"It is not over and done with, sir," said Mr. Binney. "The engagement, if there is one, must be broken off."

"Why?" asked Lucius.

"Because I say so," said his father.

"You ought to give me a reason," said Lucius. "I'm not a child. I love her and she loves me. Why shouldn't we be married? Of course I don't mean now, but in two years' time or so, when you make me a partner in the business."

"You'll never be a partner in the business," said Mr. Binney, "if you persist in this folly. You're a boy and she's a girl, and I won't have it. It's ridiculous."

"Of course she's a girl. I shouldn't want to marry her if she were an old woman," said Lucius. "If you can't give me any better reason than that, father, I don't think you're treating me fairly."

Mr. Binney laid down the law for half-an-hour or so longer. He did not produce a better reason for refusing his sanction to the engagement, not having a better one to produce, unless he had told Lucius that he was objecting simply for the pleasure of a.s.serting his authority, which was about the long and short of it. Lucius left him at last, somewhat dispirited, and sought the society of Dizzy, his friend.

"Governor won't hear of it," he said, laconically, as he threw himself into an easy chair.

"Why not?" asked Dizzy.

"Wants to show his independence, I fancy," said Lucius. "He talked a powerful lot of rot. Told me he'd turn me out of the house if I didn't break it off."

"Oh, he'll come round," said Dizzy encouragingly. "I know his little ways. You stick to it. You'll find yourself settled in a semi-detached villa at Brixton in a twelve-month, bringing home a basket of fish for dinner, and making a row about the water-rate.

It'll turn out right in the end. You see if it don't."

"I don't see much chance of it," said Lucius despondently. "The governor swears he won't allow me enough to marry on for five years at least. I've a good mind to take to gambling and try and pick up a bit that way."

"Rub your eyes, old man," said Dizzy. "This is Cambridge. It isn't a novel by Alan St. Aubyn, although you _are_ in love with a Newnham girl, and the first fellow I've ever known up here who's gone anywhere near it. Not that they're not regular toppers, some of them," he added hastily, anxious to clear himself from any suspicion of being wanting in chivalry. "But that sort of thing don't happen, as they say in the play. And that's all about it."

"Well, it's happened with me," said Lucius. "And I'm pretty well down in the mouth about it."

"Look here," said Dizzy. "Shall I go and tackle your old governor? I daresay he'd listen to me."

Lucius laughed. "I won't stop you," he said, "but it won't be any good."

"We'll see," said Dizzy. "I'll go at once."

When Lucius left his father, Mr. Binney began to turn over in his mind the news he had received. He was not really displeased at it now he came to think it over. Betty Jermyn was a very charming girl, and there was no objection to her on the score of blood relationship, for her mother had only been a second cousin of his wife's. They were both very young, it is true, certainly too young to marry yet; but then they did not want to marry yet. As far as money was concerned, Mr. Binney fully intended to take Lucius into partnership with him in two or three years' time. And even if the girl should prove to be penniless, as was probable, Lucius would have quite enough to marry on directly he gave him a share in the business. At this point in his ruminations Dizzy entered the room.

"Ah, Mr. Binney!" he said. "I thought I'd just look you up as I was pa.s.sing. How's the work getting on?"

"Very well, thank you, Stubbs," replied Mr. Binney, with a pre-occupied air. "Have you heard anything about this nonsense between Lucius and his cousin?"

"What, Miss Jermyn?" asked Dizzy. "Yes. I did hear they were thinking of getting married or something of that sort. I didn't take much notice of it."

"Then you don't think Lucius is in earnest about it?"

"Oh, I wouldn't say that. I should say he was in devilish deep earnest."

"Now, look here, Stubbs," said Mr. Binney. "Don't you think it's a very ridiculous thing a boy not much over twenty getting engaged to be married?"

"Well, if you ask me for a plain answer, I can't say I do. I believe in early marriages myself. It don't come so hard on the children. Now look at my case. My old governor didn't marry till he was past fifty.

What's the consequence? When I go down from this place and want to go about a bit and amuse myself, I shall have to sit by his bedside and hold his hand. I'm fond of my old governor, but it isn't good enough."

"That is a point, certainly," said Mr. Binney, thoughtfully.

"Yes, and look at the other side of the question," continued Dizzy.

"You married young yourself, I take it, and here you are at the prime of life with a son old enough to be a companion to you. Old enough!

