"I hear they have finished the new Squash Courts," announced a big man who was almost sitting upon the fire. "Take you on this afternoon, Jacker?"
"Have you got a court?" inquired the gentleman addressed.
"Not yet, but I will. Who is head of Games this term?"
[Illustration: THE LUNCHEON INTERVAL PORTRAIT OF A GENTLEMAN WHO HAS SCORED FIFTY RUNS]
"Good Lord! He can hardly read or write, much less manage anything. I wonder why boys always make a point of electing congenital idiots to their responsible offices. Warwick, isn't old Etherington in your House?"
"He is," replied Warwick, looking up from a newspaper.
"Just tell him I want a Squash Court this afternoon, will you?"
"I am not a District Messenger Boy," replied Mr. Warwick coldly. Then he turned upon a colleague who was attempting to read his newspaper over his shoulder.
"Andrews," he said, "if you wish to read this newspaper I shall be happy to hand it over to you. If not, I shall be grateful if you will refrain from masticating your surplus breakfast in my right ear."
Mr. Andrews, scarlet with indignation, moved huffily away, and the conversation continued.
"I doubt if you will get a court, Dumaresq," said another voice--a mild one. "I asked for one after breakfast, and Etherington said they were all bagged."
"Well, I call that the limit!" bellowed that single-minded egotist, Mr. Dumaresq.
"After all," drawled a supercilious man sprawling across a chair, "the courts were built for the boys, weren't they?"
"They may have been built for the boys," retorted Dumaresq with heat, "but they were more than half paid for by the masters. So put that in your pipe, friend Wellings, and----"
"Your trousers are beginning to smoke," interpolated Wellings calmly. "You had better come out of the fender for a bit and let me in."
So the babble went on. To Arthur Robinson, still nervously perusing the time-table, it all sounded like an echo of the talk which had prevailed in the Pupil Room at his own school barely five years ago.
Presently a fresh-faced elderly man crossed the room and tapped him on the shoulder.
"You must be Robinson," he said. "My name is Pollard, also of St. Crispin's. Come and dine with me to-night, and tell me how the old College is getting on."