Page:The plastic age, (IA plasticage00mark).pdf/209

Rh themes. “I ’ll be interested in seeing what you can do with those,” Henley concluded. “Every one of them has a good idea. Go to it—and get them back in a week.” i “Yes, sir. Thanks very much.” “Right-o. Good-by.” “Good-by, sir,” and Hugh left the office de¬ termined to rewrite those themes so that “they’d knock Jimmie Henley’s eye out.” They did n’t do exactly that, but they did interest him, and he spent an hour and a half discussing them with Hugh. That was merely the first of a series of long con¬ ferences. Sometimes Henley and Hugh discussed Writing, but often they talked about other subjects, not as instructor and student but as two men who respected each other’s mind. Before the term was out Henley had invited Hugh to his home for dinler and to meet Mrs. Henley. Hugh was enornously flattered and, for some reason, stimulated to do better work. He found his talks with Henley really exciting, and he expressed his opinions to him is freely and almost as positively as he did to his
 * lassmates. He told his friends that Jimmie Heney was human, not like most profs. And he

vorked at his writing as he had never worked at mything, running excepted, since he had been in rollege. The students never knew what to expect from Henley in the class-room. Sometimes he read