, "going back and trying to tell Johnny just what he meant to say. And I'll bet Johnny was sick and


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 tired of ballots and wouldn't listen to him. George wouldn't go out and humiliate a fellow just to get a laugh." He stared at the ceiling and called himself a fool.

"I told Praska I wouldn't be president," Johnny went on. "You can ask him. I can't do the things a president would have to do. I must—I must—." He stuttered and paused, unable to find the word.

"You mean you're going to decline?" came from the rear of the room.

"Decline," he said eagerly; "that's it. Yes; I want to decline. I—I'm not the kind of fellow to be president."

They gave Johnny another cheer then—not a cheer of thanksgiving because he would not take the place, but a cheer of appreciation. There was an unexpected manliness about his speech, and it had won them. Praska, watching the room, heaved a breath of relief, and a worry that had tormented him vanished. The fellows would never tell Johnny the real reason they had voted for him. Not one of them would hurt his feelings.

"This," said Mr. Banning, "is rather an unusual state of affairs. It would seem that the next highest candidate for president"

"Mr. Chairman," said Praska, "I cannot con-


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 sider myself the choice of the room. I received only thirteen votes. Therefore, I, too, must decline to serve. I think that the only fair way to clear up this situation would be to hold another election. If we are to discuss how that election is to be held"

"Do you think it necessary?" Mr. Banning asked dryly.

Praska was persistent. "In any event," he said, "I move you that we elect a week from to-day, that every candidate file a formal petition by next Thursday, and that the room typewrite an official ballot and make it the only ballot that can be voted."

He stood there by the teacher's desk and every eye was on him—eyes that accused, and berated, and threatened, and yet were a bit proud of him. All over the room boys were stampeding noisily to their feet and demanding instant recognition from the chair. But it was Perry King who won the floor.

"I guess," he said, "that we can see the point when somebody sticks it into us. I second the motion."

"It has been moved and seconded," said Mr. Banning—and proceeded to state the motion, very deliberately. There was a quizzical look on his face all the time that threatened to become a


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 broad smile as he asked "Is there any discussion?"

"He's got a joke on all of us somehow," whispered Littlefield, the end, to Hammond, the captain. "He looks like a cat that's swallowed a canary and is just ready to burst into song."

"Shut up, foolish!" Hammond rebuked him. "Look who's up wanting to talk. Bet it's the first time little Danny Dunn ever talked in meeting in his life."

Hammond was right. Danny had never so far mastered his bashfulness before. But something in Mr. Banning's deliberation and his quizzical smile had struck the boy as a challenge that could not be ignored; and there he was on his feet, forgetting to address the chair, stammering and hesitating, but somehow getting out words that brought a look of keen satisfaction to Mr. Banning's face.

"But, fellows," little Dunn was saying, "you don't have to go to such a lot of work as Praska's prepared ballot just to make elections safe. There's an easier way. You can"

"Aw, cut it out, Danny," interrupted a voice. "We're kind of fed up on easy ways. I'm for—"

"Order in the room. Mr. Dunn has the floor," came from the Chair.

"There's an easier way," Danny's embarrassed


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 voice persisted. "I don't know why I didn't think of it sooner, or why some of you didn't. It never came into my head until last night when I was talking to Dad about the election and Praska's wanting a prepared ballot, and Dad reminded me of the easier way and guyed me for being such a bonehead I hadn't thought of it myself."

"We'll all be dead before Danny gets down to telling his easy way," muttered Littlefield to Hammond. "Say, look at Mr. Banning. He's hep right now to what Danny's trying to tell."

"Shut up," growled Hammond again.

Dunn was rushing on. "There aren't so very many of us, only about sixty. Why don't we just have nominations in open meeting, and then when we get enough good men put up, we can close the nominations. That's a lot less trouble than a prepared ballot, and it's almost as good for a small group."

Praska, slow to think, had no immediate answer to this unexpected challenge, but Perry, still standing, bowed imperturbably, and said: "Mr. Chairman!"

"Mr. King!"

"I'm in favor of putting Mr. Praska's motion to the vote. And I hope it will carry, too. I realize that Mr. Dunn has suggested another very safe way of conducting elections, but it isn't quite


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 so good as Mr. Praska's because it doesn't give you so long to think over candidates, and it doesn't provide against electing a man who doesn't want the job and won't take it. Of course, if the man is at the meeting, he can declare that he won't be a candidate, but suppose he isn't at the meeting? I know that wouldn't happen more than about twice in a lifetime, but now I'm all for the very safest kind of nominations and elections there is on the market as far as Room 13 is concerned."

Perry paused and a hearty round of applause told him that he had the majority in the room with him. Several, however, were grinning at him meaningly. Among those were the nine who had voted with Praska for a prepared ballot.

"All right, grin," Perry snapped at them, forgetful again of time and place. "I'll admit George showed us something about playing safe that we needed to know, but just the same he had to lie to do it—told a whole bunch of us that each was the one to cast just one vote for Baffin, and that only he and the fellow who was to do the job would know anything about the plan."

"So he did," murmured Hammond.

Perry plunged on. "You're some thinker, George Praska; I'll admit that. And you're some liar, too!"


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 "Mr. Chairman!" Praska was on his feet, flushed, dead earnest. "King got this wrong. I'm no liar. If you call me a liar, then you've got to call all actors liars because what they say on the stage isn't so. All I did was to act a part to make clear an idea that I hadn't been able to get across to the crowd in any other way." He turned to Perry, his eyes hurt. "You'll have to take that back," he said very quietly.

"I sure will." Perry was a quick thinker—he had followed Praska's argument and his response came instantly and with a heartiness that took the hurt out of Praska's eyes.

With sublime indifference to conventional parliamentary procedure the two shook hands warmly.

"George," said Perry, "you're a schemer, and a plotter, and a betrayer, and a conspirator—but you're as straight as a string, and you've got the best bean of any of us. I guess we'll have to elect you president."

From the back of the room came the voice of the football captain. "Yes," Hammond boomed, "I'd like to boil you in oil, George, but I guess we'll have to elect you."


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ITTLEFIELD, the right end, sang as he dressed. The alarm clock on the dresser in his bedroom marked the hour of half-past seven. There were dabs and smears of ink upon the crystal; they gave the glass the droll look of a face overcome with surprise. Probably, had the clock been able to speak, it would have expressed amazement. Littlefield, out of bed at half-past seven and combing his blond hair with critical exactness, was a transformation of such recent birth as still to be a matter of wonder.

"For I'm to be Queen of the May," the right end warbled, and grinned at his reflection in the mirror. A final sweep of the brush, a last twirl of the comb, and the job was done. The accomplishment seemed to fill him with a feeling of humor. He broke into satirical song:


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 No; it had not been. Time was, not so very long ago, when Littlefield's day had started with a last minute scramble from under the bed coverings, had progressed to a feverish toilet, and had reached its climax in a mad scamper to report to his home room at the Northfield High School on time. Somebody had once remarked—it may have been Perry King—that Littlefield usually took a minute to dress and looked it. His trousers ran to baggy knees; shirt, collar and tie were discarded in favor of a faded sweater emblazoned with the purple N of Northfield. The sweater, Littlefield was given to explaining, was his best friend. It saved bother. He stood forth as a lovable, good-natured, careless, untidy young man!

