“Thanks very much,” said Jack; “that’s splendid!  I wish we hadn’t let ourselves in for quite so much.  I’m not fit to lead a double life like this.  I’m sure I don’t grudge them their outing, but, by George, I shall be glad to see the last of them, and I daresay you will be too.  It’s the hardest work I’ve had for a long time.”

The two came and lunched with Howard.  After luncheon he said, “Now, I am absolutely free to-day—­Jack has got a lawn-tennis match on—­ what shall we do?”

“Well,” said Mr. Sandys genially, “I will be entirely selfish for once.  I have come on the track of some very important matters in the Library, and I see they are going to take up my time.  And then I am going in to have a cup of tea at Pembroke with the Dean, an old friend of mine.  There, I make no excuses!  I did suggest to Herries that I had a daughter with me; but he rather pointedly didn’t ask her.  Women are not in his line, and he will like a quiet talk with me.  Now, what do you say to that, Howard?”

“Well, if Miss Maud will put up with me,” said Howard, “we will stroll about, and we might go to King’s Chapel together.  I should like to show her that, and we will go to see Monica Graves, and get some tea there.”

“Give Monica my love,” said Mr. Sandys, “and make what excuses you can.  Better tell her the truth for once!  I will try to look in upon her before I go.”

Maud assented very eagerly and gratefully.  They walked together to the Library, and Mr. Sandys bolted in like a rabbit into its hole.  Howard was alone with her.

She was very different, he thought, from what she had seemed that first night.  She was alert, smiling, delighted with everything and everybody about the place.  “I think it is all simply enchanting!” she said; “only it makes me long to go to Newnham.  I think men do have a better time than women; and, what is more, no one here seems to have anything whatever to do!”

“That’s only our unselfishness,” said Howard.  “We get no credit!  Think of all the piles of papers that are accumulating on my table.  The other day I entertained with all the virtue and self-sacrifice at my command a party of working-men from the East end of London at luncheon in my rooms, and took them round afterwards.  They knew far more than I did about the place, and I cut a very poor figure.  At the end the Secretary, meaning to be very kind to me, said that he was glad to have seen a glimpse of the cultured life.  ’It is very beautiful and distinguished,’ he added, ’but we of the democracy shall not allow it to continue.  It is always said that the Dons have nothing to do but to read and sip their wine, and I am glad to see it all for myself.  To think of all these endowments being used like this!  Not but what we are very grateful to you for your kindness!’”

They strolled about.  Cambridge is not a place that puts its characteristic beauties in the forefront.  Some of the most charming things lurk unsuspected beyond dark entries and behind sombre walls.  They penetrated little mouldering courts; they looked into dim and stately halls and chapels; they stood long on the bridge of Clare, gazing at that incomparable front, with all the bowery gardens and willow-shaded walks, like Camelot, beside the slow, terraced stream.