Lily, and by this time the fact that they were at odds was beginning to trouble him, as also her suggestion (shrewd or naďve, he wasn't sure which) that they didn't speak the same language.
'Oh, Lily,' he exclaimed, taking her arm (they were on the platform and the train was due and he couldn't endure the thought of separating from her on clouded terms)--'we're not going to quarrel about it, are we?'
'Of course not.' And of course they were not. 'But I can't help being sorry you were bored.'
'I wasn't bored at all.' He had to get back into the argument. 'It's just that a fellow of Reg's type always makes me shut up in company. I just can't compete with them.'
'I know. He IS a bit noisy sometimes. Poor old Reg--he'd like to have had your advantages, going to Cambridge College to study. He's really clever, everybody says, but he had to leave school at fourteen. If only he'd been properly educated it would make all the difference.'
'I don't believe it would,' Charles could not help replying. 'I've met fellows like Reg at Cambridge and I can't get along with them there either. You mustn't think education changes what people are like.'
'Then what does it do?' she asked, again either naďvely or shrewdly, and he had no time to speculate, for the train was coming in. He pressed her hand. 'Even if I knew an answer it would take me all night to give it to you.' He found a compartment and leaned out of the window to kiss her. 'Maybe you'd better come up to Cambridge and see for yourself. . . . Yes, why not? That's a wonderful idea. Come the weekend after my examinations, then I'll be free and won't have anything on my mind. Leave on the Saturday and I'll get you a room at the Lion or somewhere--there's a good train back on Sunday evening. . . . Will you, Lily?'
'I don't know if dad would let me.'
'But it's only fair--for you to come and see me once after all the times I've come to see you.'
'Yes, I know . . . Oh, I'd love to, Charlie, but I'll have to ask dad first.'
'Fine. Ask him. I don't think he'll mind. He and I got along all right.'
'Yes, you did, didn't you?' At last they had found something to agree and be glad about, and on this happier note could time their separation. 'I knew it when he took you to the Prince Rupert. He only does that with people he likes.' The train was beginning to move.
* * * * *
At Cambridge Charles was thereafter sustained a good deal by thoughts of Lily's visit. Those were the days just before the examination that (with the Diplomatic in mind) might make or mar his career; and he had better not think it absurd, while he girded himself for last-minute cramming, that what he would be doing thirty years hence might depend on a few thousand facts so chancily selected and forcibly absorbed. The days entered a tunnel of eventlessness, but once the actual examination started the tunnel became dreamlike, streamlike, a silent aqueduct of time. Every evening, after the six-hour ordeal, an entire section of knowledge was banished from his mind as if it had no longer any business there, so that concentration on the remainder could become more intense. His tutor had warned him not to overdo the cramming, but Charles found he could not sleep even if he went to bed, and it was no harder to read than to lie awake. By the end of the third of the five crucial days he could roughly estimate how he was faring, and he did not think too well. Many questions he had been unable to answer confidently, and there had been few he would have chosen for a display of what he knew. One afternoon he half collapsed over the desk; the day was hot and the examination hall airless-- all that, plus lack of sleep, probably accounted for it. An invigilator went out with him for a spell in the open, and Charles found it a strange effort to make conversation, knowing they must avoid mention of anything remotely connected with the questions. There was one about the Amphictyonic Council that Charles had been answering at the
'Oh, Lily,' he exclaimed, taking her arm (they were on the platform and the train was due and he couldn't endure the thought of separating from her on clouded terms)--'we're not going to quarrel about it, are we?'
'Of course not.' And of course they were not. 'But I can't help being sorry you were bored.'
'I wasn't bored at all.' He had to get back into the argument. 'It's just that a fellow of Reg's type always makes me shut up in company. I just can't compete with them.'
'I know. He IS a bit noisy sometimes. Poor old Reg--he'd like to have had your advantages, going to Cambridge College to study. He's really clever, everybody says, but he had to leave school at fourteen. If only he'd been properly educated it would make all the difference.'
'I don't believe it would,' Charles could not help replying. 'I've met fellows like Reg at Cambridge and I can't get along with them there either. You mustn't think education changes what people are like.'
'Then what does it do?' she asked, again either naďvely or shrewdly, and he had no time to speculate, for the train was coming in. He pressed her hand. 'Even if I knew an answer it would take me all night to give it to you.' He found a compartment and leaned out of the window to kiss her. 'Maybe you'd better come up to Cambridge and see for yourself. . . . Yes, why not? That's a wonderful idea. Come the weekend after my examinations, then I'll be free and won't have anything on my mind. Leave on the Saturday and I'll get you a room at the Lion or somewhere--there's a good train back on Sunday evening. . . . Will you, Lily?'
'I don't know if dad would let me.'
'But it's only fair--for you to come and see me once after all the times I've come to see you.'
'Yes, I know . . . Oh, I'd love to, Charlie, but I'll have to ask dad first.'
'Fine. Ask him. I don't think he'll mind. He and I got along all right.'
'Yes, you did, didn't you?' At last they had found something to agree and be glad about, and on this happier note could time their separation. 'I knew it when he took you to the Prince Rupert. He only does that with people he likes.' The train was beginning to move.
* * * * *
At Cambridge Charles was thereafter sustained a good deal by thoughts of Lily's visit. Those were the days just before the examination that (with the Diplomatic in mind) might make or mar his career; and he had better not think it absurd, while he girded himself for last-minute cramming, that what he would be doing thirty years hence might depend on a few thousand facts so chancily selected and forcibly absorbed. The days entered a tunnel of eventlessness, but once the actual examination started the tunnel became dreamlike, streamlike, a silent aqueduct of time. Every evening, after the six-hour ordeal, an entire section of knowledge was banished from his mind as if it had no longer any business there, so that concentration on the remainder could become more intense. His tutor had warned him not to overdo the cramming, but Charles found he could not sleep even if he went to bed, and it was no harder to read than to lie awake. By the end of the third of the five crucial days he could roughly estimate how he was faring, and he did not think too well. Many questions he had been unable to answer confidently, and there had been few he would have chosen for a display of what he knew. One afternoon he half collapsed over the desk; the day was hot and the examination hall airless-- all that, plus lack of sleep, probably accounted for it. An invigilator went out with him for a spell in the open, and Charles found it a strange effort to make conversation, knowing they must avoid mention of anything remotely connected with the questions. There was one about the Amphictyonic Council that Charles had been answering at the
Similar Books
