Page:The plastic age, (IA plasticage00mark).pdf/357

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page needs to be proofread.
THE PLASTIC AGE
331

he slipped out of the gymnasium and made one last tour of the campus.

It was a moonlight night, and the campus was mysterious with shadows. The elms shook their leaves whisperingly; the tower of the chapel looked like magic tracery in the moonlight. He paused before Surrey Hall, now dark and empty. Good old Carl. . . . Carl and Cynthia? He wondered. . . . Pudge had roomed there, too. He passed on. Keller Hall. Cynthia and Norry. . . . “God, what a beast I was that night. How white Norry was—and Cynthia, too.” Cynthia again. She’d always be a part of Sanford to him. On down to the lake to watch the silver path of the moonlight and the heavy reflections near the shore. Swim¬ ming, canoeing, skating—he and Cynthia in the woods beyond. . . . On back to the campus, around the buildings, every one of them filled with memo¬ ries. Four years—four beautiful, wonderful years. ... Good old Sanford. . . .

Midnight struck. Some one turned a switch somewhere. The Japanese lanterns suddenly lost their colors and faded to gray balloons in the moon¬ light. Some men were singing on the Union steps, lit was a few seniors, Hugh knew; they had been singing for an hour.

He stood in the center of the campus and listened, his eyes full of tears. Earnestly, religiously, the men sang, their voices rich with emotion: