Alick [at last].  When you’re ready, John Shand.

[John hints back, and then he has the grace to rise, dogged and expressionless.]

James [like a railway porter].  Ticket, please.

David.  You can’t think of anything clever for to go for to say now,
John.

Maggie.  I hope you find that chair comfortable, young man.

John.  I have no complaint to make against the chair.

Alick [who is really distressed].  A native of the town.  The disgrace to your family!  I feel pity for the Shands this night.

John [glowering].  I’ll thank you, Mr. Wylie, not to pity my family.

James.  Canny, canny.

Maggie [that sense of justice again].  I think you should let the young man explain.  It mayn’t be so bad as we thought.

David.  Explain away, my billie.

John.  Only the uneducated would need an explanation.  I’m a student, [with a little passion] and I’m desperate for want of books.  You have all I want here; no use to you but for display; well, I came here to study.  I come twice weekly. [Amazement of his hosts.]

David [who is the first to recover].  By the window.

John.  Do you think a Shand would so far lower himself as to enter your door?  Well, is it a case for the police?

James.  It is.

Maggie [not so much out of the goodness of her heart as to patronise the Shands].  It seems to me it’s a case for us all to go to our beds and leave the young man to study; but not on that chair. [And she wheels the chair away from him.]

John.  Thank you, Miss Maggie, but I couldn’t be beholden to you.

James.  My opinion is that he’s nobody, so out with him.

John.  Yes, out with me.  And you’ll be cheered to hear I’m likely to be a nobody for a long time to come.

David [who had been beginning to respect him].  Are you a poor scholar?

John.  On the contrary, I’m a brilliant scholar.

David.  It’s siller, then?

John [glorified by experiences he has shared with many a gallant soul].  My first year at college I lived on a barrel of potatoes, and we had just a sofa-bed between two of us; when the one lay down the other had to get up.  Do you think it was hardship?  It was sublime.  But this year I can’t afford it.  I’ll have to stay on here, collecting the tickets of the illiterate, such as you, when I might be with Romulus and Remus among the stars.

James [summing up].  Havers.

David [in whose head some design is vaguely taking shape].  Whist, James.  I must say, young lad, I like your spirit.  Now tell me, what’s your professors’ opinion of your future.

John.  They think me a young man of extraordinary promise.