ear of the wall, and come down on feet and hands to the pavement.

"Good morning, officer!" said the young gentleman, rising and dusting
his hands, "it's all right. Like to see my _exeat_? Or perhaps half a
crown--"

(V)

About six o'clock in the morning, Jack Kirkby awoke suddenly in his
bedroom in Jesus Lane.

This was very unusual, and he wondered what it was all about. He thought
of Frank almost instantly, with a jerk, and after looking at his watch,
very properly turned over and tried to go to sleep again. But the
attempt was useless; there were far too many things to think about; and
he framed so many speeches to be delivered with convincing force at
breakfast to his misguided friend, that by seven o'clock he made up his
mind that he would get up, go and take Frank to bathe, and have
breakfast with him at half-past eight instead of nine. He would have
longer time, too, for his speeches. He got out of bed and pulled up his
blind, and the sight of the towers of Sidney Sussex College, gilded with
sunshine, determined him finally.

When you go to bathe before breakfast at Cambridge you naturally put on
as few clothes as possible and do not--even if you do so at other
times--say your prayers. So Jack put on a sweater, trousers, socks,
canvas shoes, and a blazer, and went immediately down the
oilcloth-covered stairs. As he undid the door he noticed a white thing
lying beneath it, and took it up. It was a note addressed to himself in
Frank's handwriting; and there, standing on the steps, he read it
through; and his heart turned suddenly sick.

* * * * *

There is all the difference in the world between knowing that a
catastrophe is going to happen, and knowing that it has happened. Jack
knew--at least, with all his reasonable part--that Frank was going to
leave Cambridge in the preposterous manner described, after breakfast
with himself; and it was partly because of this very knowledge that he
had got up earlier in order to have an extra hour with Frank before the
final severance came. Yet there was something in him--the same thing
that had urged him to rehearse little speeches in bed just now--that
told him that until it had actually happened, it had not happened, and,
just conceivably, might not happen after all. And he had had no idea how
strong this hopeful strain had been in him--nor, for that matter, how
very deeply and almost romantically he was attached to Frank--until he