And then the home rooms had each sent a committee to meet as a tentative Congress of the whole school. Littlefield, in his baggy trousers and his sweater, had gone to the gathering as one of the representatives of Room 13. He sat in the Congress among boys neatly and soberly dressed, supremely indifferent to his own attire. His interest was centered on the discussion of the best way to preserve order in the halls. One by one, as the delegates spoke, he abstractedly noted them. Then at last his turn came to express an opinion. He had something definite to say; but


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 truth, that he was never known either to possess a shilling, or to have any ostensible method of earning one. The neighbours, when questioned, assured me that he led a most dissolute life, and, in fact, was considered as a person of extremely bad connections and pursuits; his very look would have condemned him in a court of justice; and for my own self, who had such powerful reasons for concluding both himself and his confederate Raoul to be finished rogues and highwaymen, it may be readily supposed I lost no time in applying for warrants for their apprehension. The necessary papers were no sooner asked for than given; and the very next morning, almost before daylight appeared, I repaired to the house where Court lodged; having ascended the stairs till I reached the landing-place on the first floor, I knocked at his door.

"Who is there?" asked a voice from within.

"Who should it be but Raoul?" said I, imitating the voice of the latter; "come, come, friend, open the door."

"Well, don't be in a hurry then," answered he; and, listening, I could distinctly hear the hasty movements of someone preparing to unfasten the door, which was no sooner unclosed, than, believing he was speaking to his friend Raoul, "Well," exclaimed he, "what news? anything fresh turned up?"

"Yes, yes," replied I, "I have a thousand things to say to you;" but by this, through the glimmer of morning twilight, he discovered his error, and cried out, in a voice expressive of the greatest alarm, "Bless me, if it is not Monsieur Jules!" (This was the name which I was generally called by common women and thieves.)

"M. Jules!" repeated the wife of Court, still more alarmed than her husband.

'" [sic]Suppose it is M. Jules," said I, "why should that frighten you? The devil is never so black as he is painted."

"To be sure," observed the husband; "M. Jules is


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 as he arose from his seat, stretching out his tall, athletic figure, he was all at once struck with the contrast of his rumpled sweater and wrinkled trousers. For the first time he saw himself with a truthful, critical eye, and his judgment wrote him down as slouchy.

"What room, please?" the presiding officer asked crisply.

"Room 13," he said, and flushed painfully. He was trying to draw back the sweater at the sides so that the part exposed through his open coat would be smooth. Embarrassment settled over him. He became disconcerted. The words he had been marshaling to score his point fled his recollection. He stumbled, stammered, and was lost. When he at last sat down after two minutes of torture it was with the conviction that he had made a mess of his entire argument.

When the meeting was over, he went quietly from the room. Perry King followed him to the hall. Perry, as usual, was brutally frank.

"What in thunder got into you to-day, Lit? When you stood up I thought I was going to hear something. Before you got through I was ashamed that you and I were there from the same room. I'd have liked to wish you on somebody else. What happened?"

Littlefield shrugged his shoulders.


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 "Stage fright, I guess," Perry concluded. "They say every speaker gets it sometimes. You always give a good talk when you stand up in our room."

"I guess it was stage fright," said Littlefield. But he knew better. He had been conscious of a shortcoming, and the knowledge had robbed him of the gift of logical debate. On the way home he stopped and surveyed himself in the mirrored window of a clothing store. He looked chunky and hulking. A fine formidable appearance for the football field; but the Congress of Northfield High had met in the science lecture room. He pulled his cap down over his eyes and walked on.

Next day he came to school with his trousers creased. The sweater had been discarded. In its place he wore a soft shirt and a knitted tie.

"What's the matter with the sweater?" Perry King had demanded.

"Getting its annual bath," Littlefield had answered laconically. He never wore the sweater into a classroom again.

He was thinking of all this as he dressed that morning. The grin left his face, and into his eyes came a steady look of contemplation. Somehow, the processes that had given him a sense of the fitness of things had endowed him with some of the traits of maturity. He felt in his veins,


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 at that moment, the dawning of manhood. It sobered him. Cross currents of thought were at work. Now he would have all the prankishness of a boy; on the instant he would change and be cast in the manner of a man grown serious and thoughtful.

He ate a leisurely breakfast, and had time to walk to school as befitted one who felt so changed, or changing. Reaching the street on which the school stood, he frowned across at the imposing building of brick and stone. The roadway had once been of smooth macadam, but time had wrought decay. There were holes and ruts in the pavement; ridges and patches where the bare earth showed.

"They ought to fix this street," Littlefield reflected; and started across. It had rained hard the night before, and the holes were filled with water; and where the water ended, streaks of mud began. The right end picked his way gingerly. One freshly shined shoe, getting into the mud, was suddenly smeared. One heel, slapping into a pool of water, sprayed the trouser leg. Littlefield, muttering in anger, mounted the other sidewalk and strode, mud-dappled, into the school.

He was early. The corridors were practically deserted. But up in Room 13 he found George


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 Praska reading. The book was "The Americanization of Edward Bok."

"Look at this," Littlefield cried indignantly.

Praska surveyed the havoc the mud had wrought.

"You're president of this room, aren't you?"

Praska nodded.

"Well, why don't you do something about it? Why isn't that street fixed? It's right in front of our school. We ought to be able to do something. It's our street. Why can't we do something?"

"Well—" Praska's slow speech stopped. "Why can't we?"

"That's what I want to know. What's the use of a fellow shining his shoes if he's going to be all muddy when he gets here? Might just as well be muddy when he leaves home. Mr. Banning's always talking about the voice of the people and what power it has. We're people, aren't we? Why can't we have a voice about that street?"

"Maybe we can," said Praska.

"How?"

But the president of Room 13 did not know. A frown of perplexity had settled between his eyes. There must be a way. Mr. Banning had said that in a Republic it was always possible for the people to express their will. But how? Even


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 as he debated this, Perry and Hammond came into the room expressing their distaste for mud in general and one street of Northfield in particular.

"I was just telling Praska that he ought to do something about it," Littlefield broke in. "Look at me!"

"Look at me," said Hammond in disgust.

"Oh, rats," said Perry. "What can Praska do? What can any of us do? It's up to the City Council, and a fat lot they'd care about what some high school students thought."

"How do you know they wouldn't care?" Praska asked absently. The germ of an idea was in his mind, but even as he tried to grasp it, it fled and left him bewildered. Yet, in that instant, he knew that he had seen the way, had lost it—and would see it again.

At noon he left the school building and stood looking at the street. Here and there some of the pools were dry; but the deep ruts still held water, and the mud had been tracked in every direction. He had never noticed before that the street itself spoiled the imposing appearance of the school. "Sloppy," he said, and went back to the building and up the stairs to Room 13. Presently, at his desk, he began to write. Twice he tore up paper, and began again. At length he


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 went downstairs with what he had written, and tacked it to the bulletin board just inside the entrance. The notice read:

Afterwards he could not explain why he had placed the notice on the board. He knew, instinctively, that it had something to do with the way that he had glimpsed and had lost.

