I shrugged. There was nothing to be done about it. I unwrapped the motor-bike and made tracks for Durham.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Elinor's college stood in a tree-lined road along with other sturdy and learned looking buildings. It had an imposing front entrance and a less-imposing tarmacked drive entrance along to the right. I wheeled the motorcycle down there and parked it beside the long row of bicycles. Beyond the bicycles stood six or seven small cars, one of which was Elinor's little scarlet two-seater.

Two steps led up to a large oak door embellished with the single word "Students'. I went in. There was a porter's desk just inside on the right, with a mournful looking middle-aged man sitting behind it looking at a list.

"Excuse me," I said, 'could you tell me where to find Lady Elinor Tarren? "

He looked up and said.

"You visiting? You expected?"

"I think so," I said.

He asked my name, and thumbed down the list painstakingly.

"Daniel Roke to visit Miss Tarren, please show him her room. Yes, that's right. Come on, then."

He got down off his stool, came round from behind his desk, and breathing noisily began to lead me deeper into the building.

There were several twists in the corridors and I could see why it was necessary to have a guide. On every hand were doors with the occupant or purpose written up on small cards let into metal slots. After going up two nights of stairs and round a few more corners, the porter halted outside one more door just like the rest.

"Here you are," he said unemotionally.

"This is Miss Tarren's room."

He turned away and started to shuffle back to his post.

The card on the door said Miss E. C. Tarren. I knocked. Miss E. C. Tarren opened it.

"Come in," she said. No smile.

I went in. She shut the door behind me. I stood still, looking at her room. I was so accustomed to the starkness of the accommodation at Humber's that it was an odd, strange sensation to find myself again in a room with curtains, carpet, sprung chairs, cushions, and flowers.

The colours were mostly blues and greens, mixed and blending, with a bowl of daffodils and red tulips blazing against them.

There was a big desk with books and papers scattered on it; a bookshelf, a bed with a blue cover, a wardrobe, a tall built-in cupboard, and two easy chairs. It looked warm and friendly. A very good room for working in. If I had had more than a moment to stand and think about it, I knew I would be envious: this was what my father and mother's death had robbed me of, the time and liberty to study.

"Please sit down." She indicated one of the easy chairs.

"Thank you." I sat, and she sat down opposite me, but looking at the floor, not at me. She was solemn and frowning, and I rather gloomily wondered if what October wanted her to say to me meant more trouble.

"I asked you to come here," she started.

"I asked you to come here because…" She stopped and stood up abruptly, and walked round behind me and tried again.

"I asked you to come," she said to the back of my head, 'because I have to apologize to you, and I'm not finding it very easy. "

"Apologize?" I said, astonished.

"What for?"

"For my sister."

I stood up and turned towards her.

"Don't," I said vehemently. I had been too much humbled myself in the past weeks to want to see anyone else in the same position.

She shook her head.

"I'm afraid," she swallowed, "I'm afraid that my family has treated you very badly."

The silver-blonde hair shimmered like a halo against the pale sunshine which slanted sideways through the window behind her. She was wearing a scarlet jersey under a sleeveless dark green dress. The whole effect was colourful and gorgeous, but it was clearly not going to help her if I went on looking at her. I sat down again in the chair and said with some lightheartedness, as it appeared October had not after all dispatched a dressing-down, "Please don't worry about it."

"Worry," she exclaimed.

"What else can I do? I knew of course why you were dismissed, and I've said several times to Father that he ought to have had you sent to prison, and now I find none of it is true at all.

How can you say there is nothing to worry about when everyone thinks you are guilty of some dreadful crime, and you aren't? "

Her voice was full of concern. She really minded that anyone in her family should have behaved as unfairly as Patty had. She felt guilty just because she was her sister. I liked her for it: but then I already knew she was a thoroughly nice girl.

"How did you find out?" I asked.

"Patty told me last weekend. We were just gossiping together, as we often do. She had always refused to talk about you, but this time she laughed, and told me quite casually, as if it didn't matter any more.

Of course I know she's. well. used to men. She's just built that way. But this. I was so shocked. I couldn't believe her at first. "

"What exactly did she tell you?"

There was a pause behind me, then her voice went on, a little shakily.

"She said she tried to make you make love to her, but you wouldn't.

She said. she said she showed you her body, and all you did was to tell her to cover herself up. She said she was so flaming angry about that that she thought all next day about what revenge she would have on you, and on Sunday morning she worked herself up into floods of tears, and went and told Father told Father. "

"Well," I said good humouredly, 'yes, that is, I suppose, a slightly more accurate picture of what took place. " I laughed.

"It isn't funny," she protested.

"No. It's relief," She came round in front of me and sat down and looked at me.

"You did mind, then, didn't you?"

My distaste must have shown.

"Yes. I minded."

"I told Father she had bed about you. I've never told him before about her love affairs, but this was different… anyway, I told him on Sunday after lunch." She stopped, hesitating. I waited. At last she went on, "It was very odd. He didn't seem surprised, really. Not utterly overthrown, like I was. He just seemed to get very tired, suddenly, as if he had heard bad news. As if a friend had died after a long illness, that sort of sadness. I didn't understand it. And when I said that of course the only fair thing to do would be to offer you your job back, he utterly refused. I argued, but I'm afraid he is adamant. He also refuses to tell Mr. Inskip that you shouldn't have had to leave, and he made me promise not to repeat to him or anyone what Patty had said. It is so unfair," she concluded passionately, 'and I felt that even if no one else is to know, at least you should. I don't suppose it makes it any better for you that my father and I have at last found out what really happened, but I wanted you to know that I am sorry, very, very sorry for what my sister did. "

I smiled at her. It wasn't difficult. Her colouring was so blazingly fair that it didn't matter if her nose wasn't entirely straight. Her direct grey eyes were full of genuine, earnest regret, and I knew she felt Patty's mis behaviour all the more keenly because she thought it had affected a stable lad who had no means of defending himself. This also made it difficult to know what to say in reply.

I understood, of course, that October couldn't declare me an injured innocent, even if he wanted to, which I doubted, without a risk of it reaching Humber's ears, and that the last thing that either of us wanted was for him to have to offer to take me back at Inskip's. No one in their right mind would stay at Humber's if they could go to Inskip's.

"If you knew," I said slowly, 'how much I have wanted your father to believe that I didn't harm your sister, you would realize that what you have just said is worth a dozen jobs to me. I like your father. I respect him. And he is quite right. He cannot possibly give me my old job back, because it would be as good as saying publicly that his daughter is at least a liar, if not more. You can't ask him to do that. You can't expect it. I don't. Things are best left as they are. "