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ANN ARBOR TALES


By
Karl Edwin Harriman


Philadelphia, George W. Jacobs and Company, MCMII


COPYRIGHT, 1902,
BY GEORGE W. JACOBS & CO.

_Published November, 1902._


_TO MY PARENTS_




Contents

                           PAGE
THE MAKING OF A MAN          11

THE KIDNAPPING               61

THE CHAMPIONS                97

THE CASE OF CATHERWOOD      123

THE DOOR--A NOCTURNE        177

A MODERN MERCURY            207

THE DAY OF THE GAME         259

THE OLD PROFESSOR           303




THE MAKING OF A MAN

Florence affected low candle-lights, glowing through softly tinted
shades, of pale-green, blue, old-rose, pink; for such low lights set
each coiled tress of her golden hair a-dancing--and Florence knew this.
The hangings in the little round room where she received her guests were
deeper than the shades, and the tapestry of the semi-circular
window-seat was red. It was in the arc of this that Florence was wont to
sit--the star amidst her satellites.

It was one's privilege to smoke in the little room, and somehow the odor
of the burned tobacco did not get into the draperies; nor filter through
the _portieres_ into the hall beyond; and the air of the _boudoir_ was
always cool and fresh and sweet.

Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday--every night--and Sunday most of all--there
were loungers on that window-seat, their faces half in shadow. It was
hard at such times to take one's eyes off Florence, sitting in the arc,
the soft light of old-rose moving across her cheek, creeping around her
white throat, leaping in her twisted hair, quivering in her blue, soft
eyes.

When she smiled, one thought in verse--if one were that sort--or,
perhaps, muttered, "Gad!" shiveringly under the breath.

Well may you--or I--shake our heads now and smile, albeit a bit sadly;
but then it was different. We have learned much, too much perhaps, and
the once keen edge of joy is dulled. But then we were young. Youth was
our inheritance and we spent it, flung it away, you say, as we knelt
before the Shrine of Beauty set up in a little round room where low
lights glimmered among deep shaded draperies.

We realized that it was a serious matter--a deadly serious matter; just
as did a score or more of our fellows on the campus in whose hearts, as
well, flared the flame of the fine young love that we were feeling in
our own.

For you--and I--loved Florence.

Dear little room! Dearest, dearest Florence! Many are the men who never
learned; in whose hearts your image is enshrined to-night. And few are
they who ever learned and really knew you, dear.

Some few thought they did and called you a "College Widow," because they
could remember a certain tall, dark-browed senior who danced ten times
with you at the Jay Hop of '87. Others were convinced through them; but
these were mostly freshmen upon whom you had not sought to work your
magic. How far wrong they were! Yet even you, Florence, I am thinking,
were wont, at least in blue moments, to take yourself at the scant
valuation these few saw fit to place upon you.

But in the end you, even, saw and understood.

I am glad, my dear, that I may tell the story. And if those who read it
here shall call it fiction, you, and Jim, and I, at least, shall know it
for the truth.

And then, when I have done, and you have put aside the book, to hide
your eyes from him who holds you fonder far than you can know, remember,
dear, the glory of it and be glad.


I

It was June.

The rain had been plentiful and the green things of earth rioted
joyously in their silent life. In the trees were many birds that sang
all day long, and in the night the moon was pale and the shadows were
ghostly and the air was sweet with roses that hung in pink profusion
from the trellis.

The grass was soft beneath the quick, light tread of the lads; and the
laughter of the summer-time was in the eyes of all the maids.

Many the gay straw-rides to the Lake; frequent and long the walks
through leafy lanes, down which the footfalls echoed; sweet the vigils
on the broad stone