ould afford to make the Warden angry; besides, I really liked him, and
he was always nice to me, though he did tell the Bishop in the Easter
vac that, until I lost a certain exuberance of animal spirits, any
credit I did to the college would be more physical than intellectual.
But I did not bear him any grudge for that, because he could not help
using long phrases, and if he had just said that I liked athletics I
should have been rather pleased, which was what he really meant, only
the Bishop did not think so.

I shoved the fragments of my letters into a drawer, and when Jack Ward
came in I said I was going to bed. The sight of him reminded me of
Nina, and to think of Nina gave me a headache. I had never imagined it
possible that I should find it difficult to manage her, and here she
was at the bottom of all my troubles. As I stood in my room and looked
at Jack sitting in my most comfortable chair, the reason why Fred had
written that note suddenly occurred to me. Of course she was the
reason, and leaving Jack to amuse himself I sat down and wrote another
note; but when I read it through it seemed as hopeless as the others,
so I tore it up, and having no more note-paper I decided to see Fred in
the morning. Then I went into my bedroom and began to undress noisily,
so that Jack might know what I was doing, but he gave a huge snore just
as I was ready to go to bed and I had to throw a cushion at his head.

"Turn the lamp out, when you go," I said, and I got into bed. I left
the door partly open, because my room wanted all the air it could get,
and I heard him waking up slowly and stretching himself. After that he
attacked a soda-water syphon until it gave a protesting gurgle.

"I've found the whisky, but you don't seem to have any soda," he called
to me, but I pretended that I was asleep. However, he ransacked my
cupboard until he found another syphon, and then he came and sat on my
bed. I told him I was very tired, because I had not forgotten the last
time he had invaded me in this way, and two doses of talking about love
would be a trial to any man.

"I wanted to talk to you, only you were so busy, and then I went to
sleep," he began.

"Well, cut it short, it must be nearly one o'clock."

"Your people have asked me to stay with them in the vac, and I want to
know what time would suit you best."

He had cut it far too short to suit me, and I asked him not to sit on
my foot, which he was not sitting upon,