“Why, what in the name of fortune have they been doing to you? How did you fall among such Philistines?”
“I'm such an easy fool, you see,” said Tom, “I go off directly with any fellow that asks me; fast or slow, it's all the same. I never think twice about the matter, and generally, I like all the fellows I meet, and enjoy everything. But just catch me at another of their stuck-up wines, that's all.”
“But you won't tell me what's the matter.”
“Well, I don't know why Hendon should have asked me. He can't think me a likely card for a convert, I should think. At any rate, he asked me to wine, and I went as usual. Everything was in capital style (it don't seem to be any part of their creed, mind you, to drink bad wine), and awfully gentlemanly and decorous.”
“Yes, that's aggravating, I admit. It would have been in better taste, of course, if they had been a little blackguard and indecorous. No doubt, too, one has a right to expect bad wine at Oxford. Well?”
Hardy spoke so gravely, that Tom had to look across at him for half a minute to see whether he was in earnest. Then he went on with a grin.
“There was a piano in one corner, and muslin curtains—I give you my word, muslin curtains, besides the stuff ones.”
“You don't say so,” said Hardy; “put up, no doubt, to insult you. No wonder you looked so furious when you came in. Anything else?”
“Let me see—yes—I counted three sorts of scents on the mantel-piece, besides Eau-de-Cologne. But I could have stood it well enough if it hadn't been for their talk. From one thing to another they got to cathedrals, and one of them called St. Paul's 'a disgrace to a Christian city;' I couldn't stand that, you know. I was always bred to respect St. Paul's; weren't you?”
“My education in that line was neglected,” said Hardy, gravely. “And so you took up the cudgels for St. Paul's?”