“You look on the bright side, the side that jolly well isn’t there. Myself, I cannot conceive how by any freak of fancy Henry could possibly have secured a worse hovel than this. It is the first time he’s ever had a study, and now he’s got one that they’ve forgotten about so long that it’s gone to seed. There’s moss growing on the very walls—_moss_, I tell you. Look at the fireplace. It’s a kind of ‘Spiders’ Retreat.’ They say there’s no study for him, and then after three days they say there is, and they give him one—_this_—a kennel in the attic. There’s not a stick of furniture in it. True, there’s a picture postcard on the mantelpiece depicting some phase of life in a foreign clime—a man in a red fez picking hops, I think it is. You’ll probably find it’s addressed to some fellow who’s since died of old age. And it’s the only sign that there’s ever been any life in the place at all. I do not see even a modern nail anywhere in the wall to hang your hat on. There’s probably an official ghost attached to this study. The place is absolutely mouldy. The ceiling has caved in and the walls have warped, and the fellows who’ve had studies near here at odd times during the last forty years have been in on organised raids and pinched every blessed thing.” He paused at last for breath. “And you,” he said presently, “you—always the gentleman—you—such a one with your joking ways—you open the door and look inside, and then you throw back your head and intone the following words: ‘It isn’t a bad one.’ “Well, it’s better than not having a study at all.” “_Indeed_ it is,” admitted Rouse. “How nice it will be to sit in here on one’s bowler hat, drinking cold tea out of a glove.” “We’ll rake round for a table for him,” suggested Terence hopefully. “Yes, and the only way you’ll get one at this period will be by sucking the multiplication table off the back of an exercise-book. It’s three days since term started, my dear old bean.” Terence persisted. “I’ve got some photographs in my bag,” said he. “We’ll put them up.” “Put ’em up? Easier to put them up than for poor old Henry to put up with them. He’ll get pretty weary sitting in here never more than eighteen inches away from his partner as it is. Is his only relaxation to be a turning of the head to gaze upon your likeness on the walls?” “They aren’t photographs of me.” “Whom, then, do they portray?” “One,” responded Terence, with every modesty, “portrays Phyllis Dare in evening dress.” “Right,” said Rouse more kindly. “Put it up then. Have you any other delight you can stick on the wall for him?” “Not in _my_ pocket at this moment. But I’ll go and see Toby. He might be able to produce something. If not, perhaps he can hire a bit of furniture.” “A piano, perchance,” said the other. “There’s plenty of room.” “Anyway,” said Terence, “I’ll go and see him. Probably he can suggest something.”