Mark nodded.
Sir Julian put his hand upon the younger man's shoulder with a gesture of intimacy unusual to him.
"Don't hurry back."
"Thanks very much," said Mark, with equal brevity and sincerity.
As Mark Easter went into the estate office, whither Sir Julian had driven him, he looked round with the smile that, after all, never altogether failed him.
"I might get some good golf down there."
"Yes," Sir Julian assented gravely, after an instant's pause. "You might get some good golf down there. I hope you will."
He did not go near the College that morning, but found himself wondering very much whether or not Mark had done so.
Instinct, rather than conscious volition, took him that afternoon down to the sea-wall, to find Miss Marchrose.
Mark had gone, and she herself would leave the College, probably before his return, and Sir Julian thought that it would not matter very much now if he offered her such solace as could be afforded by his understanding, complete as he felt it to be, of their wordless drama.