“The Proctor would like to speak to you, sir,” said the Bull-dog, grimly.
Harriet debated with herself whether it might not be more tactful to depart, leaving Mr. Pomfret to his fate. But the Proctor was close on the heels of his men; he was standing within a few yards other and already demanding to know the offender’s name and college. There seemed to be nothing for it but to face the matter out.
“Just a moment, Mr. Proctor,” began Harriet, struggling, for Mr. Pomfret’s sake, to control a rebellious uprush of laughter. “This gentleman is with me and you can’t-Oh! good evening, Mr. Jenkyn.”
It was, indeed, that amiable pro-Proctor. He gazed at Harriet, and was struck dumb with embarrassment.
“I say,” broke in Mr. Pomfret, awkwardly, but with a gentlemanly feeling that some explanation was due from him; “it was entirely my fault. I mean, I’m afraid I was annoying Miss Vane. She-I-”
“You can’t very well prog him, you know,” said Harriet, persuasively, “can you now?”
“Come to think of it,” replied Mr. Jenkyn, “I suppose I can’t. You’re a Senior Member, aren’t you?” He waved his bull-dogs to a distance. “I beg.your pardon,” he added, a little stiffly.
“Not at all,” said Harriet. “It’s a nice night. Did you have good hunting in St. Giles?”
“Two culprits will appear before their dean tomorrow,” said the pro-Proctor, rather more cheerfully. “I suppose nobody came through here?”
“Nobody but ourselves,” said Harriet; “and f can assure you that we haven’t been climbing trees.”
A wicked facility in quotation tempted her to add “except in the Hesperides”; but she respected Mr. Pomfret’s feelings and restrained herself.
“No, no,” said Mr. Jenkyn. He fingered his bands nervously and hitched his gown with its velvet facings protectively about his shoulders. “I had better be away in pursuit of those that have.”
“Good-night,” said Harriet.
“Good-night,” said Mr. Jenkyn, courteously raising his square cap. He turned sharply upon Mr. Pomfret. “Goodnight, sir.”
He stalked away with brisk steps between the posts into Museum Road, his long liripipe sleeves agitated and fluttering. Between Harriet and Mr. Pomfret there occurred one of those silences into which the first word spoken falls like the stroke of a gong. It seemed equally impossible to comment on the interruption or to resume the interrupted conversation. By common consent, however, they turned their backs upon the pro-Proctor and moved out once more into St. Giles. They had turned left and were passing through the now-deserted Fender before Mr. Pomfret found his tongue.
“A nice fool I look,” said Mr. Pomfret, bitterly.
“It was very unfortunate,” said Harriet, “but I must have looked much the more foolish. I very nearly ran away altogether. However, all’s well that ends well. He’s a very decent sort and I don’t suppose he’ll think twice about it.”
She remembered, with another disconcerting interior gurgle of mirth, an expression in use among the irreverent: “to catch a Senior girling.”
“To boy” was presumably the feminine equivalent of the verb “to girl”; she wondered whether Mr. Jenkyn would employ it in Common Room next day. She did not grudge him his entertainment; being old enough to know that even the most crashing social bricks make but a small ripple in the ocean of time, which quickly dies away. To Mr. Pomfret, however, the ripple must inevitably appear of the dimensions of a maelstrom. He was muttering sulkily something about a laughing-stock.
“Please,” said Harriet, “don’t worry about it. It’s of no importance. I don’t mind one bit.”
“Of course not,” said Mr. Pomfret. “Naturally, you can’t take me seriously. You’re treating me like a child.”
“Indeed I’m not. I’m very grateful-I’m very much honoured by everything you said to me. But really and truly, it’s quite impossible.”
“Oh, well, never mind,” said Mr. Pomfret, angrily.
It was too bad, thought Harriet. To have one’s young affections trampled upon was galling enough; to have been made an object of official ridicule as well was almost unbearable. She must do something to restore the young gentleman’s self-respect.
“Listen, Mr. Pomfret. I don’t think I shall ever marry anybody. Please believe that my objection isn’t personal at all. We have been very good friends. Can’t we-?”
Mr. Pomfret greeted this fine old bromide with a dreary snort.
“I suppose,” he said, in a savage tone, “there’s somebody else.”
“I don’t know that you’ve any right to ask that.”
“Of course not,” said Mr. Pomfret, affronted. “I’ve no right to ask you anything. I ought to apologize for asking you to marry me. And for making a scene in front of the Proggins-in fact, for existing. I’m exceedingly sorry.”
Very clearly, the only balm that could in the least soothe the wounded vanity of Mr. Pomfret would be the assurance that there was somebody else. But Harriet was not prepared to make any such admission; and besides, whether there was anybody else or not, nothing could make the notion of marrying Mr. Pomfret anything but preposterous. She begged him to take a reasonable view of the matter; but he continued to sulk; and indeed, nothing that could possibly be said could mitigate the essential absurdity of the situation. To offer a lady one’s chivalrous protection against the world in general, and to be compelled instead to accept her senior standing as a protection for one’s self against the just indignation of the Proctor is, and remains, farcical.
Their ways lay together. In resentful silence they paced the stones, past the ugly front of Balliol and the high iron gates of Trinity, past the fourteen-fold sneer of the Caesars and the top-heavy arch of the Clarendon Building, till they stood at the Junction of Cat Street and Holywell.
“Well,” said Mr. Pomfret, “if you don’t mind, I’d better cut along here. It’s just going twelve.”
“Yes. Don’t bother about me. Good-night… And thank you again very much.”
“Goodnight.”
Mr. Pomfret ran hurriedly in the direction of Queen’s College, pursued by a chorus of chimes.
Harriet went on down Holywell. She could laugh now if she wanted to; and she did laugh. She had no fear of any permanent damage to Mr. Pomfret’s heart; he was far too cross to be suffering in anything but his vanity. The incident had that rich savour of the ludicrous which neither pity nor charity can destroy. Unfortunately, she could not in decency share it with anybody; she could only enjoy it in lonely ecstasies of mirth. What Mr. Jenkyn must be thinking of her she could scarcely imagine. Did he suppose her to be an unprincipled cradle-snatcher? or a promiscuous sexual maniac? or a disappointed woman eagerly grasping at the rapidly disappearing skirts of opportunity? or what? The more she thought about her own part in the episode the funnier it appeared to her-She wondered what she should say to Mr. Jenkyn if she ever met him again.
She was surprised to find how much Mr. Pomfret’s simple-minded proposal had elated her. She ought to have been thoroughly ashamed of herself. She ought to be blaming herself for not having seen what was happening to Mr. Pomfret and taken steps to stop it-why hadn’t she? Simply, she supposed because the possibility of such a thing had never occurred to her. She had taken it for granted that she could never again attract any man’s fancy, except the eccentric fancy of Peter Wimsey. And to him she was, of course, only the creature of his making and the mirror of his own magnanimity. Reggie Pomfret’s devotion, though ridiculous, was at least single-minded; he was no King Cophetua; she had not to be humbly obliged to him for kindly taking notice of her. And that reflection, after all, was pleasurable. However loudly we may assert our own unworthiness, few of us are really offended by hearing the assertion contradicted by a disinterested party.
In this unregenerate mood she reached the College, and let herself in by the postern. There were lights in the Warden’s Lodgings, and somebody was standing at the gate, looking out. At the sound of Harriet’s footsteps, this person called out, in the Dean’s voice-