Littlefield came to him just before afternoon classes started. "I knew you'd think of something, George. What's in the wind?"

"I don't know," Praska confessed frankly. "You don't know? What's the use of putting up a notice if you don't know what it's for?"

"Just fishing," George answered. And then in an instant, the vision was back again. He knew now why he had written the notice. He turned again to Littlefield; but the end, disgusted, had taken himself off.

From what comment Praska heard in the cor-


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 ridors between classes he knew that he had caught the interest of the school. Students stopped him and asked him what it was all about; he smiled, and parried, and told them nothing. Mr. Quirk, teacher of English V, had once remarked that the best way to keep suspense alive was to veil a situation with mystery. Even Perry King was repulsed, and stalked off in a temper.

"You're putting on airs," he said angrily. "I'm one of the delegates to the Congress, and yet when I'm asked about this I'm in the dark. It makes me look like a fool."

George sighed. To tell Perry would be akin to shouting the tidings from the manual training rooms in the basement to the auditorium on the top floor. Perry had never quite outgrown an itch to impress others with how much he knew. The president's tone became conciliatory.

"Tell them they'll have to wait until to-morrow."

Perry looked at him suspiciously. "All right," he grumbled. "That will let me save my face, anyway. But if you make a fozzle of this don't think you're going to drag the rest of Room 13 in with you."

"I won't," George promised meekly. It had begun to dawn on him that a petition of protest would mean nothing unless it carried a formid-


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 able list of names. Suppose only a handful of students signed the notice he had placed on the board.

But when he took the list down at four o'clock that afternoon his heart gave a leap of exultation. As he walked home, he counted the signatures. Two hundred and thirteen. A great hope grew and grew within him. This would be a voice with no faltering note—a voice mighty with the strength of the numbers behind it—the voice of the people of Northfield High. He decided that in the morning he would go to Mr. Banning with the plan. But a fever for instant action was upon him. He would compose the petition at once. Common sense told him that he might only be wasting time, that Mr. Banning would probably write the document himself. Yet the demand to do something, at once, could not be ignored.

It was almost five o'clock when he sat down at the study table in his bedroom to write; the electric light above the table was lighted and his father was home before he penned the last word. With an odd agitation he read what he had written. This was Northfield High School speaking, the voice of its people. Suddenly he stood up. He would tell the story to his father, show him the petition. He picked up the written sheets of paper and bolted for the door.


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 Downstairs he found his father, busy with wrench and screw driver, repairing a kitchen faucet that had begun to leak. Mail that had come in the evening delivery was scattered about upon the dining-room table. A yellow card of some kind was uppermost. George picked it up. It was an unsigned, unfilled application for membership in the Fifth Ward Improvement Association of Northfield.

George called into the kitchen to his father. "How did you get this improvement association application, Pop?"

"Came in the mail. They want me to join."

"Going to?"

"What's the use? We'll get together, and we'll pass resolutions and we'll send letters to the City Hall, and the gang down there will do about as they please. That's how it always runs. If they feel like doing what you ask them to do they'll do it, and then some association goes around making a fool of itself by thinking that it accomplished something. The politicians run things to suit themselves. These associations are all right for men who have nothing else to do with their evenings. I don't mind becoming a member, but I don't want anybody telling me that we're going to get together and have the politicians give us what we want. We'll get it when they


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 get ready to give it to us and not before. That's how they play the game, and when you try to stop them you simply butt your head against a stone wall. The Fifth Ward Improvement Association will get just what the politicians are ready to give the Fifth Ward, and nothing else."

George's hot blood had turned to ice. After a while his father came to the doorway drying his hands with a towel.

"What are those papers you have there, son? Something you wanted to show me?"

"No, sir," George said faintly; "just some scribbling," and put the school petition in his pocket.

But the faith that was in him was too deep to be long shaken. For months he had sat with Mr. Banning, daily in Room 13, at stated intervals in the civics classroom. The pure faith of the man had been as a flame, and the light had found its way into the depth of the boy's soul. America had ceased to be a section of the earth; it had become the one land where every man in his own right was king of his country's destiny. "If we have good government," Mr. Banning was wont to say, "it is because the people are vigilant and demand good government and do their part to get it. If we have poor government it is because the people are lax. In a Republic such as ours


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 the people are supreme." Praska had found a never-ending thrill in this. He did not merely believe that what Mr. Banning said was so. He knew it was true.

And so, as he lay in bed that night, the teacher's words came back to hearten him and warm him through. With an instinctive sense of loyalty, he did not question what his father had told him. He simply felt that his father might feel differently if he had had the good fortune to be thrown in contact with Mr. Banning. He fell asleep at last with his tumult of doubt at rest, with the conviction that Mr. Banning somehow would solve his problem on the morrow.

He reached school early the next morning; but early as he was the teacher was there before him. The man's eyes appraised him swiftly as he came through the doorway of Room 13.

"What's it about, George? That posted notice?"

"Yes, sir."

"I thought you'd be around when you got whatever you were fishing for."

Another teacher, Praska reflected, might have demanded to know why he had not been consulted. Somehow, there was never any feeling of restraint in bringing a project to Mr. Banning.


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 The plan that was to do away with mud outside the school was soon told. Praska laid the names and the petitions on the desk. Mr. Banning did not take up the papers.

"There'd be over two hundred signatures," the boy said.

The teacher looked at him, and looked away.

"You don't like my plan?" Praska was disappointed. "It isn't worth carrying out?"

A hand fell on his knee. "I didn't say that, George. Don't misunderstand me. But a letter, or a petition It's so easy that it means nothing. The postman is forever walking into public buildings with letters for elected officials. Mr. Citizen feels a sense of outrage at something that has happened or has not happened. He writes a letter of condemnation. That makes him feel better. He has a virtuous feeling that he's done his duty, and then forgets all about it. It has taken him two minutes to write the letter. You can't build up citizenship on two-minute splurges."

"But this is a petition," Praska said weakly.

"George," Mr. Banning said gently, "good government in this country could be advanced fifty per cent. if people would put less faith in petitions and more in personal action. What does a petition amount to, as a usual thing? I could


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 take out a petition to-morrow for the appointment of an official fly-catcher and get enough signatures to it to make it appear formidable. If the man you approach believes in the idea, he signs it at once. If he's indifferent, he signs it on the feeling that he's doing you a favor. If he thinks it a fool idea and you argue long enough, he'll sign just to get rid of you. Of course, petitioning Congress is a different matter. Most voters live long distances from Washington. But in local affairs a petition is usually worthless. The City Hall knows just how simple a matter it is to get people to sign and values the thing accordingly."

Praska was crushed. After a moment he rose from his chair.

"I've been thinking," Mr. Banning said casually, "about two men back in my home town. One of them, if he wanted some repairs made, would write a letter to the town carpenter and always end up by saying that he wanted the work started at once. Usually the carpenter got around to it in two or three weeks. We had another man who'd go down to see the carpenter personally and impress upon him the need for haste. Usually the carpenter got around to the job in two or three days. Queer that it should work out that way. Don't you think so?"

But George was not interested in the story of


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 the carpenter. The room was beginning to fill with students, and he went back to his desk; all the high hopes of the night before vanished. Presently he looked up to find Littlefield standing beside him.

