"Thanks, father," said Lucius, "but I don't want paying for doing a thing like that. I've got a little score of my own against Mr. Piper, and I'm going to pay it off now." And Lucius took up his cap and left the room.
Mr. Binney had wished he was big and strong like his son. As a matter of fact Lucius was quite a light weight, and although wiry and in good condition, it was certain that he was quite incapable of fulfilling his threat of knocking Piper's teeth down his throat, unless Piper allowed him to do so without making any resistance, which was unlikely. Piper was a great heavy lump of bone and muscle, over six feet high, and quite as fit as Lucius, for the latter had been finally rejected for the University boat, for this year at least, and had gone out of training, while Piper was still playing football. These considerations did occur to Lucius as he walked from his own rooms to those where Piper carried on his editorial functions, but he was so angry that they carried little weight with them. In the New Court he met Dizzy.
"Come up here with me," he said. "I've got a little job on."
Dizzy followed him up the staircase to Piper's rooms, talking volubly, as was his wont; but Lucius gave him no answer.
Piper was discovered sitting at his table talking to Howden, who stood with his back to the mantel-piece.
Lucius plunged into his business without any preface.
"Look here, sir," he said, "I've come about this stuff you've been printing about me and my father. I'll trouble you to stop it, if you don't mind."
Piper's face darkened. He was a bad-tempered man. He was also a clever man, and having no reason to be alarmed at any possible violence on Lucius's part, which he would rather have welcomed than otherwise, he thought he might as well draw him into a battle of words and afford his intellect some little amusement. So he choked down his temper and said quietly:
"You are Mr. Binney, junior, I believe. You are not mentioned from one end of the paper to the other, except as having had the chuck from the 'Varsity boat, and I don't see you've any reason to complain of that."
"That's a lie," said Lucius instantly. Piper started from his chair, but sat down again and waited. "You know perfectly well," continued Lucius hotly, "that that rot about Lucy and Girton is meant for me, and even if it wasn't I object to your making fun of my father."
This was what Piper wanted. "Is the other Binney your father?" he said with a sneer. "I didn't know it. If I had a father like that I'd drown him."
Lucius made a dash forward, and Piper stood up with an evil smile on his face. But Stubbs caught hold of his friend and pulled him back, and Howden stepped forward.
"Oh, come now, Pips!" expostulated he, "don't overdo it, old man."
But Piper took no notice. He suddenly lost all control over his temper.
"What the devil do you mean by coming blustering here?" he shouted. "Get out of my rooms this minute or I'll throw you out of the window. Yes, you'd better keep him back, you putty-faced swab"—this to Dizzy—"if he comes near me I'll put some marks on him that he won't lose in a hurry."
Lucius shook off Dizzy's encircling grasp.
"Will you stop printing lies about me and my father?" he said.
"I won't stop anything," rejoined Piper.
"Then will you fight?"
"Fight! By G—, yes. Take off your coat and try."
Howden and Stubbs both tried to stop them, but they might as well have tried to stop the tide rising. They were shaken off impatiently. Piper pushed the table and sofa aside, and in less than three minutes after Lucius had entered the room they were at it hammer and tongs.
There was not much science displayed. The room was too small, for one thing, and there was a good deal of damage done to furniture and breakables before it was all over. If Lucius had kept cool he might have made up in some measure for the great disparity in weight between them, for he knew just a little more of the game than Piper; but both of them were blind with rage, and it was attack on both sides, with very little defence, as long as it lasted.
It did not last long. Lucius fought as long as he could stand, but his blows got weaker and weaker, while Piper got in again and again with as much force as at first. At last he knocked Lucius clean through the glass doors of a cupboard which held his stock of crockery, and he fell heavily on to the floor, and lay there insensible, with the blood pouring from his head. Piper had not had enough even to cool his passion. "Get a towel and water from the bedroom," he said to Dizzy, who was kneeling by the side of his friend. "And take him out of this as soon as you can. I'm not going to stay in the same room with him." And he put on his coat and went out of the room.
Howden stayed behind and helped to restore Lucius to consciousness. "It's rot his tackling a chap like Pips," he said; "he's not in the same class with him, and he's a demon when he's roused. I wouldn't care to take him on myself."
"He's a d—d cad," said Dizzy, in deep concern, "and I don't care if he hears me say so."
This was the only conversation that passed between them till Lucius came round. Then they both helped him across to his own rooms in Whewell's Court, which they reached with some difficulty, as Lucius was dazed, and as weak as a kitten. Here the drama changed from tragedy to farce, for Mr. Binney was waiting for them, and as soon as he saw the state to which Lucius had been reduced he made such lamentations that neither Dizzy nor Howden could help laughing.
"Oh, chuck it, Binney," said Howden. "He'll be all right when he gets to bed."
"Go out and get a doctor, Mr. Binney," said Dizzy. "He's cut his head with some broken glass, and we can't stop the bleeding."
Mr. Binney dashed out instantly in a frenzy of terror, and Howden and Dizzy helped Lucius off with his clothes and into bed, where he lay silent with his face to the wall, while the blood slowly oozed out from under the bandages on his head and soaked into his pillow. The two stood looking at him irresolutely.
"I'm all right now," said Lucius faintly, "you needn't wait." They went into the sitting-room.
"Look here, sir," said Dizzy. "You must stop this business. It's gone quite far enough."
"My dear fellow," said Howden, "I didn't have anything to do with it. I told Piper he ought to stop it when Binney wrote to object, because—well, because Binney ain't a bad old chap after all, and it's rough on him. But he wouldn't, and it isn't likely he'll stop now, after this."
"Well, if he won't stop it of his own accord, he'll have to be made to," said Dizzy.
"I don't know who's going to make him," said Howden.
"Oh, I think we can manage that," said Dizzy.
Mr. Binney came back with a doctor, who patched up Lucius's damaged head and told him to keep in bed until he should come again on the next day. Mr. Binney kept fussing about the room wringing his hands over the trouble that he had caused, and bewailing the smallness of his stature which debarred him from visiting summary justice upon Piper for the way he had treated his son. He was a ridiculous little object in his grief, and his behaviour was not soothing to the nerves of a sick man.
"Do get him away," whispered Lucius to Dizzy. "I want to go to sleep;" and the latter, by the exercise of infinite tact, managed to remove Mr. Binney from the premises. A short time afterwards, having seen that Lucius was comfortably settled, he removed himself, and then set to work to lay plans to circumvent Piper and cause the downfall of theNew Court Chronicle. First of all he went round to the rooms of an influential member of the Third Trinity Boat Club, a man named Tait, who was rowing "Seven" in the University boat. He found him at home, and with him were Mirrilees, two other members of the University crew, and our old acquaintance Blathgowrie. To them he confided his story, which was received with interest and indignation, for Lucius was a popular member of the boating set, between which and the clique represented by Howden and Piper there happened to be a certain amount of bad blood at that particular time.
"It's all the fault of that confounded little bantam," said Blathgowrie, when Dizzy's tale had come to an end. "It's jolly good of Lucy to fight his battles for him after the way he's treated him. I'm hanged if I would."
"Those letters are the best thing in Piper's scurrilous rag," said Tait. "It's a pity to stop them, but if Lucy objects—and I expect it was more on his own account than his governor's—I think it's about time the paper was suppressed. I've a good mind to take Mr. Piper on myself."
