so familiar.

He was a varsity half-back, a gigantic blond young man in a blue serge
suit. He said, "Hello, Rose," and she said, "Hello, Harry." And he
heaved himself erect from the wall he had been leaning against and
reached out an immense hand to absorb the little stack of note-books she
carried. She ignored the gesture, and when he asked for them said she'd
carry them herself. There was a sort of strategic advantage in having
your own note-books under your own arm--a fact which no one appreciated
better than the half-back himself.

He looked a little hurt. "Sore about something?" he asked.

She smiled widely and said, "Not a bit."

"I didn't mean at me necessarily," he explained, and referred to the
fact that the professor had detained her after he had dismissed the
class. "What'd he try to do--call you down?"

There was indignation in the young man's voice--a hint of the protector
aroused--of possible retribution.

She grinned again. "Oh, you needn't go back and kill him," she said.

He blushed to the ears. "I'm sorry," he observed stiltedly, "if I appear
ridiculous." But she went on smiling.

"Don't you care," she said. "Everybody's ridiculous in March. You're
ridiculous, I'm ridiculous, he"--she nodded along the corridor--"he's
plumb ridiculous."