"How's the secret?" the end asked. His good humor had returned. The mud of the street in front of the school had dried, the water was gone; and as the condition that had aroused his antagonism was no longer before his eyes his resentment had evaporated. It would not uncover itself again until the next storm, and then it would disappear again with dry weather.

"I was going to ask the school to send a petition to the City Hall," Praska told him, "but it's off."

"Why?" Littlefield was only mildly interested.

"Mr. Banning thinks petitions don't amount to much."

"Well" Littlefield was moving away.

"He usually suggests something better, doesn't he?"

Suddenly Praska sat bolt upright. By and by the discouragement that marked him began to melt away. The first period bell rang, but instead of following the crowd to the door he walked to Mr. Banning's desk.

"We have an assembly period to-morrow," he


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 began. "Do you think Mr. Rue would give me about five minutes for an announcement?"

"I don't know." The teacher gave him another swift survey. "I must go to the principal's office this morning. I'll ask him. Is it any thing important?"

"Betterment of school conditions," said the boy.

"In what way?"

"Why, I thought No; it was your thought.

"I'd like to sound out the school on going downtown to see the carpenter."

"I think it might be arranged," said Mr. Banning.

Next morning the auditorium exercises had reached the point that usually meant dismissal; but Mr. Rue, on the stage, was clearing his throat, and tapping his against the fingers of his left hand, and waiting for them to settle into quiet. The students shifted uneasily.

"Mr. George Praska, of Home Room 13," the principal said, "has an announcement to make that he thinks will be of general interest. I believe it comes under the head of school welfare."

There was a stirring of feet, a volley of applause, as Praska left his seat and came down one of the aisles. A quality of determination was in the set of his shoulders and the measure of his


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 stride. Inwardly, he was all atremble, but no one would have guessed it from his bearing. He disappeared up the stage steps at the side, was; momentarily lost to view, and then emerged from the wings. The applause began again.

"The old bulldog!" Littlefield whispered. A dawn of comprehension had broken upon him. "I might have known he wouldn't let go if"

"Sssh!" came from Perry King.

"I'll bet," Littlefield went on, "that this has something to do with"

"Forget it," Perry told him impatiently. "I want to hear what this song and dance is all about."

"I've been trying to tell you," Littlefield said plaintively. He sighed and gave it up. Perry's eyes were riveted on the platform.

"Fellow students of Northfield High" Praska began.

"Louder, please," cried a voice.

Praska increased the volume of his tone. "I want to say something about the condition of Nelson Avenue outside the school. It isn't a street; it's a mudhole. After every rain, after snow begins to melt, it's a case of slop and squash across. We grumble about it, and then it dries and we forget about it until the next storm. We're proud of this school, and I don't think any


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 of us want to track mud into it for days at a time. Of course, Nelson Avenue will be repaired some day, but we don't want to wait for some day. We want that street fixed now."

He had them gripped. He could feel their interest. The auditorium was profoundly still.

"We hear a lot in our civics classes about public opinion and the voice of the people. Public opinion is nothing until it expresses itself. The voice of the people isn't a voice unless it says something. We don't want mud in Nelson Avenue. Well, let's say so. We're people. We have voices. Let's use them. Letters won't do. Neither will petitions. It takes only a second to sign a petition. It takes an hour or so to go see the proper person and tell him that something's wrong. You can't get results with seconds; you've got to spend hours. The way to get a thing done is to go and see that it is done. If we want Nelson Avenue repaired, we've got to be the voice of Northfield High—a real voice. Why shouldn't we? It's our street. My father and your father pay for it. My idea is for this school to go down to the City Hall in a body and ask the City Commissioners to fix that street. A petition is only a petition, but going down there looks like business. And we'll mean business."

A murmur ran through the auditorium. The


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 school was startled, and showed it plainly. On many of the faces that Praska saw, incredulity wrote its mark. And then he came down to the end of the stage to fight for his vision, as leaders, all through the ages, have pleaded and fought for theirs.

"What are you afraid of?" he cried. "The home rooms have been showing us how citizens do their job. It all means something or it means nothing. I think it means something. Anyway, here's a chance for us to find out."

Still the boldness of the thing they were asked to do held them off.

"They'd laugh at us," came a voice.

"For what?" Praska flashed back. "For our public spirit? It is public spirit. We're working for the good of our school and for the good of Northfield."

The silence this time was thoughtful.

"Suppose they don't do what we ask?" It was Littlefield who pressed the question.

"Then we'll keep going there until they do. Where would Northfield have been last Thanksgiving Day if we had stopped line plunges after Harrison High held us for down the first time?"

He had spoken in terms that every student could comprehend. Back under the balcony applause broke out. It spread up and down the


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 aisles. In a moment the spirit of the auditorium had changed.

"All we'll ask," Praska cried, "is for a decent, clean street. I've given you merely a suggestion. It's up to the home rooms to decide what the school will do. But whatever we do, let's get started. Let's take it up in the home rooms to-day. Let's find out where we are. Let's sound out our own public opinion and let's try out our own voice."

The applause turned to cheering as he walked back to the seat. The school had caught up his battle cry. None expected Mr. Rue to comment on the situation; Northfield students always had opportunity to think for themselves. At a nod from the principal the orchestra struck up the exit march. Once out in the hall, Littlefield caught Praska by the arm.

"George," he said earnestly, "you ought to take me some place and beat me up. I was the first fellow to kick about the mud; and in two days the fight was all out of me. I'm with you now right to the finish."

"You might have let some of us in Room 13 know what was going on," Perry complained.

"I wanted to have the school take hold of it all at one time," Praska explained simply. "If we had begun to debate it in Room 13, the other


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 rooms would have heard something about it and would have begun to take sides without knowing what it was all about. This way they've got the question right before their eyes."

"I'll say they have," Littlefield announced with conviction.

In the few minutes that remained before the start of the next period Room 13 put through a resolution to take the school's demands to the City Hall. At 11 o'clock came an outburst of cheering from the second floor, to be followed by the announcement that Room 10 had voted to support Praska. At noon Room 12 paraded to the cafeteria carrying a sign reading:

Just as the earlier classes resumed for the afternoon Room 8, a girl's home room, threw its strength to Praska's course, and the tide of approval and acclaim became a flood.

That afternoon the Northfield Congress met at short notice. Only two motions were made.

"Mr. Chairman," said Perry King, "I move


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 you that this school go down to the City Hall to-morrow."

"Mr. Chairman," said Littlefield, "I move you that George Praska be selected as spokesman for the delegation."

The resolutions were passed without debate. Littlefield stood up again.

"Mr. Chairman, it strikes me that some may have the idea that we won't be admitted to the City Hall. I have some notices here I ran off on a typewriter. It might not be a bad idea to post one on every bulletin board."

The notice was short:

Next afternoon eight hundred and fourteen students marched out of Northfield High School, crossed Nelson Avenue, and turned their faces toward the heart of the town. Four abreast, they moved along in a solid, silent, serious column. Women came to the windows of houses and looked after them in wonder. Business men along Main Street, when they reached that thoroughfare, stood in their doorways and asked what it was all about. And corner loafers, always ready to shuffle along with a crowd, trailed


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 behind to see to what goal the procession would lead.