"You can't do that," said Mirrilees quickly. "You might manage to lick him, but even that is doubtful, and he'd damage you so that you wouldn't be able to row for a day or two. Besides, if you licked him once a week from now till the end of the term he wouldn't stop the paper. He's not that sort."
"It's got to be stopped somehow," said Dizzy.
"Who publishes it?" asked Blathgowrie.
"Breedon," said Tait.
"Very well, then. We'll tell him to leave off, and if he don't we'll boycott him. We can get everybody to go somewhere else for theirmenusand all those little jobs. He won't hesitate long between us and Mr. Piper, I think."
Blathgowrie busied himself to some purpose, and submitted to Messrs. Breedon & Co. a considerable list of gentlemen who proposed to transfer their valuable custom if another number of theNew Court Chronicleappeared with Messrs. Breedon's name on the cover. The firm caved in at once and intimated to the editor that he must find another publisher. Piper made himself very objectionable, but Messrs. Breedon & Co. were firm, and absolutely refused to bring out another number for him. Piper had now got his back up and swore to go on publishing his paper if he brought out every number at a loss. He found a more obscure stationer than Messrs. Breedon & Co. who was willing to oblige him, and went on with his editorial functions, throwing far more vigour and malice into the next instalment of the "Binney Correspondence" than he had done before.
Poor Lucius lay alone that afternoon in his comfortless college bedroom. He was very miserable. He felt weak and ill, and his thoughts took a melancholy turn. He had done no good by his single combat with the redoubtable Piper; in fact, things would now probably be worse than before. He had no energy to feel angry with his father, but he saw the whole University pointing fingers of scorn at him, an unpleasantness which might be expected to continue and increase as long as he remained at Cambridge. The hope which he had entertained up to a week ago of a place in the University boat no longer buoyed him up against adversity. In his present state of depression he saw himself missing everything that made Cambridge interesting to him, and heartily wished himself away from the place altogether. His thoughts, nowadays, seldom kept long away from the girl whom he had seen for the first time last term, but there was not much comfort to be got out of thinking about her. He had not been so fortunate this term as to have hit upon a lecture which she attended, and no longer had the satisfaction of sitting in the same room with her for an hour, twice a week. He had discovered that she went to a lecture at St. John's College, and used to hang about outside the gates on the chance of seeing her as she went to and fro. But there are two ways between Newnham and St. John's, one along Trinity Street and the King's Parade, the other past the backs of the colleges, and after a time the uncomfortable conviction took hold of Lucius that his divinity was taking a malicious delight in dodging him. If he waited outside the big gate of St. John's, she went home by the backs, and if he lay in wait on the Bridge of Sighs, she would go through the town. And upon the rare occasions when he did meet her face to face there was no sign that she was so much as aware of his existence. Lying on his bed, with heavy heart and throbbing head, as the light of the short winter afternoon slowly died, poor Lucius took the gloomiest view of his chances of ever becoming better acquainted with her.
Just as he had reached the lowest possible depths of depression, Mirrilees and Tait came in to see him, and to sympathise. They told him of Blathgowrie's strategy. They had not discovered yet that Piper had circumvented it, and arranged to produce his paper from another address.
"We're going to hoot Piper in hall to-night," said Tait, "and see if we can't bring on a scrimmage afterwards. If we do, we'll put him in the fountain. I expect he'll oblige us. He's a pugnacious beggar."
When they had gone, he received an unexpected visit from his cousin, John Jermyn, who was much surprised to find him in bed, and hardly knew how to express himself with reference to current events. In a small way, in his own college, John Jermyn had suffered some annoyance from his relationship to Mr. Binney, and was not particularly proud of it. His shyness, however, prevented him from alluding to his cousin's reputation. If he had done so, he might have discovered that Lucius, in spite of his loyalty, was not very well pleased with his father at that particular time.
"My mother is coming up next week for a few days," said Jermyn, "and I came to ask you if you would lunch with us on Tuesday. There will only be she and my sister from Newnham. You haven't met her yet."
"But surely, your sister is at Girton, isn't she?" said Lucius.
"No, Newnham," said Jermyn.
Lucius's heart suddenly lightened. Any connection with Newnham was welcome to him, and opened up possibilities.
"Why, I went out to Girton to call on her," said Lucius; "they said she was out."
"Rather lucky," said his cousin. "That's a Miss German with a G. Well, then, you'll come on Tuesday, if you're well enough, at half-past one."
"Yes, I'll come," said Lucius. "Thanks very much."
When his cousin had left him he found that his spirits had lightened considerably. The visit of his friends had cheered him, for he had thought that if he was to fight his father's battles for him he would have to fight them alone, and it was pleasant to find that there were others on his side. And the Newnham girl seemed to be nearer to him, somehow, now he knew that she and his cousin were at the same college. He began to build castles in the air. He knew that his cousin was in her first year, and he thought that if his divinity had been in Cambridge before last term, he must have noticed her; so the two were of the same year, and probably friends. He might get to know her through his cousin—though it was difficult to see how an introduction could be brought about. At any rate he would be able to find out her name, and that was something. He was rather sorry that he had refused the invitation to the Norfolk Rectory at Christmas. He would make up for it by cultivating his cousins now. He comforted himself with rosy visions, and by-and-bye fell asleep. Mr. Binney came in after his afternoon's work on the river was over, and went out again. Dizzy crept in, looked at him, and crept away again on tiptoe. But still Lucius slept on, and when he woke again about nine o'clock he was very much better.
In the meantime the ill-feeling between the boating men and the football players, fanned by Piper's treatment of Lucius, had burnt up to a blaze. When Piper went into hall that night, a little late, there was a chorus of groans and hisses as he passed the table where Mirrilees and Tait sat. He stopped for an instant, and an ugly look came over his face. The groans grew louder, and the dons turned round and looked down the hall from their seats at the high tables. Then Piper went to his place, the noise ceased and the dons, reassured, turned to their dinner. But there were ominous whisperings and glances at the table where Piper sat, and like signs at the table of the boating men nearer the door. The latter finished their dinner early and went out in a body. When they had got outside the door they waited by the college screens. Men who belonged to neither faction dropping out of hall one by one, looked with surprise at such an unexpected gathering, and passed on. Some of them waited outside to see what would happen. Before very long Piper came out, immediately followed by Howden and the rest. He looked black when he saw the waiting crowd, and then there was a curious pause. Bodily violence between fellow-undergraduates is a rare thing unless arising spontaneously from chance collisions of opposing factions. In this case there was plenty of bad feeling, but no hot blood at present, and although both sides were eager for a quarrel, nobody quite knew how to begin it. After a moment's pause Piper went on towards the steps leading down to Neville's Court. He looked a very ugly customer. Although Lucius had not succeeded in doing him a fraction of the damage which he himself had received, Piper had not got off quite unmarked. He had a black eye and a swollen cheek bone. His temper was up, too, and he was probably nearer the state of mind when a fight is a relief than any one there.
"Ugly bruiser!" remarked Tait as he passed.
Piper faced him instantly. "What's that, sir!" he asked angrily.
"I said you were an ugly bruiser, sir."
