It was into the life of this Martin, the intermediate Martin, who was neither the servant of Spots nor the commander of servants, that Anstey rushed in. Anstey was a small clever boy who had climbed to the Lower Sixth at great speed: he had not only considerable ability, but also possessed a genius for covering the gaps in his knowledge or reading and he would talk with Martin about authors he had never read. His manners and appearance were charming and he played half-back for Berney's second team with skill and pluck. Without being made conceited by the influential friendships which he found awaiting him wherever he turned, he had a quiet manner of self-assertion which fascinated Martin. And so when Rayner or Gregson came to Martin for a talk they would find Anstey chatting away with his feet on the table. Then Rayner would go away hurriedly, for he thought Anstey a frivolous and unreliable creature, and if ever there was a reliable man at Elfrey it was Rayner. Gregson's objections to Anstey were based on the latter's sentimental attachment to the Catholic faith. On first acquiring a study Anstey had bought 'Peggy' and the usual pictures: three weeks later he was converted, exchanged 'Peggy' for a Madonna, and dotted the room with candles. To Martin, Anstey would talk on any subject, from religious experience, which he had not undergone, to the beauty of his elder sisters which was equally fictitious. At times they read together, prose and poetry, Classics and English, and after reading they would launch out into vast discussions. In the Christmas holidays Martin went to stay with the Ansteys in Kensington: he was disappointed in the sisters, who indeed took very little notice of him, but Cyril Anstey was more than usually charming. They wandered about London together, went often to the play, and spent far more money than the Anstey family could afford: but of course Martin did not know that. It was not, however, until the summer term that Martin's friendship for Cyril Anstey reached its height; now at last he discovered how limited and pent up all his school life had been. He had had no enthusiasms. Religion had no appeal for him, the ancient literatures had been so fouled by pedantic notes and introductions that they had not moved him as they should have done, for games he had only a lukewarm affection. He liked discussing teams and the chances of teams, but he had never had personal successes in athletics; while he knew that the correct hitting of a ball might be one of life's most splendid things, his experience of that pleasure was too fragmentary to satisfy his appetite. His talks with Gregson had been enjoyable, for they had given him an opportunity to let himself go: but life, on the whole, this life at school which was universally supposed to teem with opportunities, had become monotonous and barren. One could live without feeling.