Sinister Street, vol. 2

ar. These "extensions of premises," as Castleton called them, reached the limit of expansion in the case of Lonsdale who, after a ye

eople in the lodge, so that after whatever irrelevant piece of chatter he had se

quite keen on them. I've got a dining-room now. Devilish convenient. Thought of

ant these barrack

able to run some pretty useful binges here. B

ental objection to denying them the full period of their participation in his own advance along the lines he had marked out for himself. As he entered them now to resume the tenure interrupted by the Long Vacation he compared their present state with the negative effect they had produced a year ago. Being anxious to arrange some decorative purchases he had made in France, Michael had ordered commons for himself alone. How i

terer to acquire them for the sake of the knowledge of human by-ways they generally so jejunely proffered. And yet perhaps it was less for their material contents that they were purchased than for the fact that in some dead publishing season more extravagant buyers had spent four or five times as much to partake of their accumu

commentary, and so sonorous was their euphony that Michael made of their reading a sanctuary where every night for a while he dreamed upon their cadences resounding through a world of polychromatic images and recondite jewels, of spiritual maladies and minatory comets, of potions for revenge and love, of talismans, to fortune, touchstones of treasure and eternal life, and strange influential herbs. Mere words came to possess Michael so perilously that under the spell of these Jacobeans he grew half contemptuous of thought less prodigally ornate. The vital ideas of the present danced by in thin-winged progress unperceived, or rather percei

books and pictures, he had changed the room scarcely at all. Curtains and covers, chairs and tables, all preserved the character of the room itself as something that existed outside the idiosyncrasies of the transient inhabitants who read and laughed and ate and talked for so comparatively fleeting a space of time between its four walls. With all that he had imposed of what in the opinion of his contemporaries were eccentricities of adornment, the rooms remained, as he would observe to any critic, essentially the same as his

ost obvious pledge of man's spiritual potentiality, but these subtler intimations of momentary vision had such power to impress themselves that Michael could believe in the child Blake when he spoke of seeing God's forehead pressed against the window panes, could believe that the soul liberated from the prison of the flesh had struggled in the very instant of her recapture to state the ineffable. To him Blake seemed the only poet who had in all his work disdained to attempt the recreation of anything but these moments of positive faith. Every other writer seemed clog

njoyed the atmosphere of security without which a club unlike an orchard never tastes sweet. Now, with the presence of a new year's freshmen and with the lordship of the college in their own hands, s

er wine in J.C.R. clustered there like a swarm of bees. Venner's own high chair stood far back in the corner behind his high sloping desk on which, always spread open, lay the great ledger of J.C.R. accounts. On the shelves above were the account books of bygone years in which were indelibly recorded the extravagances of more than thirty years of St. Mary's men. Over the fireplace was a gilt mirror of Victorian design stuck round with the fixture cards of the university and the college, with notices of grinds and musical clubs and debating soc

art of the college as the tower itself. The moon-faced Warden, the dry-voiced dons, the deer park, the elms, the ancient doors and traceries, the lawns and narrow entries, the groinings and the lattices, were all subordinate in the estimation of the undergraduates to Venner. He knew the inner history of every rag; he realized why each man was popular or unpopular or merely ignored; he was a treasure-house of wise counsel and kindly advice; he held the keys of every heart. He was an old man wi

to sit and listen to Venner's ripe old stories: how amazingly important seemed the trivial gossip of the college in this historic atmosphere: how much time was apparently wasted here between eight and ten at night, and what a thrill it always was to come into college about half-past nine of a murky evening and stroll round Cloisters to see if there was anybody in Venner's. It could after all scarcely be accounted a waste of time to

architecture, a simple poem of England. One of Venner's applauded tricks was to attach a piece of string to the tongs for a listener to hold to his ears, while Venner struck the tongs with the poker and evoked the sound of St. Mary's chimes. But the poker and tongs were unnecessary, for in Venner's own voice was the sound of all the bells in England. Communion with this gracious, this tranquil, this mellow presence affected Mich

p of Cirencester when he was up? Stebbing his name was. My moth

ld fellow," Venner began, full of re

he Bishop, spent in the period when undergraduates were photographed with mutton-chop

half dozen put down for the next day. Ah, but the men are much quieter nowadays. Not nearly so much drinking done in college as there used to be. Oh, I re

ides into another, Venner glided from

hat a pity everybody can't drink in moderation,' said Gaiters. Next time

r bringing out a magazine?" Venner

nner," Maurice ann

d when I get home, though I always smoke a pipe first. We had two men here once who brought out a paper. Chalfont and Weymouth. I used to have some copies of it somewhere. They put in a lot of s

r, Venner," explained somebody. "It's goi

at Radical this man was-Sir Hugh Gaston-a baronet-there's a funny thing, fancy a Radical baronet. Well, the men got to hear of this Socialist coming up and what do you think they did?" Venner chuckled in anticipatory relish. "Why, they c

er rather nervously a tin of biscuits. The familiar frequenters of Venner's

explained. "He's a very quiet man. I don't

erm," said Michael, s

," declared Ave

l get a first, I expect, but there, you don't think anything of that, I know. But the dons do. The Warden often has him to dinner. I shouldn'