Piper aimed a savage blow at him before the words were well out of his mouth. Tait had just time to parry it. There was no need for any further introduction. Exactly where they were, with startled waiters going to and fro from the kitchens to the hall, and the intermittent stream of undergraduates passing through, the two parties fell upon one another, and the noise of the combat rose above the clatter of plates and the muffled swinging of the heavy doors, and reached the dons on the daïs at the other end of the hall. "Put him in the fountain," shouted Mirrilees, and the struggling mass surged slowly out of the doorway and down the shallow flight of steps into the Great Court. Blood was up now and there was no lack of sincerity in the blows that were given and taken. Little groups of disinterested spectators looked on at the strange spectacle of men of the same college, most of them well known throughout the University for their prowess in different branches of sport, fighting fiercely, and gradually drawing nearer to the great stone fountain which rears its stately mass from one of the grass plots. The boating men had a slight advantage in numbers, but the footballers were, with some few exceptions, a heavier lot, and progress was slow. Piper fought savagely and disabled one or two of the men who were dragging him along, while his friends were mostly engaged in a series of single combats round him. There is no knowing how the battle would have ended. In spite of their slightly superior force it is doubtful whether Mirrilees's and Tait's party could have succeeded in inflicting the punishment on Piper which they intended. But before they reached the fountain a little party of dons who had been apprised of what was going on came running down the steps of the hall towards the struggling and swaying mass. They were led by the Senior Dean. "Stop this, gentlemen, stop this," he shouted, as he reached them. A few of them stopped irresolutely. The rest paid no attention to the order. It is doubtful if they heard it. The Senior Dean, who was a man of resolution, threw himself among them, followed by one or two of his companions. At first there was no result, except that dons and undergraduates were mixed up together in one generalmêlée. But gradually the voice and energetic action of authority began to tell. First one left off fighting and then another, until Piper and the men who had got hold of him were the only ones still left. Deprived of the assistance of his backers, Piper was carried with a little run right up to the steps of the fountain, but there the Dean and a few stalwart Fellows who were helping him managed to stop them by sheer force, and the fight ceased, leaving a dishevelled panting crowd of combatants facing one another, with the stern figure of judicial vengeance master of the field. Names were taken, orders given, and the crowd slowly dispersed. The boating men held the conviction that if they had been left alone they would have done what they meant to do and avenged the defeat Piper had administered to Lucius. At any rate they had given him a lesson which he wouldn't forget in a hurry. The football men made a great deal of the fact that they had been overpowered by superior numbers.Theywere also greatly cheered by the conviction that they had given their opponents something that they wouldn't forget in a hurry.
The sequel to the fracas was rather curious. It resulted in an entire healing up of the feud that had arisen, no one quite knew how, for it dated from before the issue of theNew Court Chronicle. These quarrels between two sets of men are rare in the University, but they sometimes arise and continue for a year or so and then die away. This one would have disappeared slowly in due course, because no two sets of men can be said to be absolutely clear and distinct one from another, but are merged at some points by friendships between their respective members. But, the matter having been brought to a head by the quarrel between Lucius and Piper, and the bad blood let off, the ill-feeling disappeared as if by magic, and men who had fought with one another on that night by the fountain might have been seen in one another's rooms later on in the term the best of friends.
There was one exception to the general amicability. Piper, who was an evil-tempered fellow, emerged from the tussle in a black rage, and continued in it for much longer than a normally constituted man would have found such a state of mind possible.
The Senior Dean being wise in his generation, and having a fairly shrewd idea as to how the unseemly fracas had arisen, and what was likely to be its result, dealt lightly with the offenders. There were a good many official interviews and a few "gates," and then the matter was allowed to drop. None of the combatants actually told him in so many words what had been the immediate origin of the fray, but Mr. Binney having discovered the day after that Piper was more determined than ever to continue the publication of his paper, had paid an early visit to the Dean and asked him to suppress it officially. He had brought the term's numbers already issued with him, and the Dean gravely perused the "Binney Correspondence" then and there, while the object of it sat uneasily before him watching his face.
"I don't defend this, Mr. Binney," said the Dean, laying down the papers on his table when he had finished them. "A great deal of it is very offensive. But, you know, you've got yourself to thank for most of it.
"I know—I know," said poor little Mr. Binney, whose cock-sureness in his treatment of Deans and Tutors had been considerably reduced of late. "A good deal of it might fairly have been said of me last term. But it isn't true of me now. With the exception of a dinner in my rooms on the second night of the term, after which occurred some insubordination for which I was not responsible, nothing of the sort mentioned here has happened. I have been one of the quietest men in the college. It is my fixed intention to bring an action for libel against this man Piper," he continued, with a slight return to his former manner, "if this goes on, and if you don't see your way of stopping it, sir. It is intolerable."
"You will not find it necessary to do that, Mr. Binney," said the Dean. "I will see that it is stopped. You had better leave these papers with me."
It did not add to Piper's amiability when it came to his turn to be interviewed, to be told by the Dean that he had perused several numbers of theNew Court Chronicle, and that it was about time that publication came to an end. He allowed Piper to argue the point, but when he found that they were no nearer an agreement on it than before, he told him peremptorily that he had made up his mind that the paper should be stopped, and stopped it must be. He pointed out several offensive articles aimed at the authorities of the University and Colleges, and alluded very little to the "Binney Correspondence," and finally found it necessary to tell Mr. Piper that he might choose between publishing another number of the paper and remaining at Cambridge.
So theNew Court Chroniclecame to an end, and neither Mr. Binney nor Lucius suffered any further annoyances from the printed expression of Piper's malice. The effects of the hitherto published instalments of the "Binney Correspondence," however, did not end there as far as Mr. Binney was concerned, as will afterwards, appear.
Lucius was out and about again, not much the worse for his late encounter, by the time Tuesday came round, when he was to lunch with his cousin. He was in fairly good spirits as he walked down the King's Parade and Silver Street, towards the ancient pile of Queens' College. He and his father were better friends than they had been any time since Mr. Binney had come into residence at Cambridge. Mr. Binney now comported himself with the dignity that befitted his years, and no longer made his son's life a burden to him by those continued indiscretions which had brought shame and confusion of face to Lucius in the past. He had restored his full allowance, and Lucius was better off in pocket than he had been since Mr. Binney had come up. And then the Newnham girl, to whom somehow he seemed to be getting nearer, now that he had discovered that she and his cousin were fellow-students, had distinctly given him a glance of recognition when he had seen her in King's Chapel on the previous Sunday. It was not much to pride himself on, certainly, but such as it was he had hugged the thought of it ever since. She had been sitting with some other girls in the front row of seats as Lucius walked up the chapel, and he had taken particular notice of those other girls when he had manoeuvred himself into a seat opposite her, in case one of them should turn out to be his cousin.
John Jermyn kept in a charming set of oak-panelled rooms over-looking the river.
There was an elderly lady sitting in the window seat as Lucius entered, who rose to greet him. She was tall and graceful, with a sweet face and grey hair.
"You are very like your dear mother," she said, her eyes growing a little moist as she looked at him. "We used to be great friends in days gone by, but that is twenty years ago now."
Lucius sat and talked to her in the window seat, while John Jermyn wandered about the room with his hands in his pockets casting impatient glances at the clock on the mantelpiece and the lunch on the table. "Betty is late," he said. "I told her half-past one, and it is getting on for a quarter to two."
"We had better not wait any longer," said Mrs. Jermyn, rising. But just then light steps were heard on the staircase, the door opened, and disclosed to Lucius's astonished gaze the form and features of the Newnham girl.
Miss Betty Jermyn came forward, rosy and a little out of breath, with murmured apologies, kissed her mother and her brother, and then waited with a deepening blush and a mischievous light in her eyes, to be introduced to Lucius, for whom the low dark room seemed suddenly to have become filled with brilliant sunshine.
