The Junior Prior was not at this time happy. Quite recently he had himself been one of the Dundoons. He was a young professor of mathematics; and, because he was also an astronomer, they called him Peepy. He was brilliant on paper, but an admitted failure in dealing with the men. His discipline was openly flouted. Peter, who naturally did not know that the Junior Prior was an error of judgment, confessed by the authorities, regarded him, unfairly to Gamaliel, as typical of the place. He derided in him a wholly ineffectual and pedantic person whose dignity at Gamaliel reduced life to absurdity. Peter was barely civil to the Junior Prior. It was characteristic of the Junior Prior that he tactlessly favoured the Dundoons. They used his pet name, and paraded with him linked in familiar conversation. Naturally, when his discipline fell upon men outside the set he favoured, it was bitterly resented. It was remembered, a fact unknown to the Fellows, that in the term before Peter came to Gamaliel the Junior Prior had been pushed downstairs by a robust man from the Colonies who, though he happened to be reading theology, was old enough to be the father of the Junior Prior, and had, it was believed, actually killed people somewhere in Mexico. The incident between Peter and Dundoon naturally splashed rather rudely into these College politics. Clearly it needed very little to raise a scandal. One of the Dundoons talked with Peter in the boat that afternoon, telling him that vengeance was intended, but Peter was wearily contemptuous. In the evening he sat peacefully at his window. To-day they had paddled far, passing through the locks to lower reaches of the river. Peter was tired and contemplative, his brain still rocking with the boat and filled with desolate echoes of shouting over lonely water. Big Tom was belling his hundred-and-one. The lawn was deserted and very quiet. Peter could recover distantly the rhythm of the town band. He remembered the night of his first introduction to the dons of Gamaliel--the infinite promise that once had sounded in the Oxford bells. A riotous party broke into the far corner. Peter was not long in doubt as to who they were. Dundoon was cracking his whip. Peter sat still as they came irregularly towards him. "Peter Pagger," said Dundoon, not quite certain of his syllables, "we have come to rag you. Have you any objections?" He stood below on the grass. He had been drinking and was very serious. "None at all," said Peter indifferently. He looked down, as it were, on a group of animals. "He hasn't any objections," said Dundoon confidentially to his supporters. "Listen to me," he continued, addressing the open window. "This is most important. You've been very rude to me. What are you going to do about it?" "I'm sitting here," said Peter. He heard them blundering up the wooden staircase. He might have sported a strong oak, locking them out until his friends had come together. But it hardly seemed worth while.