"Ah, well," said Mr. Binney, "I won't let a hundred a year, or even two, stand in the way, and we'll share alike if you're sensible about it. But I'm not going to pay you four hundred a year to look down on your father, so you had better make up your mind how you're going to behave before October comes."
Lucius sat silent with a gloomy countenance and his hands in his pockets. When he was at school the idea of his father accompanying him to Cambridge as a freshman seemed so absurd that he was sometimes surprised to find that he was enjoying life much as usual, without being very much burdened by it. When he was at home and realised how very much in earnest Mr. Binney was, the dark fate that hung over him became less remote, and filled him with gloomy forebodings. But youth is elastic. It seemed almost out of the question that Mr. Binney would succeed in passing the entrance examination, while Lucius himself was already admitted a member of Trinity College. The allowance his father had named seemed to him quite adequate, and he allowed himself to cheer up a little and inquire after the health of Mrs. Higginbotham.
Mr. Binney coughed in some little embarrassment.
"Mrs. Higginbotham has a bad cold," he said, "and is confined to the house. I hope she will be well enough to accompany me to Lord's for the Eton and Harrow match, if the state of her bronchial tubes, which are giving her a lot of trouble just now, permit of it. You will be able to introduce us to some of your friends and future companions at Cambridge."
"I'm very sorry," said Lucius, "but I shan't be there. Henley comes in the same week."
"I shall be at Henley as well," said Mr. Binney, "and Mrs. Higginbotham has kindly consented to accompany me. She takes a great interest in your rowing career, Lucius, as she does in every other manly sport. Ah! I hope the day may come when I myself—but we mustn't count our chickens before they are hatched, must we? With regard to Henley, you will be able to go about with us, I suppose, and see that——"
"Very sorry, father," interrupted Lucius hastily, "I shall be rowing nearly all day long. We're in for the Grand and the Ladies' Plate. Besides, the captain of the boats is a terrible fellow. If he caught one of us so much as speaking to a lady he'd cut up very rough."
"Why is that, pray?" inquired Mr. Binney.
"Oh, I don't know. They might offer us an ice or something. We have to be awfully strict, you know, over training."
"Ah, well, that's a pity. Mrs. Higginbotham would like to meet a few of the young fellows who will be my companions for the next three years. She said so. Perhaps you might get one of your cricketing friends who would be unoccupied to look after us."