It led to the City Hall, an imposing building of gray granite, its walls rising from the top of a solid terrace. For a moment the head of the line waivered. The solemnity and majesty that is part of government in a Republic filled them with an instinctive sense of awe. Then Praska saw the words chiseled out of the marble above the entrance: "THE PEOPLE RULE." That gave him courage, and he led the way into the building.

A wide stairway of stone led to the floors above. In front of the stairway was a great open space; but vast as was the foyer, the students filled it as the lines kept crowding in one upon another. Where to go was something of a problem. Praska looked about him helplessly. Now he wished that Mr. Banning or some of the teachers had come along; but Mr. Banning had told them that it would be best for them to carry the ball themselves.

"What do we do now?" Littlefield whispered hoarsely.

The tramp of sixteen hundred feet on the tiled floor had echoed through the building. City employees came crowding from offices marked "City Clerk," "Tax Collector" and "Department of


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 Weights and Measures." They stood in puzzled groups.

"Who let the kindergarten in?" a voice asked with a laugh.

Praska's face flushed.

A man came down the wide stairway, stared at them, and abruptly quickened his pace.

"What is it?" he asked good-naturedly, "a riot?"

"A delegation," said Praska.

"Oh! Anybody you want to see in particular?"

"We want to see the city commissioners."

"They don't meet to-day. If you want to reach any individual commissioner"

"We want to see about having a street improved."

The man gave a low whistle of surprise. "The Commissioner of Streets and Public Improvements is your oyster. His office is Room 36, third floor. Where are you from?"

"Northfield High."

"The whole school?"

"Yes, sir. More than eight hundred students."

"Caesar's ghost," said the man in a startled voice. Suddenly he made a break up the stairs, only to stop short. "Jim!" he cried and waved toward one of the groups of city employees. "Do me a favor. Call the Morning Herald and ask


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 them to jump a photographer here in a hurry." He caught Praska's eye. "Room 36, third floor," he called, and was gone up the stairs.

"That fellow's a newspaper reporter," Perry King said in excitement.

In the wake of the reporter went the students. The lines had been broken; they mounted the stairway in one packed mass. The door of Room 36 had a glass lintel; behind it a voice cried in amazement, "You don't mean it! Eight hundred of them!" Then a shadow showed on the glass; the door was thrown open, and the Commissioner of Streets and Public Improvements stood on the threshold. At sight of the crowd in the corridor his eyes opened wide as though here was something they had never seen before.

"I am Commissioner Hunter," he said doubtfully. "Are you sure I am the man you are looking for?"

"Yes, sir," George answered positively. "We came here as a delegation."

"On public business?"

"Yes, sir."

Some of the incredulity faded from the official's face. The gravity of those who had packed their way into the corridor space outside his office was contagious. He still looked upon them with wonder, but into his gaze was coming the dawn


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 of comprehending respect. And yet he did not quite gage the mettle of these young visitors.

"What can I do for you?" he asked.

There was a moment of silence.

"We come here," Praska said then, "as citizens of the Northfield High School. We come as the voice of the school. We ask for a hearing."

"You shall have it," the Commissioner said promptly. "I would invite you into my office, but the room is too small. You could not all fit into it. If there are no objections we can transact our business out here. Do you come here with a complaint?"

"Yes, sir." Praska's voice was earnest. "We come to protest against the condition of Nelson Avenue in front of the high school. We take pride in our school, but we cannot take pride in our street. It fills with mud and water after every rain, and we have to track through the muck to reach the school. We feel that this condition should be corrected, and we have come to-day to ask you to correct it. I voice the sentiment of the entire school."

A flurry of broke out, but was instantly hushed. The delegation, in its sense of dignity, in its self-control, expressed its desires in a way that was even stronger than Praska's words. Behind the Commissioner's back the news-


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 paper reporter wrote his notes rapidly, one ear cocked so that he would not miss a word of what was said.

Twice Commissioner Hunter cleared his throat, but did not speak. His gaze kept running over the sea of faces turned anxiously toward him. At last:

"Young man, may I ask your name?"

"George Praska, sir."

"I want to congratulate you on the delegation that has accompanied you, and I want to congratulate the high school for possessing such a fine student body. At this moment, I can make no binding promises. We will have to look into the matter. But I will pledge you that your protest will receive the immediate attention of my department and, if possible, what you ask will be done. Is that satisfactory?"

Praska turned to the school. "Is it?"

A roar of approval was their answer.

And then they began to move toward the stairs, and the Commissioner began to shake hands with all those whom he could reach. Praska, the nearest to him, was the last to reach the outdoors. A photographer was on the sidewalk focusing a camera, and the reporter, standing beside him, was crying, "Just a moment, please. We won't detain you but a moment." Then the shutter


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 clicked, the photographer waved his hands and the students flooded down the terrace steps.

Perry King was strutting a bit with his chest out. "Our pictures in the paper. That's class, I'll tell the world. I hope we'll be able to recognize the faces."

Praska was not thinking of photographs. He had come into contact with government in a free country and had found it all that he had dreamed it to be.

He came down to the dining room in the morning to find his father already at breakfast. Mr. Praska was reading a newspaper as he ate; now and then his eyeglasses came up over the top of the page and surveyed his son. There was, about his eyes, a shadow of perplexity and unaccustomed appraisement.

"Were you at the City Hall yesterday, George?"

"Yes, sir; the whole school. I wanted to tell you about it last night, but Mother said you would not be in until late. I guess I was asleep when you got home."

"There's a story in the Herald. Care to see it?"

The boy leaped from his chair. The report of the school's visit was on the first page, coupled with a three column cut of the delegation. He


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 did not bother to scan the photograph for faces. His interest leaped to the type:

There was more of it, and the boy read it through to the end. The reporter had written his story seriously and honestly, with no attempt at cheap humor. Slowly Praska put the paper down. Popular government! The voice of the people! These things meant more now than they had ever meant before.


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 His father had left the table. From the hall, as he put on overcoat and hat, he called a question.

"What do you think of the story?"

"Good! I'm glad he didn't try to poke fun at us."

"Why were you selected as spokesman for the delegation?"

"I don't know; I guess because I was the first one to think of going to the City Hall."

The man drew a breath of relief. He had had a fear that his name in the paper might go to his son's head. For a moment he appeared in the dining room doorway.

"I'd watch myself on speech making, son. It's easy to overdo it. You had a real case yesterday; that's all right. But don't get the habit. I know men who cannot be happy in a gathering unless they have the floor. They become pests. Always wait until you have something to say—then say it."

The boy was glad, for some reason, that his father said nothing about what might be the result of the mission.

When he reached the school, it seemed that almost every student had brought a newspaper. Morning Heralds were everywhere. Some of them had been posted on the bulletin boards. The


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 and the doctors had said to me, ‘We'll straighten your boy's legs for you, but he will be in pain all the rest of his life,’ I'd not have let them touch him.

"I seemed to have to tell them that I knew a way. I suppose it would have been sly to sit there and not tell them. I told them, anyhow. But, oh, I can't do it! Go out and put an end to the poor love's happiness. After the time he's had, the war and all. And then he'll have to go back there! I can't! I can't!”

