d to me at last. "This is a kind
of end to all the good time we have had here. I mean that everything
will be different; I can't imagine Nina being married."

"She won't be for ages, and when she is it will be just the same," I
answered. "The Bradder's the best sort in the world, except you.
Let's go to bed, we have to shoot to-morrow."

I stayed in Fred's room, however, for a long time, and I expect some of
the things we said would have amused those who can jump without regret
from one state of things to another. But all the same this talk did us
good, for we finished off the subject of Nina's engagement at one
sitting, and Fred pleased me by saying that he must have been a fool to
hate Jack Ward so violently. That told me all I wanted to know, and
though he was not in very good spirits for a day or two he soon
recovered, and I believe that Nina and he enjoyed themselves more than
they ever had since they began to wonder whether they were grown up or
not.

Before going back to Oxford Fred and I went to stay with Mr. Sandyman,
our old house-master at Cliborough. I had been to Cliborough several
times since I left school, but my first visits made me feel almost sad.
The glory of being a blue, and I could not help feeling it, was not
enough compensation for the way in which I seemed to have entirely
dropped out of things. I loved Cliborough, and when you are fond of
places or people it is horrid to see that they can get on quite well
without you. You may not be forgotten, but you must necessarily cease
to count for much, and it was not until I went back after having left
for three years that I was quite happy there. Our feelings--for Fred
felt as I did--may have been wrong, but no one would have them who was
not fond of their school and who did not in some way or other wish to
be worthy of it. Sandy was as nice to us as possible, and it was quite
funny to see what a hero Fred was thought to be by some of the fellows
in our house. I think I was regarded as a hero more or less decayed,
but Fred nearly reinstated me by saying that I was the fastest bowler
he had ever played against, and by forgetting to add further details.

We went back to Oxford from Cliborough, and during my last year I saw
more of Fred than ever, for in nearly every college men in their fourth
year have to go into lodgings, and Jack and I took rooms in the same
house in the High as Fred and Henderson. Fred was President of
Vincent's, Hend