Risley's rooms were at the end of a short passage; which since it contained no obstacle was unlighted, and visitors slid along the wall until they hit the door. Maurice hit it sooner than he expected — a most awful whack — and exclaimed "Oh damnation" loudly, while the panels quivered.

"Come in," said a voice. Disappointment awaited him. The speaker was a man of his own college, by name Durham. Risley was out.

"Do you want Mr Risley? Hullo, Hall!"

"Hullo! Where's Risley?"

"I don't know."

"Oh, it's nothing. I'll go."

"Are you going back into college?" asked Durham without looking up: he was kneeling over a castle of pianola records on the floor.

"I suppose so, as he isn't here. It wasn't anything particular."

"Wait a sec, and I'll come too. I'm sorting out the Pathetic Symphony."

Maurice examined Risley's room and wondered what would have been said in it, and then sat on the table and looked at Durham. He was a small man — very small — with simple manners and a fair face, which had flushed when Maurice blundered in. In the college he had a reputation for brains and also for exclusiveness. Almost the only thing Maurice had heard about him was that he "went out too much", and this meeting in Trinity confirmed it.

"I can't find the March," he said. "Sorry."

"All right."

"I'm borrowing them to play on Fetherstonhaugh's pianola."

"Under me."

"Have you come into college, Hall?"

"Yes, I'm beginning my second year."

"Oh yes, of course, I'm third."

He spoke without arrogance, and Maurice, forgetting due honour to seniority, said, "You look more like a fresher than a third-year man, I must say."

"I may do, but I feel like an M.A."

Maurice regarded him attentively.

"Risley's an amazing chap," he continued.

Maurice did not reply.