Poor Lucius lay alone that afternoon in his comfortless college bedroom. He was very miserable. He felt weak and ill, and his thoughts took a melancholy turn. He had done no good by his single combat with the redoubtable Piper; in fact, things would now probably be worse than before. He had no energy to feel angry with his father, but he saw the whole University pointing fingers of scorn at him, an unpleasantness which might be expected to continue and increase as long as he remained at Cambridge. The hope which he had entertained up to a week ago of a place in the University boat no longer buoyed him up against adversity. In his present state of depression he saw himself missing everything that made Cambridge interesting to him, and heartily wished himself away from the place altogether. His thoughts, nowadays, seldom kept long away from the girl whom he had seen for the first time last term, but there was not much comfort to be got out of thinking about her. He had not been so fortunate this term as to have hit upon a lecture which she attended, and no longer had the satisfaction of sitting in the same room with her for an hour, twice a week. He had discovered that she went to a lecture at St. John's College, and used to hang about outside the gates on the chance of seeing her as she went to and fro. But there are two ways between Newnham and St. John's, one along Trinity Street and the King's Parade, the other past the backs of the colleges, and after a time the uncomfortable conviction took hold of Lucius that his divinity was taking a malicious delight in dodging him. If he waited outside the big gate of St. John's, she went home by the backs, and if he lay in wait on the Bridge of Sighs, she would go through the town. And upon the rare occasions when he did meet her face to face there was no sign that she was so much as aware of his existence. Lying on his bed, with heavy heart and throbbing head, as the light of the short winter afternoon slowly died, poor Lucius took the gloomiest view of his chances of ever becoming better acquainted with her. Just as he had reached the lowest possible depths of depression, Mirrilees and Tait came in to see him, and to sympathise. They told him of Blathgowrie's strategy. They had not discovered yet that Piper had circumvented it, and arranged to produce his paper from another address. "We're going to hoot Piper in hall to-night," said Tait, "and see if we can't bring on a scrimmage afterwards. If we do, we'll put him in the fountain. I expect he'll oblige us. He's a pugnacious beggar."