Why, bless me, you're the younger of the two, and that's a fact."

Mr. Binney was very much impressed by this argument. "There is a good deal in what you say, Stubbs," he remarked. "I don't want to be hard on the boy, of course, and I've no objection to the girl personally.

She seems a very nice girl, what little I've seen of her."

"Oh, _she's_ all right. She's a topper," said Dizzy.

"Of course I've got to keep up my authority, you know," pursued Mr.

Binney. "It won't do to slack the rein yet awhile."

"By George, no," said Dizzy. "I should be a whale on parental authority myself if I were in your place. Still, I don't think you'll find Lucius disposed to question your decision. He told me himself he had the utmost faith in your judgment and should follow your advice whatever it might cost him."

"Did he really tell you that?" inquired Mr. Binney, somewhat surprised.

"Well, he didn't put it quite in that way," admitted Dizzy. "But that's about what it came to."

"Then if he feels like that about it," said Mr. Binney, "I shall put no further obstacles in his path. He's a good boy, Lucius, and I'm pleased with him."

"He's got a good father," said Dizzy. "That's about the size of it,"

and he took himself off to inform Lucius that he had managed everything for him in a perfectly satisfactory manner.

Mr. Binney had a.s.serted his authority and was content. Subject to the approval of Betty's parents, she and Lucius were allowed to consider themselves engaged, with the prospect of marriage when Lucius should reach the age of twenty-three. Mr. and Mrs. Jermyn made no objections.

Lucius had made himself very popular in the Norfolk rectory, and he was a good match for their daughter from a worldly point of view. He went about Cambridge for the rest of that term in the seventh heaven of happiness.

A few days after Lucius's future had been satisfactorily settled for him, Mr. Binney had occasion to call on his Tutor. He now no longer looked upon this as an ordeal. The sternest official critic could have found no flaw in his behaviour during that part of the term that was past, and he had no intention of giving any occasion for complaint during the remainder of his residence in Cambridge. He could hold up his head before anybody, and entered the Tutor's presence with an air of conscious worth.

Mr. Rimington received him pleasantly and attended to the business upon which Mr. Binney had come. "I hope you are feeling happy amongst us now that things are going more smoothly, Mr. Binney," he said as he blotted the paper in front of him.

"Thank you," said Mr. Binney, "University life is full of interest to those who know how to value it."

Mr. Rimington looked at him and smiled. "You have found out how to value it now, have you?" he asked.

"Certainly," said Mr. Binney. "I hope, sir, that you do not intend to allude to past mistakes. I should resent such remarks on your part."

"Oh, not at all," said Mr. Rimington hastily, "we have had no cause to complain of you this term, Mr. Binney, and I have no wish to remind you of what is over and done with. I hope you are getting on well with your work."

"I expect to take a first in both parts of the examination," said Mr.

Binney, rising. "Good-morning, sir."

As the summer term pa.s.sed quickly away with its feverish work and its incessant pleasures, for it is the term when examinations closely jostle its crowded gaieties, Mr. Binney found himself nearing two important events. In one week about the beginning of June he was to go in for both parts of his Little-go, and at the end of it to steer the First Trinity first boat in the May races. With regard to his examination, he felt confident of acquitting himself well. That he was over-confident was shown by his boast to Mr. Rimington, for it is not out of material such as himself that first cla.s.ses are made, even in the most elementary examination that Cambridge affords. But he had worked so hard that he was certain of pa.s.sing, and he looked forward with trembling hope to a renewal of his intercourse with Mrs.

Higginbotham as a reward of his success. In being chosen to steer the representative oarsmen of First Trinity he had been extremely fortunate. When he had so disgraced himself in the previous term after the success of his boat in the Lent races, Mirrilees had sworn that he should never again steer a boat with which he had anything to do. But one of the c.o.xswains tried for the first boat had fallen ill, others had proved unsatisfactory, and by the middle of term, by which time Mr.

Binney had already proved that his manner of life would be innocuous for the future, Mirrilees had relented, and he was installed in the proud position that he so coveted. Trinity Hall was the head boat on the river, First Trinity was second, and Third Trinity was behind them.

All three were considered equally good, and no one could safely prophesy what the result of the races would be so far as they were concerned. The Hall men laughed at the idea of losing their place; the First Trinity men expected to b.u.mp them, and said so; while Third Trinity kept quiet, but expected to find themselves in the second place if not head of the river by the time the races were over.