As he passed the windows, he saw within characteristic glimpses of college life. Half a dozen students were gathered about a fireplace with their pipes, clothed in every variety of garment from the sweater or bath-robe to the evening dress of one who had dropped in for a chat on his way to a dance. In another room a game of cards was in progress; in still a third a thoughtful plodder sat close to his shaded lamp, his head resting upon his hand, an open book before him. Somewhere above he heard a piano played with brilliancy and dash, and the rollicking chorus of the college song:--
Then we 'll drink to old St. George, (By George!) Then we 'll drink to our valiant knight, With his trusty spear, And never a fear, And the dragon pinned down tight, tight, tight, And the dragon pinned down tight!
Emmet listened to the refrain with a curious mixture of envy and contempt. Many a time these fellows had taken his car and discussed football news with him, but at no time, in his hearing, had their conversation indicated intellectual interests or risen even to the level of the socialistic problems that were dear to his heart. He had yet to learn more of college life than is disclosed by the sporting clique to a street-car conductor; but with characteristic self-assurance he thought he had penetrated to the very heart of the machine. The quiet and unobtrusive student, the leaven of the loaf, the future poet or statesman, had never attracted his attention or that of men of his kind. They saw only what was on the surface. It was the froth of college life that gave him a not unwelcome excuse to form caustic generalisations upon a privileged class.
He hurried along, relieved to meet no one on the walk, for there were few who would not have recognised him, and his mood was all for concealment. Observing from without that the light in Leigh's windows was dim, he concluded that he was still upon the tower and went on up the stairs, striking match after match to guide his steps. As he paused to extinguish the embers, he encountered the blank darkness of the walls, relieved by ghostly slits of windows holding here and there a star; and the hollow drumming of the wind was like the sea. It was a release to emerge at last from this series of aerial prisons and to stand beneath the wide sweep of the sky. In answer to his knock Leigh opened the door and confronted him, clothed like a Siberian Cossack.