"This is jour cousin Lucius, Betty," said Mrs. Jermyn, and the two shook hands, but found no words with which to address one another.
In the course of luncheon it came out in the most natural way that Betty and Lucius had attended the same lecture in Trinity College all last term, and remembered one another perfectly.
"But you must have known who I was," said Lucius, a sudden light breaking in on him, as he remembered those little glances of amusement which had so thrilled his soul last term. "Gandey always used to read out our names after the lecture."
"Yes, I knew who you were," said Betty, with a little laugh. "And I wondered how long it would be before you knew whoIwas."
Lucius felt that when he was alone again he would be very angry with himself for not having cultivated the society of his cousin John more assiduously, and also for having refused Mrs. Jermyn's invitation to stay with them in the Christmas vacation, but at present he was so happy that there was no room for regrets.
It was quite apparent to the maternal eyes of Mrs. Jermyn before lunch was half over that this nice boy with his mother's eyes was head over ears in love with her pretty little daughter, whom she still looked upon as a child, in spite of the dignity conferred upon her by a scholarship at Newnham. Her son, of course, saw nothing of the sort, but he was pleased to find that his cousin, who was something of a hero in his eyes, seemed to have taken a fancy to his sister, whom he found it constantly necessary to keep in her place. He was afraid that Betty would never learn to show reverence where reverence was due, but it was a relief to find that Lucius apparently did not take her little audacities amiss, and indeed seemed to be even amused by them. What Mrs. Jermyn thought, it would not become us to disclose, but she accepted Lucius's invitation for the whole party to lunch with him on the next day, and her cordiality towards him had suffered no diminution when they parted.
It was curious that Mr. Binney's name was not once mentioned between them. John Jermyn had given his mother a rather highly coloured account of our hero's peccadillos, and Betty had added her little comments, for the fame of Mr. Binney's exploits had penetrated even the walls of Newnham College.
"Oh, mother," she had said, "you really can't have anything to do with cousin Peter. He is a horrid little man and leads Lucius such a life, so everybody says. And Lucius is so popular with all the men. It is a great shame."
"I never cared for Mr. Binney very much," said Mrs. Jermyn, "but I should like you to ask Lucius to meet us, John. I should like to see dear Lucy's boy, although I saw very little of her after her marriage."
So Lucius had come, been seen and had conquered, and went away again full of delighted wonder at the surprising thing that had happened. His first desire was to find the sympathetic Dizzy and impart to him the astounding news. He tracked him down at the racquet courts and brought him away when he had finished his game.
"I say, old man," he said in as calm a tone as he could muster, "I've found out the name of that girl at last. What do you think it is?"
"Oh, I don't know," said Dizzy, who had lost his match, and was as nearly inclined to pessimism as was consistent with his equable nature. "Henrietta, I should think, or Lulu, or Kate. Parents haven't any taste nowadays. Look at mine christening me Benjamin. Stubbs is bad enough, but Benjamin! 'Pon my word I sometimes feel inclined to get it changed by Act of Parliament."
"Her name is Elizabeth J——"
"Yes, it would be," interrupted Dizzy. "Elizabeth Jones. Just what I said. Well, what are you going to do about it?"
"I didn't say Elizabeth Jones," said Lucius. "Elizabeth is a very pretty name, especially when it's shortened to Betty. Her surname isn't Jones, it's Jermyn."
"Oh, is it? Well, I'm not so sure that—what! JERMYN!! You don't mean to say——?"
"Yes, I do," said Lucius triumphantly. "That very girl is my cousin at Newnham, and no other."
"Well, I'm blowed!" exclaimed Dizzy. "But there, Lucy, I always told you if you'd only take the trouble to hunt your cousin down, or rather up, she'd turn out to be a topper. And I was right. When are you going to have her to tea?"
"She's coming to lunch to-morrow," said Lucius.
"I'm engaged to-morrow, I'm afraid," said Dizzy. "Going to lunch with Blathgowrie. I dare say I could get off it, though."
"You needn't try," said Lucius; "but I'll get her to tea some day soon, before her mother goes away, and then you can come. Oh, my goodness! What a chance for a fellow! to be head over ears in love with a girl, and think he's never going to get to know her, and then for her to turn out to be his own cousin after all."
"Did she say anything about me?" inquired Dizzy.
"About you? No. Why should she?"
"Why shouldn't she, you mean. I'm a very striking looking feller. She must have noticed me in the lecture-room last term."
"You needn't trouble yourself that she'll waste many thoughts onyou."
"Oh, all right, old man. Keep your wool on. Now, don't forget to ask me to tea one of these days. I won't try and cut you out; you can rely on me."
The remainder of that week passed like a happy dream to Lucius. He managed to spend some time every day with his cousins, found his way right inside Mrs. Jermyn's heart, and seemed to make very good headway up to a certain point with Betty. That is to say, they became excellent friends, and were on perfectly familiar terms, but at the end of the week he was no nearer knowing whether she reciprocated his admiration than at the beginning, for beyond a certain point he was never allowed to go. When Saturday came, Mrs. Jermyn went away and left Lucius desolated. But she had already asked him to stay with them in Norfolk during the Easter vacation, and he was left in by no means such a state of hopeless longing as before, for he managed to meet his cousin pretty often during the rest of the term, and although he was never allowed to enjoy the pleasure of her company for very long, she seldom met him without a few words of conversation passing between them, which gave Lucius something to live for now that the University boat had gone to Putney and left him behind in Cambridge.
Mrs. Jermyn had not been able to avoid Mr. Binney altogether during her stay at Cambridge. She thought that she ought to see something of him now that his son seemed likely to become an intimate friend in her family. Accordingly Mr. Binney was notified of her arrival, and called on her at the "Bull" where she was staying. Mr. Binney had not yet recovered from the events narrated in the last two chapters, and was in a depressed and dull state of mind. He quite forgot to patronize Mrs. Jermyn on the fact of her son being a scholar of Queens' College, while he was a pensioner of Trinity, as he certainly would have done a few months before. Mrs. Jermyn talked chiefly about his wife, and Mr. Binney, who had been a widower for fifteen years, and had set up the image of Mrs. Higginbotham in the niche left vacant by the death of Lucius's mother, followed her lead with some uneasiness of mind. There was no warmth of feeling between them, and each was mutually relieved when Mr. Binney rose to take his leave. He apologised for not asking his cousins to lunch, but explained that he had to be down on the river early every afternoon, and Mrs. Jermyn was not sorry that the invitation was not given.
Mr. Binney, of course, still corresponded regularly with Mrs. Higginbotham. He had refrained from sending her theNew Court Chronicle, or, indeed, from mentioning that feature of it which most nearly concerned him, for some slight sense of dignity, which he had appeared to have relinquished during the Michaelmas term, had returned to him, and he was not anxious to have it known that he was treated with ridicule. He wrote about his work and about the prospects of the First Trinity first Lent boat, and if his letter did betoken a depression of spirits, the tender Mrs. Higginbotham put this down to his separation from her and threw a wealth of affection and sympathy into her replies, which greatly consoled Mr. Binney during his trying time. She also expressed herself delighted with the improvement in conduct displayed by her undergraduate lover, for, although Mrs. Higginbotham liked to read stories of youthful daring and devilry, when theory resolved itself into practice her mind recoiled affrighted. Mr. Binney was fond of imagery, and he often assured Mrs. Higginbotham at this time that her love and confidence in him was the rock to which he clung while the waves of adversity buffeted him; it was also an anchor, and a port, and a city of refuge; a ray of sunshine, a star, a beacon, a lantern; a refreshing fountain, an oasis in the desert, a cup of cold water; a buckler, and a good many other things. Mrs. Higginbotham made no attempt to discover what the waves of adversity were that were reported to be buffeting Mr. Binney. She liked his poetical method of expressing himself; she said it made her feel warm all over, and there she let the matter rest.
