For an instant I gazed in stupid amazement. Then, as the door closed behind him and he came from out the shadow, I sprang to my feet and ran forward, with a cry. And, almost before I knew what was happening, his two hands gripped my shoulders, and he backed me into the full light of the window, holding me away from him at arms’ length and looking down into my face. He was a good half head taller than I. ‘Dearest Brownlow--my dear old man, my dear old man,’ he repeated, and his grip tightened while his voice was tender as a girl’s. Then, while I stammered in my excitement and surprise, he gave a naughty little laugh. ‘Oh! I am no ghost,’ he said. ‘You needn’t be afraid. I’m very solid flesh and blood; worse luck for you, perhaps, old man. Gad, but it’s good, though, to see you once again.’ He threw down his hat among the papers on the table, tossed his gloves into it, and drew me on to the window-seat beside him. Already the spell began to work, the spell of his extraordinary personal charm. Already he captivated me, firing my somewhat sluggish imagination. Already I asked nothing better than to devote myself to him, spend myself for him, stamp out the evil and nourish the good in him, at whatever loss or disadvantage to myself. I inquired what had brought him to Cambridge. ‘I am in trouble, Brownlow,’ he answered simply, while his face hardened. ‘It’s an ugly sort of trouble, which I have not the pluck to meet single-handed. I cannot see my way through or out of it. I tell you, it was beginning to make me feel rather desperate. And I remembered your wisdom of old’-- He smiled at me, patting my knee. ‘So, as I do not want to take to drink--which last night seemed the only alternative--I took the road this morning instead, and came to look for you. Perhaps it is a rather presumptuous proceeding on my part. I have no claim on you, for I have been neglectful and selfish. I know that well enough--not by any means a model pupil, dear old man, not any great credit to you. But you cared for me once.’ Cared for him? God was my witness that I did! ‘And, as I tell you, I have not courage to meet this trouble alone. It raises a devil of suspicion and anger in me. I am afraid of being unjust, of losing my head and doing some wild thing I shall regret for the rest of my life. But we need not go into all this just yet, and spoil our first half-hour together. It will keep.’ And he looked away, avoiding my eyes with a certain shyness, as I fancied; glanced round the room, at its sober colouring, solid furniture, ranges of bookshelves and many books; glanced through the window at the fine trees, the bright garden, and quiet river glistening in the still June sunlight. ‘Gad! but what a delightful place!’ he said. ‘I am glad to know where you live, Brownlow, and I could find it in my heart to envy you, I think. The wheels must run very smooth.’ I thought of Nellie, of my home-coming from Westrea. Verily, less smooth than he imagined--sometimes.