She pouted. 'But I can't stay beyond tomorrow morning, and I want so
much to see all your celebrated oarsmen practising.'
'You are not staying over the night?' he gasped.
'Yes, I am,' and she threw him a dazzling glance.
His heart went pit-a-pat. 'Where?' he murmured.
'Oh, some poky little hotel near the station. The swell hotels are
full.'
He was glad to hear she was not conspicuously quartered.
'So many people have come down already for Commem,' he said. 'I suppose
they are anxious to see the Generals get their degrees. But hadn't we
better go somewhere and lunch?'
They went down the stone staircase, past the battalion of boots, and
across the quad. He felt that all the windows were alive with eyes, but
she insisted on standing still and admiring their ivied picturesqueness.
After lunch he shamefacedly borrowed the dunce's punt. The necessities
of punting, which kept him far from her, and demanded much adroit
labour, gradually restored his self-respect, and he was able to look the
uncelebrated oarsmen they met in the eyes, except when they were
accompanied by their parents and sisters, which subtly made him feel
uncomfortable again. But Winifred, piquant under her pink parasol, was
singularly at ease, enraptured with the changing beauty of the river,
applauding with childish glee the wild flowers on the banks, or the
rippling reflections in the water.
'Look, look!' she cried once, pointing skyward. He stared upwards,
expecting a balloon at least. But it was only 'Keats' little rosy
cloud', she explained. It was not her fault if he did not find the
excursion unreservedly idyllic.
'How stupid,' she reflected, 'to keep all those nice boys cooped up
reading dead languages in a spot made for life and love.'
'I'm afraid they don't disturb the dead languages so much as you think,'
he reassured her, smiling. 'And there will be plenty of love-making
during Commem.'
'I am so glad. I suppose there are lots of engagements that week.'
'Oh, yes--but not one per cent come to anything.'
'Really? Oh, how fickle men are!'
That seemed rather question-begging, but he was so thrilled by the
implicit revelation that she could not even imagine feminine
inconstancy, that he forebore to draw her attention to her inadequate
logic.
So childish and thoughtless indeed was she that day that nothing would
content her but attending a 'Viva', which he had incautiously informed
her was public.
'Nobody will notice us,' she urged with strange unconsciousness of her
loveliness. 'Besides, they don't know I'm not your sister.'
'The Oxford intellect is sceptical,' he said, laughing. 'It cultivates
philosophical doubt.'
But, putting a bold face on the matter, and assuming a fraternal air, he
took her to the torture-chamber, in which candidates sat dolefully on a
row of chairs against the wall, waiting their turn to come before the
three grand inquisitors at the table. Fortunately, Winifred and he were
the only spectators; but unfortunately they blundered in at the very
moment when the poor owner of the punt was on the rack. The central
inquisitor was trying to extract from him information about Becket,
almost prompting him with the very words, but without penetrating
through the duncical denseness. John Lefolle breathed more freely when
the Crusades were broached; but, alas, it very soon became evident that
the dunce had by no means 'got hold of the thing'. As the dunce passed
out sadly, obviously ploughed, John Lefolle suffered more than he. So
conscience-stricken was he that, when he had accompanied Winifred as
far as her hotel, he refused her invitation to come in, pleading the
compulsoriness of duty and dinner in Hall. But he could not get away
without promising to call in during the evening.
The prospect of this visit was with him all through dinner, at once
tempting and terrifying. Assuredly there was a skeleton at his feast, as
he sat at the high table, facing the Master. The venerable portraits
round the Hall seemed to rebuke his romantic waywardness. In the
common-room, he sipped his port uneasily, listening as in a daze to the
discussion on Free Will, which an eminent stranger had stirred up. How
academic it seemed, compared with the passionate realities of life. But
somehow he found himself lingering on at the academic discussion,
postponing the realities of life. Every now and again, he was impelled
to glance at his watch; but suddenly murmuring, 'It is very late,' he
pulled himself together, and took leave of his learned brethren. But in
the street the sight of a telegraph office drew his steps to it, and
almost mechanically he wrote out the message: 'Regret detained. Will
call early in morning.'
When he did call in the morning, he was told she had gone back to London
the night before on receipt of a telegram. He turned away with a bitter
pang of disappointment and regret.