I felt an ecstatic sense of ease. Everything was going to be right. Chris was to live in the interminable enjoyment of his youth and love. There was to be a finality about his happiness which usually belongs only to loss and calamity; he was to be as happy as a ring cast into the sea is lost, as a man whose coffin has lain for centuries beneath the sod is dead. Yet Margaret continued to say, and irritated


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 school, so full of dignity and restraint the day before, was running riot in a tide of spontaneous elation.

Just before the first period bell rang Mr. Banning, who was standing at a window, caught Praska's eye and motioned mysteriously with his hand. The boy walked toward him. Down in the street three men were inspecting Nelson Avenue. One of them was Commissioner Hunter.

Praska gasped. "Do you think"

The teacher smiled. "The voice of the people is a strong voice when it asks for what is just."

That afternoon, in every home room, the students heard read a letter from Mr. Rue commending the school for the manner in which it had conducted itself. At that the elation died, to be succeeded by a fitting and sober pride of accomplishment. Just before classes ended for the day came another announcement from the principal—this time delivered in person. Commissioner Hunter, he said, had telephoned him that Nelson Avenue had been inspected and found wanting, and that the street would be repaired within a month.

The cheering that broke out then must have been heard at the City Hall. Praska found a lump in his throat. So this was the process of government in free America! He glanced at


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 Mr. Banning. The teacher's face, at that moment, was transformed.

The closing bell rang, but it was a half hour before the school had emptied and the students had gone their way. Littlefield's attempt to express himself had been incoherent. Perry King's sentiments had found expression in but one sentence, repeated over and over again.

"I'll tell the world I'm an American and darned glad of it."

Praska reached home long past his usual time. A rolled newspaper thrown there by a carrier, was on the front porch. It was the Evening Star; he unrolled it and smoothed out its creases. There was nothing in the news columns about Commissioner Hunter's message to Mr. Rue; probably the Commissioner's decision had come too late to be published that day. But on the editorial page was this:

Government is not the whim or fancy of any group of public officials. American government is the American people. The American people are the American government. But confusion, and misrepresentation, and trouble arise because the people refuse to function in their government. The mere act of voting on election day does not constitute citizenship. True citizen-


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 ship functions three hundred and sixty-five days a year; it is alive, active and intelligent; it plays its part and does not shirk; it consults with its elected officials and helps them to formulate policies of wisdom and justice.

The eight hundred boys and girls of the high school who yesterday came to the City Hall and asked Commissioner Hunter to improve a street showed that they are alive to the possibilities of popular government. Instead of wasting time by grumbling, they chose the direct road and put their case frankly before a city official. The citizens of to-day who take their citizenship lightly can learn a needed lesson from the part these high school students have played. They have shown the will and spirit to function as Americans. They are torch-bearers of a true Democracy.

The minutes passed, but Praska remained on the porch. Twice he read the editorial through. Slowly, at last, he came into the house. "Mother!"

"Yes."

"Will Pop be home early to-day?"

"No; he telephoned a little while ago. There is some business that must be attended to to-night. He thought he'd probably be up on the midnight train."

The boy appeared to be lost in thought. By and by he folded the Evening Star so that the


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 editorial stood face up, and laid it on the small table where his father kept his pipes and some books. Struck by an he took a pencil from his pocket and wrote a sentence across the newspaper page.

"Commissioner Hunter has promised to fix our street next month."

Hours later, when Mr. Praska reached home, the house was hushed and stilled. Gently he closed the front door. A night light burned in the dining room. He drew out a chair, turned the light higher, and began to read the Evening Star's editorial on democracy. He had read it once coming out on the train. "They have shown," he repeated aloud, "the will and the spirit to function as Americans."

After a time he went over to the side table to look for his pipe. At sight of the newspaper that his son had left for him a whimsical smile touched his lips; and then he saw the sentence telling of the Commissioner's promise, and abruptly the smile was gone.

His hand, feeling around for his pipe, sent something falling to the floor. He picked it up. It was a yellow card that he had tossed aside and had not given another thought. Now, as he stared at it, his lips moved. "The will and the spirit to function as Americans," he said.


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 Abruptly he ceased to search for the pipe and took out his fountain pen. On the card he signed the line that made him a member of the Fifth Ward Improvement Association.


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HE football season was over—the last game had been played. Basketball had not yet begun the hectic run of its schedule. Perry King, at his desk in Home Room 13 sighed dolefully.

"Might as well be a hermit," he reflected. "There won't be enough excitement for what's left of this semester to muss a fellow's hair."

But Perry was wrong. Life had a way of bobbing up with unexpected surprises. Three days later Frank Baldwin, president of the Northfield Congress—in another school the body might have been termed the Student Council—resigned with the announcement that his family was moving from town. And the school, aroused from its quiet, found itself confronted with the duty of electing some one to fill his place.

"Praska!" cried Perry. "Room 13 wants George Praska. Nothing to it but Praska. Might as well hold the election at once and get it over with! Praska!"


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 If Perry's plan had been to stampede the school for his candidate, he almost succeeded. The cry was taken up in the halls. Northfield remembered how, under Praska's leadership, the school had marched to the City Hall and had had muddy Nelson Avenue improved. Perry, flushed and excited, buttonholed Littlefield in the doorway of the physics laboratory.

"If we can get that election called at once," he said, "Praska will go over without opposition. And then we'll have a Room 13 fellow bossing the whole show. Room 13 has three votes in the Congress—yours, Praska's and mine. I'll make a motion to hold the election at once. You and Praska will vote for it. We'll pick up enough support from other members of the Congress to jam the motion through. If you ask me, I'll say that it will be pretty work."

But student participation in the government of Northfield High had endowed many of the body with a true sense of values, a gravity of thought, and a perception of real responsibility. Littlefield, instead of giving off sparks of enthusiasm, grew sober. His eyebrows drew down in a frown.

"I don't like that," he said. "And I know Praska wouldn't be a party to it. It's not Praska's style."


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 "Do you think the school could get anybody better than George Praska?" Perry demanded hotly.

"No. But rushing through an election just to seat our own candidate would make a bad precedent. This year it would give us Praska. But how about next year, or the year after? We've got to think of the school. You and Praska and I will be through here in a year or so, but the school will be here long after we're out. That's what count's—not to-morrow, but a long line of to-morrows."

Perry was silent. "I guess you're right," he said at last. Littlefield flashed him a look of approval. The abrupt manner in which he had surrendered an unsound theory was indication of what Northfield was doing for its young citizen.

But though Perry had surrendered, he could not stifle a secret regret. He had developed an uncanny knack of interpreting popular sentiment. The sharp brain, functioning above his thin, bony body, seemed able to read what a group might be thinking. He knew that, at the moment, Praska was the choice of the school. But the moment would pass. Other candidates would be brought forward—it was in the nature of things that this should happen. And shrewd instinct told him that certainty passed out of an election


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 once the friends of rival candidates began to run main issues up obscure and unexpected bypaths.

