Dr. Toller was pleased to hear it. Poor Mr. Binney was so ashamed of himself and looked such a pitiable object bundled up in his armchair with a despairing look on his white face and black rings under his eyes, that he readily promised to keep the account of the previous night's orgie from Mr. Binney's friends in Bloomsbury, and before he went gave the repentant sinner full absolution and a great deal of very good advice.
When the doctor had removed himself it was time for Mr. Binney to call on the Proctor, who was a Fellow of Jesus College. Mr. Binney crawled along down the sunny side of the lane feeling very miserable. But the interview was not quite so painful as he had imagined. The Proctor was a young man with a keen sense of humour. He tried to impart a fitting air of severity into his strictures on the disgraceful scene he had interrupted, but spoilt it all by bursting into a peal of laughter in the middle of his lecture. After that there was nothing further to be done but to extort a heavy fine from the culprit and to let him go. Mr. Binney felt somewhat relieved as he walked out through the gates of Jesus down the passage into the lane, but his heart sank again like lead as he remembered his coming interview with his Tutor. He had just time enough to go into his rooms and drink a glass of milk and soda, before it was time to repair to Trinity College to undergo the ordeal of Mr. Rimington's displeasure.
Mr. Binney had to wait some time in the Tutor's ante-room. His thoughts were very bitter as he sat turning over the pages of a book, keenly aware of the titters and whispers of the men who were waiting with him.
The Tutor's face, when Mr. Binney at last entered the inner room, was not reassuring. It wore a severe, and, to Mr. Binney's overstrung perceptions, it seemed a contemptuous look. Mr. Rimington did not shake hands with his pupil as was his wont, but motioned him to a chair and plunged immediately in medias res.
"You know, of course, why I have sent for you, Mr. Binney," he said. "I have no intention of expostulating with you. I have tried that already, and it proved to be of no avail. I simply have to say that the college can no longer put up with the way you choose to behave yourself, and you must go down to-day."
"What? go down for good, sir?" said poor Mr. Binney in a broken voice.
"Yes, I think so," said the Tutor.
"Oh, surely you can't be so hard as that," pleaded Mr. Binney. "Think of the disgrace, sir."
"I do think of the disgrace," said the Tutor, with a short laugh. "I wish you had thought of it yourself a little sooner."
It will be remembered that on the last occasion of a conversation between Mr. Rimington and Mr. Binney, the latter had taken a very high line, for which he had subsequently apologised, but not quite adequately. Mr. Rimington had become very tired of Mr. Binney's methods of speech and conduct, and had made up his mind to speak shortly and sharply, and not to allow any discussion of his decision. He was not, however, prepared for the total breakdown of Mr. Binney's opposition to his authority. The poor little creature sitting crumpled up before him in abject and hot-eyed misery was a very different person from the combative self-sufficient gentleman who had resisted his warnings in such a high-handed fashion when he had before animadverted on his conduct, so he did not refuse to listen when Mr. Binney began to plead with him in a piteous, broken-hearted manner.