Sometimes a wave of anger would sweep over the young man, and he would turn to look about him with an impulse to suddenly break away and attempt to defy them all.  But his every movement was anticipated, and he had the whole football team about him!  There was no chance to move.  He must stay it through, much as he disliked it.  He must stand it in spite of the tumult of rage in his heart.  He was not smiling now.  His face had that set, grim look of the faithful soldier taken prisoner and tortured to give information about his army’s plans.  Stephen’s eyes shone true, and his lips were set firmly together.

“Just one nice little cuss-word and we’ll take you home,” whispered a tormentor.  “A single little word will do, just to show you are a man.”

Stephen’s face was gray with determination.  His yellow hair shone like a halo about his head.  They had taken off his hat and he sat with his arms folded fiercely across the back of “Andy” Roberts’s nifty evening coat.

“Just one little real cuss to show you are a man,” sneered the freshman.

But suddenly a smothered cry arose.  A breath of fear stirred through the house.  The smell of smoke swept in from a sudden open door.  The actors paused, grew white, and swerved in their places; then one by one fled out of the scene.  The audience arose and turned to panic, even as a flame swept up and licked the very curtain while it fell.

All was confusion!

The football team, trained to meet emergencies, forgot their cruel play and scattered, over seats and railing, everywhere, to fire-escapes and doorways, taking command of wild, stampeding people, showing their training and their courage.

Stephen, thus suddenly set free, glanced about him, and saw a few feet away an open door, felt the fresh breeze of evening upon his hot forehead, and knew the upper back fire-escape was close at hand.  By some strange whim of a panic-maddened crowd but few had discovered this exit, high above the seats in the balcony; for all had rushed below and were struggling in a wild, frantic mass, trampling one another underfoot in a mad struggle to reach the doorways.  The flames were sweeping over the platform now, licking out into the very pit of the theater, and people were terrified.  Stephen saw in an instant that the upper door, being farthest away from the center of the fire, was the place of greatest safety.  With one frantic leap he gained the aisle, strode up to the doorway, glanced out into the night to take in the situation; cool, calm, quiet, with the still stars overhead, down below the open iron stairway of the fire-escape, and a darkened street with people like tiny puppets moving on their way.  Then turning back, he tore off the grotesque coat and vest, the confining collar, and threw them from him.  He plunged down the steps of the aisle to the railing of the gallery, and, leaning there in his shirt-sleeves and the queer striped trousers, he put his hands like a megaphone about his lips and shouted: