He was browned from his passage, appeared a little stouter, was very well dressed and good to look at, and fairly exuded vitality and pleasant humor.  Sharlee was delighted and quite excited over seeing him again, though it may be noted, as shedding a side-light upon her character, that she did not greet him with “Hello, Stranger!” However, her manner of salutation appeared perfectly satisfactory to West.

They had the little office to themselves and plenty to talk about.

“Doubtless you got my postals?” he asked.

“Oh, stacks of them.  I spent all one Saturday afternoon pasting them in an album as big as this table.  They made a perfect fireside grand tour for me.  What did you like best in all your trip?”

“I think,” said West, turning his handsome blue eyes full upon her, “that I like getting back.”

Sharlee laughed.  “It’s done you a world of good; that’s plain, anyway.  You look ready to remove mountains.”

“Why, I can eat them—­bite their heads off!  I feel like a fighting-cock who’s been starved a shade too long for the good of the bystanders.”

He laughed and waved his arms about to signify enormous vitality.  Sharlee asked if he had been able to make a start yet with his new work.

“You might say,” he replied, “that I dived head-first into it from the steamer.”

He launched out into eager talk about his hopes for Blames College.  In all his wide circle of friends, he knew no one who made so sympathetic and intelligent a listener as she.  He talked freely, lengthily, even egotistically it might have seemed, had they not been such good friends and he so sure of her interest.  Difficulties, it seemed, had already cropped out.  He was not sure of the temper of his trustees, whom he had called together for an informal meeting that morning.  Starting to advertise the great improvements that had taken place in the college, he had collided with the simple fact that no improvements had taken place.  Even if he privately regarded his own accession in that light, he humorously pointed out, he could hardly advertise it, with old Dr. Gilfillan, the retired president, living around the corner and reading the papers.  Again, taking his pencil to make a list of the special advantages Blaines had to offer, he was rather forcibly struck with the fact that it had no special advantages.  But upon these and other difficulties, he touched optimistically, as though confident that under the right treatment, namely his treatment, all would soon yield.

Sharlee, fired by his gay confidence, mused enthusiastically.  “It’s inspiring to think what can be done!  Really, it is no empty dream that the number of students might be doubled—­quadrupled—­in five years.”