In due time the Northfield Congress met and promulgated its findings. Nominations, the Congress ordered, must be made from the home rooms; and each home room was limited to one choice. The names of candidates, the decree ran, would be placed on the ballot in alphabetical order, and the Congress would supervise the election. Five days were given in which to make nominations.

Room 13 promptly nominated Praska. Three other home rooms promptly indorsed him. Then came a halt. Perry went scouting to learn thei reason.

"Opposition," he reported to Littlefield.

Littlefield scowled. "Where?"

"The girls."

Next day one of the girls' home rooms nominated Lee Merritt, who was serving as a member of the Congress.

In Room 13 there were outbursts of mirth. Hammond, the captain of the eleven, was convulsed with laughter.

"You don't mean that they've named old 'Nimble-feet' Merritt?"

Perry nodded.

"Why, all that fellow can do is dance. That's


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 where he got his nickname. What did he ever do for the school?"

"He was chairman of the committee that gave the Thanksgiving Day Entertainment," said Littlefield.

Hammond snorted. "He had a good live committee. The committee members did the work and saved his bacon. He's a fusser with the girls, and that's the only place he shines."

"Yes," Perry said slowly; "and there are four hundred and fifty girls in Northfield and about three hundred and fifty fellows. He's the best dancer in the school, and the girls crowd each other for a chance to be his partner. He has a way with them. There's no getting away from that. He's popular with them. You can't get away from that. And if they really get behind old 'Nimble-feet' they've got the votes."

"Who," said Littlefield, "who sprung his nomination?"

"I don't know. But Betty Lawton is helping his candidacy."

Littlefield gave a low whistle of consternation. Betty Lawton was, without question, the leading spirit in the girls' rooms.

"Confound girls, anyway," Hammond said bitterly.

The following morning two more of the girls'


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 rooms came out for Merritt. Betty Lawton's influence was showing its strength. In a corner of the cafeteria, Perry, Hammond and Littlefield held a council of gloom.

"If the worst comes to the worst," Littlefield said, "we might try stuffing the ballot boxes."

"No crooked work at Northfield," Perry said sharply.

Littlefield gave him a glance of scorn. "Did you think I meant it? Of course there's nothing crooked at Northfield."

But there was. Just before classes were dismissed that afternoon the news spread through the school that money had been stolen from three clothing lockers on the first floor.

In the auditorium, the following morning, Mr. Rue, the principal, faced the students with unwonted gravity.

"As a rule," he said, "the faculty prefers to have matters of ordinary interest to Northfield announced by duly elected officials of the student body. We like to see Northfield citizens function intelligently for themselves. But the matter that must come before you this morning is of such extraordinary character that I deem it best to handle the matter myself.

"Three of the clothing lockers were rifled yesterday, and money was stolen from all three.


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 Fortunately, the amounts taken were small; but that does not lessen the seriousness of the occurrence. All of us, alive to the best interests of Northfield, have been asking, in our hearts, one question. Was this thing done by a citizen of Northfield? I can tell you that it was not.

"We have definitely established the fact that some outsider entered the school, committed the thefts, and left. However, there is an aspect to the case that must give us pause. The intruder did not force a door nor break a lock. Each locker that was robbed had been left open. This was, in itself, a frank and careless invitation to loss.

"To this extent Northfield has been guilty of poor citizenship. Good citizenship writes as its cardinal virtue obedience to law. The law calls for clothing lockers to be kept locked. The person who committed the thefts broke the moral law and the law of organized society. The students who left their lockers invitingly open broke the law of the school. No bank leaves its money out on the sidewalk. Such a condition would be akin to tempting people to steal. The giver of a bribe is as guilty as the taker; and he who by carelessness tempts another to commit a theft is as guilty, in the larger meaning, as the one who steals.


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 "We must have no more of this laxness at Northfield. Last night we got in touch with every member of our Congress. The school day has hardly begun, but the Congress has already met, and is organized to handle the situation. A 'Safety Committee' has been organized with Mr. Lee Merritt as chairman; and it will have Room B-2 in the basement as its headquarters. This committee will patrol all corridors, and will test lockers during the day to see that they are kept locked. If a locker is found open, a warning slip will be left on the knob. A second slip will be for the second offense. But if a locker is found open for the third time, everything in it will be taken to the committee room and the owner will have to identify his property in order to get it back.

"The members of this committee will wear arm bands, and on each band will be two letters—'S' and 'C'. Their authority, where open lockers are found, is to be accepted by the school. I am sorry that the Congress has had to name such a committee. It should not be necessary for us to police ourselves. The Congress asks me to inform you that the committee will be disbanded just as soon as Northfield shows that it is capable of obeying its own laws without supervision."

The school filed soberly from the auditorium;


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 but once in the corridors the walls echoed a medley of excited debate and speculation. Back in Room 13 Mr. Banning held the boys while waiting for the next period bell.

"I think," he said, "that Room 13 has a representative on the Safety Committee."

Perry King arose. "I'm on the committee. We won't have our arm bands until to-morrow."

"Can't do anything in this school," little Johnny Dunn chortled, "without Room 13 having a finger in the pie."

"Let Room 13 keep its hands clean by not making it necessary to be reported by the Safety Committee," Perry said savagely. Plainly he was chewing some cud of bitter reflection. Mr. Banning looked at him in surprise. Littlefield nudged Hammond.

"Something's gone wrong," he observed wisely. "I'll bet it has something to do with the election."

It did have something to do with the election. Twice, before the period bell rang, Perry tried to catch Praska's eye; later there was no chance to overtake him in the orderly lines out in the hall. During the morning he heard that one more room had declared for Praska. That was good. The information was followed by the announcement that the two remaining rooms—a girls' room and Merritt's own home room—had taken a stand


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 for the rival candidate whose specialty was dancing. Perry's face grew long. He counted the minutes until noon, and then hastened down to the cafeteria. Praska was eating at a corner table.

"Speed it up," Perry said. "I want to talk to you, and I can't do it here. There's too big a crowd." He got a tray, and brought his own meal back to the table. "I've got an earful for you," he added, "and don't make any mistake about that."

Twenty minutes later, on the quiet landing of a little used rear stairway, the earful was duly delivered.

"Four home rooms have declared for you," Perry said, "and four have declared for Merritt. Of course the fact that a home room indorses a candidate doesn't mean that the other fellow won't get any votes from that room. You'll get everything in your room; Merritt will get everything in his. But in the other rooms that indorsed Merritt, you got some votes, and he got some votes in the rooms that indorsed you. A room indorsement is simply a majority opinion. It doesn't bind the fellow who voted against the majority to swing into line and make the choice unanimous."

Praska smiled his slow smile. "Why get excited about that?"


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 "Four rooms against four rooms," said Perry. "The girls' rooms have the most votes. They're going to control this election."

"Why shouldn't they, if they have the most votes?"

"But 'Nimble-feet' Merritt is chairman of the Safety Committee."

There was something in the way the sentence was said that brought Praska's brows together in a frown. Plainly his friend was hinting at something queer—but he could not follow him. "What of that?" he asked at last.

"Oh, you ninny," Perry said pityingly. "Can't you see what's going to happen? By and by some of the girls will leave their lockers open for the third time. Their things will be brought down to the committee room. And what will 'Nimble-feet' do? Will he make them toe the mark? He will not. He'll apologize to them for making them come down and they'll go away figuring that he's just the nicest fellow in Northfield. What chance will you have against that?"