But there was a serpent in this garden of mutual esteem. If Mrs. Higginbotham did not read theNew Court Chronicleand was ignorant of the dreadful things that were being said about her Peter, there was someone else who was fully acquainted with them.
The day after Mr. Binney's dinner-party in Russell Square, Mrs. Toller called upon Mrs. Higginbotham, as she had announced her intention of doing. She waited for ten minutes alone in the drawing-room before Mrs. Higginbotham made her appearance. The first three or four she spent in refreshing her memory of the contents of the room. Then, growing bolder, she inspected the contents of Mrs. Higginbotham's Davenport writing-table, without, however, discovering anything that interested her. Thinking she heard a step on the stair she seated herself quickly beside the fire and snatched up a paper from the little table by her side. Nobody came, and Mrs. Toller then turning over the little pile of periodicals, lighted upon the creased copy of theNew Court Chroniclewhich Mr. Binney had posted from Cambridge.
"Well! upon my word!" exclaimed Mrs. Toller to herself when she had perused the paragraph in "Madge's Letter" already referred to. She then turned to the title page of the paper and made a note of the publisher's address on the little ivory tablet she carried in her purse. When she had done that she heard Mrs. Higginbotham approaching, so, hastily burying theNew Court Chronicleunder the pile and taking upThe Christian Worldinstead, she affected to be so deeply interested in its varied contents as to be unaware of Mrs. Higginbotham's approach until that good lady had closed the door behind her and begun to make apologies for her delay, which had arisen through the arrival of a dressmaker to "try on."
When Cambridge University had once more got into the swing of term time, there appeared every Monday morning among Mrs. Toller's correspondence a wrapper enclosing a paper directed from that ancient seat of learning. Mrs. Toller always secreted this and opened it after breakfast when the Doctor had retired to his study, for her subscription to theNew Court Chroniclecost her sixpence halfpenny a week, which was more than the good Doctor paid for having theDaily Chronicleserved up hot with his breakfast every morning. University journalism is not apt to afford great entertainment to people outside the University where it is practised, but Mrs. Toller, although a woman of economical habits, counted the information which she derived from theNew Court Chroniclecheap at the price which she paid for her subscription, and looked forward keenly to the budget of news which arrived for her every Monday morning.
It must not be supposed that Mrs. Toller intended to keep her information from her excellent husband; she was far too good a wife for that. What she meant to do was to keep theNew Court Chronicleto herself until the end of the term, in order that Mr. Binney's infamies might heap themselves up until she had a good budget of scandal to lay before the Doctor. The game went merrily on for four or five weeks and there was matter of offence against Mr. Binney enough to have brought down upon him the wrath of the whole congregation of which he was so distinguished a member. But Mrs. Toller's appetite, whetted by the disclosure she had already surprised, thirsted for more. More she would have had, for Mr. Piper had got his hand thoroughly in, but, as we know, theNew Court Chroniclehad come to an untimely end, and great was Mrs. Toller's disappointment when she received, one Monday morning, instead of the journal she had so looked forward to during the whole of the Sunday's religious exercises, a letter from the publisher informing her that the publication had ceased, and that he begged to return to her the remainder of the term's subscription. However, there was quite enough upon which to act.
The Doctor retired to his study as usual after breakfast. Mrs. Toller got her daughter out of the way, produced the numbers she had already received, and refreshed her memory of the whole of the "Binney Correspondence." Then she sought her husband, who was taking a well-earned rest after his Sabbath labours over a novel, which he hastily secreted upon the entrance of his wife.
"What's that you're reading, Samuel?" said Mrs. Toller. "I shouldn't waste my time over that trash if I were you. I've got an important matter to talk to you about."
Dr. Toller breathed a sigh of resignation. He knew those important matters. If they were not complaints of the behaviour of various members of his congregation, they were generally household matters which Mrs. Toller could very well have settled for herself.
"You know how deep an interest I take in the welfare of the church," began Mrs. Toller, seating herself in the easy chair by the side of the fire.
Dr. Toller knew only too well. "Yes, my dear, certainly," he said.
"I should be very sorry," pursued Mrs. Toller, "if any scandal occurred through the behaviour of one of our most prominent members, especially when he happens to be a deacon."
"Yes, my dear," interrupted Dr. Toller hastily, "but I think that is hardly likely to happen. All our deacons are men of irreproachable character."
"I am not so sure about that," said Mrs. Toller. "There is one of them who seems to be rapidly treading the broad road, and if he is not very sharply pulled up, I tremble to think of the catastrophe that may occur."
"Oh, nonsense, my dear," said Dr. Toller. "You must surely be exaggerating. There is an occasional tendency towards undue interference on the part of our officers, who are some of them men of more money than brains, although I wouldn't for the world have it known that I said so. But I have no reason to dread anything worse than that. You have got hold of some trivial matter and are magnifying it in your mind—quite unintentionally, I am sure," he added hastily, observing the ominous stiffening of Mrs. Toller's upper lip, "and with the best of intentions, I am sure."
"I am not aware," said Mrs. Toller, drawing herself up, "that drunkenness is a trivial matter, Samuel, or revelry. If it is so, I have misread the meaning of Scripture, and I should be glad to be corrected."
"Of course, my dear," said Dr. Toller, "such things are very dreadful, but you have surely no reason to charge one of our deacons with such—er—crimes."
"Read the passages I have marked with blue pencil in these papers," said Mrs. Toller, rising and handing the doctor her little bundle of ephemeral journalism. "And then say if you can justly accuse me of exaggeration, which I beg to say is not a habit of mine. I will leave you for a quarter of an hour and then return."
When Mrs. Toller did return she found the Doctor chuckling over some of the humorous sallies of Mr. Piper's young lions.
"Samuel!" she exclaimed, "is that the fashion in which you treat a serious matter like this? Such ill-timed levity is surely out of place."
"Quite so, my dear, quite so," said her husband, his face instantly becoming serious. "I was not laughing at the news about Mr. Binney, which I finished perusing some time ago. Some of these young men are very clever. But really, with regard to Mr. Binney, I fully share your feeling, my dear. Mr. Binney has always been rather erratic, curiously so for a man of his years and position, but I could never have believed that this sort of thing would happen. I—I—hardly know what to say about it. But how did you get hold of these papers?"
"Never mind that," said Mrs. Toller firmly. "We must act, and act promptly so as to save scandal."
Dr. Toller disliked acting at all on Monday morning, but he saw that his wife was not to be trifled with, and said, "Certainly. Yes. I quite agree with you. What shall I do?"
"You must go up to Cambridge instantly, and remonstrate with the misguided man."
Dr. Toller looked blank. "Do you think that is necessary?" he asked. "I should have thought a letter would have answered the purpose."
"Not at all," said Mrs. Toller. "Mr. Binney is in that state of mind in which he would take no notice of a letter. Severe expostulation and ghostly advice are what he wants. He must be checked in his profligate career at all costs, or worse may come of it. I should go with you, but I have my mothers' meeting this afternoon, and I am not one to neglect my duty."
