Page:A Princetonian.djvu/49

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Quod Erat Demonstrandum.
33

fact that the time was quite evident by a glance at the face, he pressed a spring and the hour rang out in the repeater's musical tinkling notes. So still was the room that the sound was quite audible, and even the professor, seated cross-legged on the platform, looked up. The young man closed the watch with a snap, heaved a sigh, and, walking down the aisle, was the first to give in his papers. Inscribed in a bold hand on the outside sheet was, "L. Putney Betts, New York, New York."

There was a flutter as he passed.

Once outside the door, he paused and drew a cigarette from a silver case.

"Dead easy," he said: "struck four out of five. Knew 'em by heart." Then he chuckled, "There's nothing like having a professor's brother for a tutor," he remarked to himself; "there's where I had a great head."

But to return to the busy room again.

The big freshman was seated in one of the back seats. His brow was wrinkled and he had run his fingers so often through his hair that it stood up from his head in all directions like an aurora. At last, however, he wrote his name carefully in the right-hand corner of his paper