However, he tried to put the best face on the matter.  ’You won’t do that,’ he said.  ’She would spoil sport, my friend.  Her ladyship is no fool, and would not suffer your little amusements.’

‘She is no fool,’ Mr. Dunborough replied with emphasis.  ’As you will find, Tommy, if she comes to Oxford, and learns certain things.  It will be farewell to your chance of having that milksop of a Marquis for a pupil!’

Now, it was one of Mr. Thomasson’s highest ambitions at this time to have the young Marquis of Carmarthen entrusted to him; and Lady Dunborough was connected with the family, and, it was said, had interest there.  He was silent.

‘You see,’ Mr. Dunborough continued, marking with a chuckle the effect his words had produced, ‘you have got to get her.’

Mr. Thomasson did not admit that that was so, but he writhed in his chair; and presently he took his leave and went away, his plump pale face gloomy and the crow’s feet showing plain at the corners of his eyes.  He had given no promise; but that evening a messenger from the college requested Mrs. Masterson to attend at his rooms on the following morning.

She did not go.  At the appointed hour, however, there came a knock on the tutor’s door, and that gentleman, who had sent his servant out of the way, found Mr. Fishwick on the landing.  ‘Tut-tut!’ said the don with some brusqueness, his hand still on the door; ‘do you want me?’ He had seen the attorney after the duel, and in the confusion attendant on the injured man’s removal; and knew him by sight, but no farther.

‘I—­hem—­I think you wished to see Mrs. Masterson?’ was Mr. Fishwick’s answer, and the lawyer, but with all humility, made as if he would enter.

The tutor, however, barred the way.  ‘I wished to see Mrs. Masterson,’ he said drily, and with his coldest air of authority.  ‘But who are you?’

‘I am here on her behalf,’ Mr. Fishwick answered, meekly pressing his hat in his hands.

‘On her behalf?’ said Mr. Thomasson stiffly.  ‘Is she ill?’

‘No, sir, I do not know that she is ill.’

‘Then I do not understand,’ Mr. Thomasson answered in his most dignified tone.  ’Are you aware that the woman is in the position of a college servant, inhabiting a cottage the property of the college?  And liable to be turned out at the college will?’

‘It may be so,’ said the attorney.

’Then, if you please, what is the meaning of her absence when requested by one of the Fellows of the college to attend?’

‘I am here to represent her,’ said Mr. Fishwick.

’Represent her!  Represent a college laundress!  Pooh!  I never heard of such a thing.’

‘But, sir, I am her legal adviser, and—­’

‘Legal adviser!’ Mr. Thomasson retorted, turning purple—­he was really puzzled.  ’A bedmaker with a legal adviser!  It’s the height of impudence!  Begone, sir, and take it from me, that the best advice you can give her is to attend me within the hour.’