"But, surely, my dear," exclaimed the Doctor, "you would not wish me to go to Cambridge to-day?"
"Certainly I should," replied Mrs. Toller. "Why procrastinate? And yet, I don't know. To-morrow perhaps I could accompany you. Perhaps there is no necessity."
"If it has to be done," said Dr. Toller, "perhaps it had better be done to-day. It is not a pleasant business, but I agree with you that the gravity of the occasion demands immediate action, and I shall not shrink from taking it. I am really astounded at the disclosures made in these papers. If the extraordinary course Mr. Binney appears to have taken were to come to the ears of the church committee, I don't know what would happen. I will go to Cambridge after the ladies' Bible class this afternoon, and I think I will stay the night, my dear. I should like to have a look round the colleges, that is if you have no objection."
"Yes, you can do that," said Mrs. Toller, "if you like. And you might call on Lucius and see how he is behaving himself, and on young Bromley, at Emmanuel College. And mind, Samuel, I shall expect a full account from you when you return home."
So Dr. Toller packed his bag and traveled up to Cambridge by the five o'clock train. He drove first of all to Corpus, where he had a friend among the Fellows. He was persuaded to dine in Hall before he set out on his visit to Mr. Binney, and enjoyed himself exceedingly at the High Table, and in the Combination room afterwards. He did not disclose his object in coming up to Cambridge, but heard quite enough about the extraordinary career of Mr. Binney, who enjoyed considerable notoriety at the University, to persuade him that his visit of expostulation was really needed. About nine o'clock he told his host that he wished to call on an undergraduate, and putting on his clerical cloak and hat, he went round to Trinity College, where he was directed by the porter to Mr. Binney's rooms in Jesus Lane.
Since the dinner at the beginning of the term Mr. Binney had done nothing further to bring him under the displeasure of the authorities. Howden, in return for the pecuniary assistance he had received, kept his noisy friends away from him almost entirely, and so managed it that none of them considered himself ill-used by the cessation of Mr. Binney's former hospitalities. He worked very hard, and if the absence of his previous amusements did make life rather dull to him, the excitement of the coming Lent races and the probability that the crew he was steering would give a good account of themselves buoyed him up. Everything went well, the men were trained to a nicety, and most of them were confident that their boat would go head of the river. On the morning of the races Mr. Binney was too nervous to work. He attended one lecture, but found himself quite incapable of discovering any meaning in the lecturer's remarks. After that he relinquished the attempt to turn his mind to anything except boat-racing, and wandered about the town, with his hands in his pockets, looking the picture of misery. By-and-bye it occurred to him to pay a visit to his son and to try and extract some consolation from that experienced oarsman. He found Lucius engaged over a game of piquet with the ever-cheerful Dizzy. Lucius looked rather ashamed of himself when his father entered, but Dizzy was not at all put out.
"Ah, Mr. Binney," he exclaimed, "very pleased to see you. We are just unbending our great minds a little. All work and no play, you know, won't do at all."
But reprehensible as card playing at twelve o'clock in the morning undoubtedly is, Mr. Binney made no comment upon his son's occupation.
"I am terribly nervous, Lucius," he said. "I wish this afternoon was well over."
"What! Got the needle!" exclaimed Dizzy, while Lucius cleared away the cards. "Well, I'm not surprised at it. My old governor once had to make a political speech. He don't know anything about politics, but the big man had disappointed 'em, and they couldn't get anybody bigger at a day's notice. I assure you he got so nervous that he lost the use of his limbs and had to be massaged for an hour before he went off to the meeting, and when he got there he made such a hash of it that nobody's ever asked him to talk since, although he frequently obliges when heisn'tasked."
"Political speaking is nothing to this," said Mr. Binney. "I know all about that. When I put up for the County Council two years ago, I had to make a speech every night of my life for a fortnight, and I enjoyed it, although I didn't get in; but I feel so nervous now that I really don't know what to do."
"You will be all right, father," said Lucius, "when you find yourself sitting in the boat with the rudder lines in your hand. Make a good lunch and forget all about it till it's time to go down to the river. I should take a glass of brandy if I were you. It'll pull you together, and can't do you any harm as you're not rowing."
"Brandy, Lucy!" echoed Dizzy, "the very worst thing you could possibly take. Don't you remember Dale who coxed the Eight at Eton. When he was in the lower boats he got the needle to such an extent he cried all the morning. Some fellow gave him half a glass of brandy. It made him as merry as a cricket. He said he didn't care for anybody, but he forgot which was his left, and steered 'em into the bank before they had rowed twenty strokes."
"I am not likely to do that, Stubbs," said Mr. Binney, slightly offended. "I'm not a child. I'm a man with a head on my shoulders, as Mirrilees has often told me, but all the same I wish it were all over."
Just then Mirrilees himself came into the room and looked a little disturbed at finding Mr. Binney there. It was quite easy to treat him as a freshman of no importance when he was by himself, but in the presence of his son Mirrilees found the position awkward.
"You're bound to catch Pembroke to-night, I think," he said shyly, "and I should certainly think you will go head on Saturday if everything goes well."
"I feel so nervous, you know, Mirrilees," said poor little Mr. Binney. "It's all very well for you young fellows who are used to it, but it's all new to me, and it's no use pretending I feel at my ease."
"Oh, for heaven's sake don't lose your head," said Mirrilees anxiously, "or Third will bump you to a certainty. They're not so good as you are, but they always go off with a rush, and may hustle you a bit at first. If they don't catch you before Grassy you'll keep away all right, and ought to run into Pembroke at Ditton Corner."
"Third's pretty good," said Lucius. "They're not to be sneezed at. We generally row faster than we are expected to."
Then followed a long discussion between Lucius and Mirrilees upon the respective merits of the two boats, which was not calculated to allay Mr. Binney's nervousness, so he took his leave, and wandered about again until lunch time, more disconsolate than ever. A hundred times he wished he had never joined a boat club and even that he had never come up to Cambridge.
He passed a very trying few hours until it was time to go down to the boat-house. During the long row down to the starting-point he discovered that he had not entirely forgotten all that he had learnt about the art of steering and felt a little better. But when the crew got out of the boat and waited about in the drizzling rain for the first gun his fears returned and he was unable to take any part in the mild horse-play with which the rest of the crew beguiled the interval. The bustle of getting into the boat again and seeing that everything was right with stretchers, rowlocks, and steering-gear, revived him a little, but during that awful minute before the last gun, when the boat was shoved out and the men sat forward with every nerve on edge, while the coach stood on the bank, watch in hand, telling off the relentless seconds, Mr. Binney's face of gloom and despair was a picture to behold. He was convinced that he was going to drop the chain so that it would foul the rudder lines, or not drop it at all, or pull the wrong string, or perform one of those mistakes to which the best of coxswains are liable at these terrible moments.
But the gun went off at last, and before Mr. Binney had time to realise that they were fairly off, the boat was swinging down the river and he himself was steering as straight as an arrow towards the vivid blue of the Pembroke cox's blazer, feeling as capable and clear-headed as he had ever done in his life.
At first it seemed almost impossible to believe that they would ever make up the distance which lay between them and the boat which was moving along so steadily in front of them. But they had not rowed twenty strokes before Mr. Binney realised that they were slowly creeping up.
A wild exultation took hold of him. "We're gaining!" he cried.
Stroke's face was immovable, but he quickened up slightly. Another thirty strokes and there was only a length between the two boats. Then Pembroke spurted and began to draw away.