Praska's face was grave. "You mean Merritt will use the Safety Committee as part of his campaign?"

"No; no." Perry was impatient. "He won't be able to do anything else. It's his way. He always gushes over a girl. And members of the


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 committee, that the whole school know are for you, will have to play along as he plays or your election is gone."

They looked into each other's eyes as men do who seek to read each other's souls. Praska was the first to speak.

"Let's go back," he said, and started down the stairs.

Perry sighed. The interview had not gone as he had counted. He had come there to warn Praska of the defeat that lay ahead; to tell him. A chill of doubt stabbed at him and he grew icy with apprehension. As he started to follow, his steps were slow, his feet were heavy.

"Praska stooping to that," he said in a whisper. "I can't believe it."

And then Praska turned and came back up the stairs. In his eyes now was a look of pain as though the thing that brought him back might hurt; but his jaw was squared.

"Perry," he said rapidly, after the fashion of one who seeks to get an unpleasant duty over with, "the presidency of the Congress is the greatest honor that Northfield can give. It's a big temptation, but. Oh, we got to play the game. If I thought that a single vote came to me because some friend in Room 13 let things slide and winked at. You know what Mr. Rue


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 said this morning about open lockers. Bad citizenship! We can't stand for that. I don't care how many votes"

Perry gave a cry of understanding. "You mean you think I'm going to do 'Nimble-feet's' stunt and play for votes?"

"Isn't that what you were trying to tell me?"

"You poor prune! I wanted you to see what you were up against. I wanted to tell you that I was going to treat everybody who came down to the committee-room without gloves. I was trying to tell you I was just about going to lose you that election."

"And I thought it was the other thing," said Praska.

Perry was going to announce what he had believed, but stifled the words before they were uttered. Somehow, the thought itself seemed to carry a sting of insult. After a moment his lips twisted into a crooked smile.

I would rather be right than be president.' Regular Henry Clay stuff. Remember when we first heard that saying of Clay's? Back in the eighth grade of grammar school. It didn't mean much then; but Mr. Banning said something about it last week. I'll tell the world he drove it home to me."

"It's the spirit of America," Praska said pas-


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 sionately. And Perry wondered how he could ever have dreamed that Praska would sell his ideals for an honor.

There are, in every school, a shiftless few who cannot be touched by the finer things, and who take their responsibilities lightly. Close on their heels tread the laggards, the thoughtless and indifferent. Northfield was no exception to the common rule. And so it came to pass that before many days lockers were being emptied by the Safety Committee, and uneasy and blustering students were coming down to Room B-2 to claim their temporarily-confiscated belongings.

It was in Room B-2 that Perry's scathing tongue won for him the nickname of the "BawlerOut"

"Why," said Littlefield in admiration, "you never heard such dressing downs in your life. To hear that long-legged bantam talk you'd think he was the Constitution of the United States and the Supreme Court rolled into one. Half the fellows who go down there could squeeze his ear and make him dance to their music; but they take what he has to say and walk out like tame ducks."

Friend or mere acquaintance—it was all the same to Perry. He had been placed in power to see that a necessary and vital law was obeyed. He


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 recognized no other creed. Those who came to wheedle grew abashed before his indignant glare. A few came to threaten, only to become silent under his withering indignation. He knew neither fear nor favor, excuse nor extenuation. Northfield had soiled itself through contact with a thief. It was never to happen again. Soft words had no power, friendship no appeal, to turn him from that.

Between times he found occasion to campaign for Praska. One boy whom he had flayed in the morning, he approached for support in the afternoon. The student eyed him coldly.

"You were certainly around when nerve was given out," he commented. "A few hours ago you scalped me; now you're asking for favors."

"What do you want me to be," Perry demanded, "a Northfield fellow or a trimmer?"

The student flushed. "A Northfield fellow," he said after a moment. "I wouldn't promise to vote for Praska; but I haven't promised to vote for Merritt, either."

Merritt, on the other hand, took his duties with light ease. During his periods of patrol, he walked the corridors faithfully; but there were times when Room B-2 did not see him for an entire day and the committee took care of itself. "When he would come in, he would always wear


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 an air of busy importance. He would glance briefly through the record book, sign the reports that others had prepared, and then he was gone.

"Good work," he would say from the doorway. "Somebody had better stay on deck. That stuff we took out of locker 136—Morris will be down looking for that this afternoon. Somebody'll have to be here to give it to him."

Perry regarded him with sour disfavor.

The campaign ran on and grew feverish with the days. Twice the auditorium was given over to political mass meetings—once so that Merritt's friends could plead his case, again so that Praska's adherents could advance his claims. Neither Betty Lawton nor Perry were among the orators. Perry was down in Room B-2 doing work that had to be done. Betty was in the assembly, merely a listener, but she applauded each speaker who said a good word for Merritt. Littlefield, who was watching her narrowly, saw that.

It was after the meeting called to help him that Merritt made one of his brief visits to the headquarters of the Safety Committee. He had been praised for the sharp manner in which the committee was supervising the lockers; his spirit had expanded mellowly under the tide of ap-


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 proval. No doubt he thought he had earned all the good things that had been said of him. And while he was in the committee room making his perfunctory examination of the records, a girl from the junior class came in to claim several articles that had been removed from her open locker.

Merritt sprang nimbly to his feet. "Miss Hunt! I'm sorry you have had to come down here. Has it inconvenienced you? Really, I could have taken care of this if you had let me know. We had to take them; no way out of it. It's a school order. You'll keep your locker closed hereafter, won't you? Going right upstairs?"

"Yes; Betty Lawton is waiting for me." In fact, Betty stood in the doorway.

"Let me carry them for you," Merritt said quickly, and draped the girl's coat over his arm. Chatting and laughing he led the way from the room.

Perry, who had seen it all, made a bow to an imaginary visitor. "Oh, Miss Dillpickle! What an outrage that your own things should have been taken from your own locker. I am humiliated that this should have happened to you. Of course, the school says you deserve this punishment, but what's good citizenship between friends?" He kicked over the chair that Merritt


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 had just vacated. "Of all the rot," he said in disgust.

But calling Merritt's methods names did not minimize their danger to Praska. Here was a girl offender who had been treated apologetically, and another girl who had witnessed the deference that she had been shown. They would spread a report of Merritt's consideration through the girls' home rooms. And with Betty Lawton telling it—

Perry waited glumly until another member of the committee came to relieve him. This was Wednesday. The election was to be held Friday. All day to-morrow for the telling of a sympathetic story of what a thoughtful, engaging young man Lee Merritt was. All of Friday, until the hour of the election, for the story to be told and retold. If Merritt had been deliberately seeking votes through his connection with the Safety Committee, Perry might have found a savage joy in counter-plotting; but Merritt, who could find so little time for his committee chairmanships, seemed innocently unaware of the strength he was building up behind his gallantries. Perry shook his head helplessly and went upstairs.

The hour was well on toward four o'clock; yet by rare good luck, he met Praska going out the school door. Perry was nothing if not curious.