But towards the end of this month, Isabel became suddenly conscious of Mr. Perrin in a very different way. It was now only three weeks before the end of term, and in another week examinations would begin. That something in the atmosphere that signified the coming of examinations was busy about the place. People were very quiet, and then suddenly in the most singular way would break out; there was continual quarreling in the common room, strange rumors were carried of things that people had said—it was all a question of strain. There came, it now being the first week in December, the first day of snow, and the light, feathery flakes fell throughout the afternoon, and when the sun set there was a soft, white world with the buildings black and grim and a sky of hurrying gray cloud. Isabel and Mrs. Comber sat in Mrs. Comber's little drawing-room over a roaring fire, and there was no other light in the room. Mrs. Comber sat, as she so often sat now, with her chin resting in her hand, silently staring at the fire. Isabel was unhappy; the silent whiteness of the world outside, the consciousness of Miss Madder's rudeness to her that afternoon, the trouble that she had seen in Archie's eyes when she had said good night to him after Chapel, above all, a general sense of strain and nerves stretched to breaking-point—all this overwhelmed her. She had never felt so strongly before that she and Archie, if they were to keep anything at all of their vitality, must escape at once... to-night... to-morrow; it might be too late. She knew that Archie had lost his temper with West that afternoon, that he had called him a “rotten little counter-jumper,” and that West had made an allusion to “stealing things.” Where were they all? What were they all doing to be fighting like this? They sat in silence opposite to one another, one on each side of the fire, and the ticking of the clock, and every now and again a tumbling coal, were the only sounds. Then suddenly Isabel broke out. “Oh! I can't stand it any longer; I feel as though I should go mad. What is the matter with everybody? Why are we all fighting like this? Oh! I do want to be pleasant to somebody again, just for a change. For the last three weeks, ever since that wretched quarrel, there has been no peace at all.” “I know,” Mrs. Comber answered without raising her eyes from the fire; “I am very tired, too, and it's a good thing there are only three weeks more of the term, because I 'm sure that somebody would be cutting somebody's throat if it lasted any longer, and I wouldn't mind very much if somebody would cut mine.” She gave a little choke in her throat, and then suddenly her head fell forward into her hands, and she burst into passionate sobbing.