Mr. Binney's face fell. "We're losing ground!" he said, but Stroke made no answer. His eyes were fixed upon something past Mr. Binney's head, and our hero suddenly woke up to the fact that the cries of: "Third! Third!" which came from the bank behind him, were now much nearer and almost as loud as those of "First! First!" from their own supporters alongside.
A panic seized him, and he quickly turned his head and saw the nose of the Third Trinity boat within six feet of his own. As he did so, he unconsciously pulled one of his strings and the pursuing boat shot up to within two feet.
"Steady, there, steady!" growled Stroke, with an awful frown.
Mr. Binney pulled himself together and set his teeth, determined to think of nothing but the Pembroke boat, which had now increased its lead to a length and a half.
"How far are they ahead?" asked Stroke, in a low voice.
Mr. Binney told him. Stroke quickened up and Mr. Binney had the delight of feeling the boat shoot away under him, while a tremendous roar from the men on the bank told him that Third Trinity was being left behind and that all danger of being bumped by them was over for the present.
Up and up went the boat; the length and a half was lessened to a length, then to half a length, then to a few feet. The Pembroke stroke quickened, and drew away for a few seconds, but the spurt soon died down. First Trinity went on gaining. The Pembroke cox began to wash them off with his rudder.
They had now reached the Red Grind, and Ditton Corner was close ahead. Mr. Binney bided his time and crept in a trifle closer to the bank. The nose of his boat began to dance up alongside the stern of the one in front. Then the Pembroke cox made a mistake and steered into the river. "We've got them," yelled Mr. Binney.
Stroke made a mighty effort, which was answered by Pembroke, too late, for the Trinity boat was shaving the corner, while they were right out in the river. Mr. Binney held his course until the nose of his boat was level with No. 5's rigger. Then he pulled his left string sharply and ran into them just behind their coxswain's seat.
"Well steered," said Stroke quietly, as he rested on his oar. "Couldn't have been done better." And Mr. Binney tasted the joys of paradise.
The next day Mr. Binney's nervousness had vanished entirely. He thirsted to be again in the fray, and looked forward keenly to repeating the triumph of the previous afternoon. Needless to say he wrote a long, exultant letter to Mrs. Higginbotham, recounting his success and the honour it had brought him. Lucius and Dizzy came round in the morning to congratulate him and to wish him luck in the coming race.
"Of course I wish Third had bumped them," said Lucius, as they walked down Jesus Lane together, "but still the governor would have been so sorry for himself that it's just as well they didn't."
"You would have had your screw docked, Lucy, if Third had caught them," said Dizzy, "so you may consider yourself jolly lucky they kept away."
"Oh, that's all over now," said Lucius. "The Governor behaves much more respectably than he did last term. If that business had gone on I really don't think I could have stopped up here."
Mr. Binney received their congratulations with equanimity. He had jumped from the depths of self-distrust to the height of complaisance, and now felt that if he had gone to Putney with the University crew the victory of Cambridge over Oxford would have been assured.
"Oh, it's as simple as anything," he said, in answer to their congratulations. "I can't think what ever can have made me feel so nervous yesterday."
"Don't you be too cocksure about it, Mr. Binney," said Dizzy. "I knew a fellow once who rode in a steeple-chase. He'd got by far the best nag, and the odds were four to one on him. But he was so certain of winning that he forgot he was riding in a race at all, and got off to pick a flower after he had jumped the first hurdle. By the time he remembered where he was and got on again, the other fellows had reached the winning post. The bookies nearly murdered him."
Mr. Binney was not in a frame of mind to take warning by this awful example of forgetfulness. He was so talkative in the changing room that he was severely snubbed by the Captain of the boat. Jesus, the boat in front of them this evening, ought to have presented no difficulties and would certainly have been caught by Pembroke in the long reach the night before if First Trinity had not made their bump at Ditton. Mr. Binney steered very badly at Grassy and lost a lot of ground. His steering round Ditton Corner was a little better, but nothing like so good as on the previous evening, and again Jesus got away. First Trinity made their bump at the railway bridge, but the men had had a hard race instead of a very easy one, and some unpleasant things were said to our hero when the race was at last over.
The next day Mr. Binney had learned a lesson, steered well, and caught Lady Margaret at Ditton much in the same way as Pembroke had been bumped on the first night.
First Trinity were now in the second place on the river, and had their work cut out for them to bump Trinity Hall on the last night.
It was generally agreed that they were slightly the better boat, but whether they were good enough to overcome the advantage that the head boat always has in rowing in clear water, was a disputed point. They had at any rate nothing to fear from the boat behind them. Mr. Binney's previous experience had brought him into the right state of mind to enable him to do his best. The three bumps he had already made had given him confidence, and his mistakes of the second night preserved him from being over-confident.
First Trinity made up their distance by the time they had reached the Red Grind, and from that time there was never more than a few feet of daylight between the two boats until the end of the race. At Ditton they overlapped, but Mr. Binney made his shot too early, and the Hall just managed to keep away. The enthusiasm from the supporters of the Crescent, standing or running on the banks, had the effect of steadying Mr. Binney's nerves. A ding-dong race ensued, right up the Long Reach, but with all their exertion the First Trinity men were unable to increase their distance. At the railway bridge the nose of the pursuing boat was a foot past the rudder of the other. But Mr. Binney knew that if he made a shot at them now all was lost.
"Plug it in," he said in a low voice to Stroke, "and we've got them."
Stroke did plug it in. He was nobly seconded in one last despairing effort by the men behind him. The nose of the First Trinity boat crept slowly but surely up, Mr. Binney pulled his left line just in the nick of time, and First Trinity bumped the head boat not a dozen yards from the winning post.
A very proud man was Mr. Binney that evening when everything was over, when they had rowed back to the boat-house with the heavy flag flapping behind them and the cheering crowd of men accompanying them on the bank. When he had changed and gone home to his rooms with the pleasures of an amusing bump supper in the hall before him, he sat down in front of his fire and went over in his mind the causes for self-congratulation. At last he had done something which raised him out of the common ruck of University men, something that could never be taken away from him. He saw in imagination his rudder with the Trinity coat-of-arms, the names and weights of the crew and the cox, and the conquered colleges emblazoned upon it hanging up in his hall in Russell Square. His imagination did not stop there. He saw other rudders nailed up by its side, of which at least one should bear the combined arms of Oxford and Cambridge. He felt that he had acquitted himself so as to earn him Mrs. Higginbotham's undying admiration, and visited a telegraph office immediately upon his return in order to send that excellent woman the earliest information of his brilliant achievement.
At the bump supper that evening Mr. Binney was the gayest of the gay. He did not exceed his usual allowance of wine. This, in spite of the unmannerly taunts of theNew Court Chronicle, he had never yet done and would have been ashamed of doing. But he was so excited by his success that other members of the party who had not been so careful as himself gave him full credit for having done so, and laughed uproariously at his sallies of wit, clapped him vigorously on the back, and displayed all the usual signs of the best of good fellowship.
