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The young fellow sitting near me winked; and the divinity-student said, in an undertone, Optime dictum. Your talking Latin, said I, reminds me of an odd trick of one of my old tutors. He read so much of that language, that his English half turned into it. He got caught in town, one hot summer, in pretty close quarters, and wrote, or began to write, a series of city pastorals.
The excitement of pleading his cause before his self-elected spiritual adviser, the emotion which overcame him, when the young girl obeyed the sudden impulse of her feelings and pressed her lips to his cheek, the thoughts that mastered him while the divinity-student poured out his soul for him in prayer, might well hurry on the inevitable moment.
However, I fought this matter with one of our boarders the other day, and I am going to report the conversation. The divinity-student came down, one morning, looking rather more serious than usual. He said little at breakfast-time, but lingered after the others, so that I, who am apt to be long at the table, found myself alone with him.
But I am a teetotaller, said the divinity-student in a subdued tone; not noticing the enormous length of the bow-string the young fellow had just drawn. He took up his hat and went out. I think you have worried that young man more than you meant, I said.
They are useful, too, in keeping up the standard of dress, which, but for them, would deteriorate, and become, what some old fools would have it, a matter of convenience, and not of taste and art. Yes, I like dandies well enough, on one condition. What is that, Sir? said the divinity-student. That they have pluck. I find that lies at the bottom of all true dandyism.
To come back to what I began to speak of before, the divinity-student was exercised in his mind about the Little Gentleman, and, in the kindness of his heart, for he was a good young man, and in the strength of his convictions, for he took it for granted that he and his crowd were right, and other folks and their crowd were wrong, he determined to bring the Little Gentleman round to his faith before he died, if he could.
When the divinity-student had gone, and the Little Gentleman found himself alone with Iris, he lifted his hand to his neck, and took from it, suspended by a slender chain, a quaint, antique-looking key, the same key I had once seen him holding.
The divinity-student came and read over her shoulder, very curious, apparently, but his eyes wandered, I thought. Fancying that her breathing was somewhat hurried and high, or thoracic, as my friend, the Professor, calls it, I watched her a little more closely. It is none of my business. After all, it is the imponderables that move the world, heat, electricity, love.
If you like the company of people that stare at you from head to foot to see if there is a hole in your coat, or if you have not grown a little older, or if your eyes are not yellow with jaundice, or if your complexion is not a little faded, and so on, and then convey the fact to you, in the style in which the Poor Relation addressed the divinity-student, go with them as much as you like.
Such was the aspect of the face upon which the divinity-student looked, after the brief silence which followed his prayer. The change had been rapid, though not that abrupt one which is liable to happen at any moment in these cases. The sick man looked towards him. Farewell, he said, I thank you. Leave me alone with her.
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