"We'll do that this afternoon. I'll give tongue, and you can write it down. See here, surely if you can make old man Bracebridge give you--or us--decent marks every day for prep...."
O'Rane worked three more problems in silence; then he said:
"We must fix the exams. somehow. I don't see it yet, but it can be done. We'll circumvent Bracebridge. And the answer is one ton, three hundredweights, no quarters, eleven pounds, twelve ounces." He threw down his pen and rose with a yawn. "Come for a walk; it's only eleven."
Sinclair felt that some expression of thanks was due from him. It was not easy to frame it, and he was still half-consciously resentful of O'Rane's unasked interference.
"I thought you were going home with young Dainton."
A ray of light struggled fitfully through the clouds of Sinclair's brain.
"Did you stay here just to ass about with this filth?" he demanded, rather red in the face, pointing contemptuously to the pile of impositions.
Sinclair meditated in an embarrassed silence; then he held out his hand.
"You know, Spitfire, you're not half such a swine as I thought," he admitted handsomely.
"Go and get your hat," O'Rane ordered. "I'll wait for you on Little End."
They walked in Swanley Forest till luncheon, returned to Matheson's for a hurried meal, and set out again along the favourite, forbidden Southampton road. As we returned from Crowley Court, we passed them between the cricket ground and Big Gateway, trudging with arms linked, tired and happy. At the porter's lodge O'Rane darted aside to inspect the notice-board.
"I wanted to see when the Shelton's had to be sent in," he explained.
"I don't know. They've got to reach Burgess to-morrow. Come back to Matheson's and finish the Div."
In the still deserted Hall Sinclair sat, pen in hand, while O'Rane rapidly turned the pages of an Old Testament history and dictated an irreligious abstract. As each sheet was finished, it was blotted and placed on one side. Once O'Rane exhibited some modest sleight of hand. Sinclair had written his name at the top of a fresh piece of paper, and before anything could be added O'Rane begged him to poke the fire. On his return to the table the sheet had disappeared.
Late that night, when Leave was over, and Hall resounded with the voices of elegant young men in brown boots, coloured waistcoats and other unacademic costume, O'Rane descended with inkpot and pen to the changing-room. Seating himself on an upturned boot-basket, he produced from one pocket the foolscap sheet with Sinclair's name at the head, from another an incredibly neat fair-copy of a set of Greek Alcaics. Working quickly and in a bad light he produced a far from tidy version, with sloping lines, sprawling characters and not infrequent blots. As the prayer-bell began to ring he endorsed an envelope with the words, "Shelton Greek Verse Prize: The Rev. A. A. Burgess, Litt.D.," and dropped it into the house letter-box.