“But it’s just as well,” she thought, watching him run across the quad like an undergraduate, “he hasn’t too much time as it is. Bless the man, if he hasn’t taken my gown instead of his own! Oh, well, it doesn’t matter. We’re much of a height and mine’s pretty wide on the shoulders, so it’s exactly the same thing.”

And then it struck her as strange that it should be the same thing.

Harriet smiled to herself as she went to change for the river. If Peter was keen on keeping up decayed traditions he would find plenty of opportunity by keeping to a pre-War standard of watermanship, manners and dress. Especially dress. A pair of grubby shorts or a faded regulation suit rolled negligently about the waist was the modern version of Cherwell fashions for men; for women, a sun-bathing costume with (for the tender-footed) a pair of gaily-coloured beach-sandals. Harriet shook her head at the sunshine, which was now hot as well as bright. Even for the sake of startling Peter, she was not prepared to offer a display of grilled back and mosquito-bitten legs. She would go seemly and comfortable. The Dean, meeting her under the beeches, gazed with exaggerated surprise at her dazzling display of white linen and pipe-clay.

“If this were twenty years ago I should say you were going on the river.”

“I am. Hand in hand with a statelier past.”

The Dean groaned gently. “I’m afraid you are making yourself conspicuous. That kind of thing is not done. You are clothed, clean and cool. On a Sunday afternoon, too. I am ashamed of you. I hope, at least, the parcel under your arm contains the records of crooners.”

“Not even that,” said Harriet.

Actually, it contained her diary of the Shrewsbury scandal. She had thought that the best thing would be to let Peter take it away and study it for himself. Then he could decide what was best to be done about it.

She was punctual at the bridge, but found Peter there before her. His obsolete politeness in this respect was emphasized by the presence of Miss Flaxman and another Shrewsburian, who were sitting on the raft, apparently waiting for their escort, and looking rather hot and irritable. It amused Harriet to let Wimsey take charge of her parcel, hand her ceremoniously into the punt and arrange the cushions for her, and to know, by his ironical eyes, that he perfectly well understood the reason of her unusual meekness. “Is it your pleasure to go up or down?”

“Well, going up there’s more riot but a better bottom; going down you’re all right as far as the fork, and then you choose between thick mud and the Corporation dump.”

“It appears to be altogether a choice of evils. But you have only to command. My ear is open like a greedy shark to catch the tunings of a voice divine.”

“Great heavens! Where did you find that?”

“That, though you might not believe it, is the crashing conclusion of a sonnet by Keats. True, it is a youthful effort; but there are some things that even youth does not excuse.”

“Let us go down-stream. I need solitude to recover from the shock.” He turned the punt out into the stream and shot the bridge accurately. Then:

“Admirable woman! You have allowed me to spread the tail of vanity before that pair of deserted Ariadnes. Would you now prefer to be independent and take the pole? I admit it is better fun to punt than to be punted, and that a desire to have all the fun is nine-tenths of the law of chivalry.”

“Is it possible that you have a just and generous mind? I will not be outdone in generosity. I will sit like a perfect lady and watch you do the work. It’s nice to see things well done.”

“If you say that, I shall get conceited and do something silly.”

He was, in fact, a pretty punter to watch, easy in action and quite remarkably quick. They picked their way at surprising speed down the crowded and tortuous stream until, in the narrow reach above the ferry, they were checked by another punt, which was clumsily revolving in mid-stream and cramming a couple of canoes rather dangerously against the bank.

“Before you come on this water,” cried Wimsey, thrusting the offenders off with his heel and staring offensively at the youth in charge (a stringy young man, naked to the waist and shrimp-pink with the sun), “you should learn the rule of the river. Those canoes have the right of way. And if you can’t handle a pole better than that, I recommend you to retire up the back-water and stay there till you know what God gave you feet for.”

Whereat a middle-aged man, whose punt was moored a little way further on, turned his head sharply and cried in ringing tones:

“Good lord! Wimsey of Balliol!”

“Well, well, well,” said his lordship, abandoning the pink youth, and ranging up alongside the punt. “Peake of Brasenose, by all that’s holy. What brings you here?”

“Dash it,” said Mr. Peake, “I live here. What brings you here is more to the point. You haven’t met my wife-Lord Peter Wimsey, my dear-the cricket blue, you know. The rest is my family.”

He waved his hand vaguely over a collection of assorted offspring. “Oh, I thought I’d look the old place up,” said Peter, when the introductions were completed all round. “I’ve got a nephew here and all that. What are you doing? Tutor? Fellow? Lecturer?”-

“Oh, I coach people. A dog’s life, a dog’s life. Dear me! A lot of water has flowed under Folly Bridge since we last met. But I’d have known your voice anywhere. The moment I heard those arrogant, off-hand, go-to-blazes tones I said ‘Wimsey of Balliol.’ Wasn’t I right?”

Wimsey shipped the pole and sat down.

“Have pity, old son, have pity! Let the dead bury their dead.”

“You know,” said Mr. Peake to the world at large, “when we were up together-shocking long time ago that is-never mind! If anyone got landed with a country cousin or an American visitor who asked, as these people will, ‘What is this thing called the Oxford manner?’ we used to take ’em round and show ’em Wimsey of Balliol. He fitted in very handily between St. John’s Gardens and the Martyrs’ Memorial.”

“But suppose he wasn’t there, or wouldn’t perform?”

“That catastrophe never occurred. One never failed to find Wimsey of Balliol planted in the centre of the quad and laying down the law with exquisite insolence to somebody.”

Wimsey put his head between his hands.

“We were accustomed to lay bets,” went on Mr. Peake, who seemed to have preserved an undergraduate taste in humour, owing, no doubt, to continuous contact with First-Year mentality, “upon what they would say about him afterwards. The Americans mostly said, ‘My, but isn’t he just the perfect English aristocrat!’ but some of them said, ‘Does he need that glass in his eye or is it just part of the costoom?’”

Harriet laughed, thinking of Miss Schuster-Slatt.

“My dear,” said Mrs. Peake, who seemed to have a kindly nature.

“The country cousins,” said Mr. Peake remorselessly, “invariably became speechless and had to be revived with coffee and ices at Buol’s.”

“Don’t mind me,” said Peter, whose face was invisible, except for the tip of a crimson ear.

“But you’re wearing very well, Wimsey,” pursued Mr. Peake, benevolently. “Kept your waist-line. Still good for a sprint between the wickets. Can’t say I’m much use now, except for the Parents’ Match, eh, Jim? That’s what marriage does for a man-makes him fat and lazy. But you haven’t changed. Not an atom. Not a hair. Absolutely unmistakable. And you’re quite right about these louts on the river. I’m sick and tired of being barged into and getting their beastly punts over my bows. They don’t even know enough to apologize. Think it’s dashed funny. Stupid oafs. And gramophones bawling in your ears. And look at ’em! Just look at ’em! Enough to make you sick. Like the monkey-house at the Zoo!”

“Noble and nude and antique?” suggested Harriet.