“The devil himself, that’s what’s up,” said Peter savagely.  “Look here, Pen, come on down town and let’s have a spree.  I hate this place and this infernal camp.  It gets on my nerves.  I must have a change.  Will you come?  It’s my do.”

“I’m with you, old thing.  I know what you feel like; I get like that myself sometimes.  It’s a pleasure to see that you’re so human.  We’ll go down town and razzle-dazzle for once.  I’m off duty till to-night.  I ought to sleep, I suppose, but I can’t, so come away with you.  I won’t be a second.”

He disappeared.  Peter stood for a moment, then slipped his tunic off and put on another less distinctive of his office.  He crossed to the desk, unlocked it, and reached for a roll of notes, shoving them into his pocket.  Then he put on his cap, took a stick from the corner, and went out into the passage.  But there he remembered, and came quickly back.  He folded Hilda’s letter and put it away in a drawer; then he went out again.  “Are you ready, Pennell?” he called.

The two of them left camp and set out across the docks.  As they crossed a bridge a one-horse cab came into the road from a side-street and turned in their direction.  “Come on,” said Peter.  “Anything is better than this infernal walk over this pave always.  Let’s hop in.”

They stopped the man, who asked where to drive to.

“Let’s go to the Bretagne first and get a drink,” said Pennell.

“Right,” said Peter—­“any old thing.  Hotel de la Bretagne,” he called to the driver.

They set off at some sort of a pace, and Pennell leaned back with a laugh.  “It’s a funny old world, Graham,” he said.  “One does get fed-up at times.  Why sitting in a funeral show like this cab and having a drink in a second-rate pub should be any amusement, I don’t know.  But it is.  You’re infectious, my boy.  I begin to feel like a rag myself.  What shall we do?”

“The great thing,” said Peter judiciously, “is not to know what one is going to do, but just to take anything that comes along.  I remember at the ’Varsity one never set out to rag anything definitely.  You went out and you saw a bobby and you took his hat, let us say.  You cleared, and he after you.  Anything might happen then.”

“I should think so,” said Pennell.

“I remember once walking home with a couple of men, and one of them suggested dousing all the street lamps in the road, which was a residential one leading into town.  There wasn’t anything in it, but we did it.  One man put his back against a post, while the second went on to the next post.  Then the third man mounted the first man’s back, shoved out the light, jumped clear, and ran on past the next lamp-post to the third.  The first man jumped on No. 2’s back and doused his lamp, and so on.  We did the street in a few minutes, and then a constable came into it at the top.  He probably thought he was drunk, then he spotted lights going out, and like an ass he blew his whistle.  We were round a corner in no time, and then turned and ran back to see if we could offer assistance!”