Stover at Yale by Owen Johnson

Night after night, Wookey, the little freshman from a mountain village of Maine, the shadow of a grind, whom no one knew in his class, and who would never know anyone, waited over his books the hour of twelve and the arrival of the great man gone wrong, whose secret only he possessed. Sometimes at the clatter on the stairs, when he went out eagerly, the hero would be in control, and would say:

"Hello, Wookey, how are you tonight?"