istered that only the momentar

d to Venables, and it was a pleasure to see

sy one night at the Bullingdon wine, and one of them left his handkerchief in the rooms of a Christ Church man, and what do you think they did? Why, when they got back to college, this man said he wasn't going to bed without his handkerchief. Did you ever hear of such a thing? So they all climbed out of St. Mary's at about two in the morning and actually climbed into Christ Church. At least they thought it was Christ Church, but it was really Pembroke. Do you know Pembroke? I don't suppose you've even been there. Our men always cheer Pembroke in the Eights-Pemmy, as they call it-because their ba

er, Venner," Mi

amist, are you?-he came out to bat so drunk that the first ball he hit, he went and ran after it himself. It caused quite a scandal. But you

ow how deep an impression

y like him at the

o admit there wa

one's with him for ever, and yet one knows that people who have gone down can feel just the same, and that people who haven't yet come up will feel just the same. You know, I

a democracy," said Alan. "

there. It depends en

ers you were talking about?"

be," Michael u

e all the same," Alan said.

can at St

democracy," Alan

chael, in surprise. "You're

iot," said Alan. "But I am reading Honor Mods. It's

ly get a first

hool he himself had indolently passed over. Of course he would never take a first. He was too much occupied with the perfection of new leg-

emember when we used to lie awake talking in bed at Carlington Road? It was alwa

an keep that leg-break," he added fervidly. "There's no slow right-hander of

ing for Mods," Michael re

a navvy at Mo

oked admiringly at his friend. "And do you know, Alan

yesterday," said Alan, in gra

"It's your whole personality. I nev

han you used to talk even," said Alan

undulations through the Oxford streets. What a strangely attractive walk Alan had always had, and now it had gained something of determination, whether from

s greeting when he recognized acquaintances was there the least variation, since some would nod or toss their heads, others would shudder with their chins, and a few would raise their arms in a fanlike gesture of social benediction. Michael turned round into the Broad where the fog made mysterious even the tea-tray gothic of Balliol, and Trinity with its municipal ampelopsis. A spectral cabman saluted him interrogatively from the murk. A fox-terrier went yapping down the street at the heels of a don's wife hurrying back to Banbury Road. A belated paper-boy yelled, "Varsity and Blackheath Result," hastening toward a more profitable traffic. The fog grew denser every minute, and Michael turned rou

and in their entertainment to eat a solitary and meditative dinner at Buol's. But it would have been a pity to have missed hall when the electric light failed abruptly and when everybody had

mphant exhaustion. "Did you see that bad man Carben combing the potatoes out of his hair with a fork? I

nsdale, sir, you'd better keep a bit quiet. The Su

rice Avery came hu

d everybody. "It's nearl

mportantly. "Just been seeing the first

fs and the Forty Two'th. Look here, have we all got to

" said Mauri

ear old ink-slinger, I can buy the

th a good deal of chaff

program," Sinc

reat event that he rashly produced from his pocket the content

ORD LOOK

.

tions. By Ma

u reflecting

d Maurice lightly,

Prime Minister nex

Balliol. By G

o have been," commented Lonsdale

of the Modern

! Jolly old Wedders! The Failure of the Modern Illustrator. Wedder

said Wedderburn, turning gravel

not really saying bloo

t eight o'clock the little office was fuller than usual, with the college gossip being carried on in a helter-skelter of unceasing babble. Just when Fitzroy the Varsity bow was enunciating the glories of Wet Bobbery and the comparative obscurities of Dry Bobber

ched fists upon his inflated chest, as gorillas do. The rest of the compa

st self-confidence and unabashed clarity o

fernal assurance had led him to suppose he might stroll into Venner's in the third raw week of his unc

he might have deprecated this deliberate entrance armored in self-satisfaction. Something there was in Venner's assumption of impersonal

and even nodded to one or two of them whom presumably he had known at school. "So if the b

d that, by Jove, his cigarette had gone out, and "You've got a light," he added to Lonsdale, who was standing nearest to him. "

ung friend, Lo

as the Common Room

s to Mr. Lonsdale to ta

f the freshmen are very timid at first. They think the senior men don't like their coming in too soon. And perhaps it's better for them to order what they want when

demanded half a doz

eorge Appleby. But you ought

mists present seized the occasion to point out the impo

yours, then?" said

, Venner!" dec

liar terms with you," V

moments and then announced with conviction that Appl

"The dons don't like it, and the Dean won't be in a

noise, but I'm hanged if I'm going to have my cigarette taken out of my hand

ection beneath their dignity, and the duty

Avery. "The O.L.G.'s

her word about your rotten paper,

ith the behavior of Appleby in like circumstances. Grainger offered to come if Lonny would promise to fight sixteen rounds with

e probably supposed to be an expression of ferocity, though he was

, as the party entered. "Come in an

in a chair so deep that for the person once plunged into its r

enity. "I don't know any of your names, but take pews,

terrupted Lon

e," continued Appleby, without a tremo

whatever your name is, what you'

in interrup

ge four? Or are you ch

e, young Appleby

this time," said Ap

have your room bally w

pleby, with a suave a

meant to convey so much of fearful intent was so palpably unimpressive that L

ll that side. It's not done. He's a fresher," gasped

cheerfully. "I'll send the

explain, he found himself drinking Appleby's whisky and smoking one of Appleby's c

o debag him

y apparent loss of dignity, the debagging had to be written down a failure. Finally he folded up his trousers and put on a dressing-gown of purple velvet, and wh

Lonsdale. "The ma

the laugh, thoug