Mr. Binney made a speech. He always did make a speech whenever there was an opportunity. He said that this was the proudest moment of his life. (Cheers.) He should despise himself if he thought otherwise. (Cheers.) He thought that the cox was the most important man in a boat. (Loud cries of "No! No!" and laughter.) Well, if he wasn't the most important, at any rate, they couldn't get on without him, and he was very proud to find himself in a position of that sort. He had had triumphs in his life before now (cheers and laughter), but they were as nothing to this. He didn't know how to say enough about it, although he was used to public speaking. (Laughter, cries of "Union.") Some gentleman had mentioned the word "Union." Well, he had thought at one time that success at the Union was the best sort of success that Cambridge could afford. He didn't think so now. Give him success on the river—he would leave all the rest to gentlemen not so fortunate as himself. (Loud applause and cries of "Sit down.") He saw around him a great many friends. (Laughter.) He hoped he might call them friends. (Cries of "Certainly," "By all means.") They were all jolly good fellows, and so say all of us. (Cheers.) He had said before that this was the proudest moment of his life. He would say it again. (Laughter, and the rest of Mr. Binney's speech, which he appeared to be about to begin all over again, was drowned by vociferous cheers which were gradually rounded off into "For he's a jolly good fellow," sung in chorus by everyone present.)
At the close of the evening, just before twelve o'clock, as Mr. Binney was going out of college, arm-in-arm with two jovial companions, the gate was opened to admit Piper and one or two more football players who had gained a great victory over Dublin University that afternoon in the last match of the season, and had since celebrated the occasion by a more protracted dinner than was good for them.
Piper was, in fact, very drunk, and his potations always had the effect of making him extremely quarrelsome. At this particular juncture he was, in American phraseology, "looking for trouble." He found it in the obnoxious person of his late butt, Mr. Binney, who came towards him smiling, his gown put on inside out, over his somewhat disordered evening clothes.
The sight of Mr. Binney roused Piper's smouldering ill-humour to the point of frenzy. With a muttered execration he went for our hero. Mr. Binney saw him coming, and with a shriek of terror, turned round, loosening his hold upon his two companions, and fled terrified back towards the hall.
Piper gave a yell, and started off in chase, but lost his footing at the two steps leading into the Court, and enabled Mr. Binney to get a clear start as far as the fountain, before his pursuer was up and after him again.
His two friends made no attempt to protect him. They shrieked with laughter at the ridiculous spectacle, and rolled about doubled up in their ecstasy of amusement.
But fortunately for Mr. Binney the Great Court was full of his late companions of the feast. "Save me, save me!" cried the poor little man, as he ran towards a group of them near the kitchen staircase. Piper was still abête noirto a great many of the rowing men, although with his exception the feud between oarsmen and footballers was now quite healed. Mr. Binney ran through the astonished group, down the narrow passage leading into the Hostels. They closed up their ranks and let Piper run into them. There was great confusion for the moment, and cries of "Now then, sir, where are you coming to?" and the like. Piper forgot for the moment where hewasgoing to, and in the meantime his companions came up. One of them was Howden, who was in the effusive after-dinner stage.
"You're the fellows who went head of the river, aren't you?" he cried. "You're jolly noble fellows all the lot of you, and I shall be proud to shake hands with you all round. We're the fellows who have beaten the Irishmen by two goals and a try to nothing. And that's all right, isn't it?"
It appeared to be all right, certainly, for the two groups immediately fraternised with mutual expressions of admiration. And even Piper was so overborne by the general good feeling that he relinquished his intention of spilling Mr. Binney's blood, and allowed himself to be drawn off, while our hero crept round by Neville's Court, through the screens and out again through the Great Gate, still somewhat frightened, and by no means so hilarious as he had been five minutes before.
The next morning Mr. Binney woke up feeling rather cheap, but not without a thrill of pride when he recalled the glorious achievements of the last four days. He went to the chapel which he was accustomed to attend twice on a Sunday, and thought that every member of the congregation must have heard of his prowess on the river, and be eyeing him with admiration as he handed round the plate at the close of the service, clad in his undergraduate's gown. As he sat at his solitary lunch Howden came in.
"Hullo, Binney, old chap," he said, "here you are at last. I've been in once or twice to try and find you this morning. You did jolly well in the races. I was there on Friday and saw you make your bump."
"It's a splendid thing, you know, Howden," said Mr. Binney, "taking part in a great contest like that. You know what it is, for you're a celebrated athlete yourself. It makes you feel warm all over, doesn't it?"
"It makes you feel black and blue all over," said Howden, "after a game like yesterday. We didn't do so badly, Binney, did we? We never expected to beat them like that. Look here, I've got some of the fellows who were playing yesterday coming to supper with me this evening, and two of the Irish chaps who are staying here over Sunday are coming as well. You come too, Binney. We shall have a jolly rowdy evening, quite like old times. You're out of training now, and you haven't had a bust since the beginning of the term. Eight o'clock in my rooms."
Mr. Binney looked shocked.
"What, on Sunday evening?" he exclaimed. "My dear Howden, I couldn't entertain the idea for a moment."
"Oh, well," said Howden, somewhat abashed, "we shan't be doing any harm. You must feed somewhere even if it is Sunday."
"I always dine in hall on Sunday," said Mr. Binney, "and go to church afterwards. I am sorry I can't join you, Howden, although, if it had been on any other night in the week, I should have been delighted. Those dinners we used to have were rather good fun, weren't they? I shouldn't mind another one now if we could keep it a bit quieter. I'll tell you what, Howden, wewillhave another dinner in my rooms to-morrow night; just to celebrate our going head."
"What, the old lot!" exclaimed Howden. "That will be ripping, Binney. I've never had such jolly dinners since I've been up here as yours were. You're such a capital good host, you know."
"Well, I like entertaining my friends," said Mr. Binney, much gratified. "I used to enjoy those dinners myself, but they certainly were getting rather too rowdy. We must keep a bit quieter to-morrow."
"Right you are," said Howden, and he and Mr. Binney drew out a list of half a dozen constellations of the athletic world, who had already had experience of Mr. Binney's hospitality in days gone by, and might be supposed to be willing to partake of it again.
Mr. Binney's dinner was a repetition of those which had brought him into disrepute during the previous term, only, instead of being quieter than had been customary with those entertainments, it was a noisier revel than any of them. Bumpers had to be drunk to the First Trinity Boat Club, and to the cox of its first Lent boat. This was done before the fish came on. By the time theentréehad made its appearance success to the University Rugby Football Club had been duly honoured, and the healths of the various members of it there present brought them to dessert in a state of hilarious good fellowship. Mr. Binney usually objected to bumpers, but it was pointed out to him that his refusal to empty them would be considered a cowardly insult to his guests in whose honour they were proposed.
Alas! before dinner was well over, Mr. Binney was in a state the mere imagination of which would have made him blush with shame in his more collected moments. His face was flushed, his speech thick, and his laughter meaningless but incessant. His guests were, most of them, in a similar state, and the unhappy little man, instead of mildly rebuking them for their excesses, as he had been accustomed to do, encouraged them to further libations, and filled their glasses himself with an unsteady hand, and giggling exhortations to make a night of it. At a later stage of the evening Mr. Binney was on his legs making the inevitable speech. It was an entirely incoherent speech, but his hearers applauded it no less for that. When a gleam of intelligence did detach itself from Mr. Binney's rambling procession of verbiage and pierce their heated brains, the cheers and hammerings on the table rose to fever pitch, and spurred on the poor little object to still greater exertions. During one of these interludes, when the applause was at its height and Mr. Binney stood leaning against the table with glassy eye and fatuous smile waiting for the din to subside, and bracing himself up for a further attempt, the door of the room opened, and a tall black figure, its face wearing an expression of scandalised amazement, stood framed in the door-way. It was the Reverend Dr. Toller come to expostulate with the wandering sheep of his otherwise irreproachable flock.