CHAPTER VI
LORD BLATHGOWRIE HAS SOMETHING TO SAY
Poor Lucius went up to Cambridge for his second year with his allowance pared down to £360 a year, for, careful as he was, he had not been so successful as altogether to avoid hurting his father's susceptibilities; and with him went Mr. Binney, for eighteen months of hard toil had enabled him to pass the entrance examination, and he was now duly admitted a pensioner of Trinity.
Lucius had been allotted rooms in college, while Mr. Binney inhabited one of the choice mansions in Jesus Lane. He had knocked off ten pounds from his son's allowance for suggesting a retired situation in the Trumpington Road. "I am determined to do the thing as well as my means will permit of," he had said. "If I can secure good rooms in college next year, I shall do so. Until then I shall take the best lodgings that are available."
They parted at the railway station. "I suppose I shall see you some time to-morrow," said Mr. Binney, when he had collected his luggage and was just stepping into a fly.
"I suppose so," said Lucius dejectedly, as he drove away.
Lucius dined that night in hall, and sat in extreme misery while his friends aired their humour at his expense, for by this time the news of Mr. Binney's arrival had become public property. Their chaff was not ill-humoured, and if matters had stood as they evidently imagined, Lucius could have borne it. Elderly undergraduates are not altogether unknown at Cambridge, although they do not often appear at Trinity College; but they are usually careful to comport themselves with dignified reticence, and to keep very much in the background. A University degree is, as a rule, the sole end they have in view in putting themselves to school again, and they are very far from wishing to ape the manners and customs of the young men with whom they share the pursuit of that laudable object. Lucius had the mortification of feeling that if Mr. Binney had contented himself with working quietly for a degree, and living the unobtrusive life which befitted his years, the amused interest aroused by the event of father and son pursuing their studies at the same time at the same college would have worn itself out, and Mr. Binney might even have come to be considered in the light of a pleasant acquaintance by Lucius's friends. He knew quite well that his father would not be content with this humble role, and that the intermittent sniping of which he was now the object would develop into a regular fusillade of ridicule when Mr. Binney had had time to spread himself a bit and become more notorious.
He went back to his solitary rooms after hall and set himself down to read. Poor boy, he was too dispirited to do anything else. He sported himself in with the half-formed intention of refusing admittance to his father if he should present himself. But up to ten o'clock, when the college gates are shut to outsiders, no one had attempted to invade his privacy. Soon afterwards he went to bed, having spent his first evening at Cambridge entirely in his own society. For two days he moped alone, keeping to his rooms as much as possible and only leaving the college to go down to the river, where his fame was steadily rising. His friends for the most part considerately kept out of his way, thinking that he might be engaged in looking after his freshman parent. But strangely enough he heard or saw nothing of Mr. Binney. He avoided places where he was likely to meet him, and so far his father had never once been to his rooms.
On the third morning he determined to face the music. "If I'm to stop up here," he said to himself—"and I can't go down now I've got a chance of my Blue—I must make up my mind to get used to it. But it's enough to make a fellow take to drink, or work, or something." Then he put on his hat and went round to the "Pitt" Club.