It was one late afternoon in January, walking away from the library, that Nevin told Felix about Sheilah. They had met on the library steps. Felix had been spending three long terrific hours in the library, trying to dig the important facts out of fifty pages of prescribed history, and then attempting to transport them across the great, wide, all but unnavigable space that yawned between the white pages of the book and his brain. And, once transported, to keep them there, in some sort of order and state of preservation until they were needed for consumption in class the next day, or the next week. One never could tell when. Nevin had been spending less than one hour transporting, from twice the number of pages to his brain, similar facts which, when once they were landed, seemed mechanically to slip into their proper cells and places.
It was raining when Nevin came running down the library steps behind Felix. Felix carried an umbrella. He always carried an umbrella when it rained. Nevin never carried an umbrella.
'Hello, Pastey. Going in my direction?'
Felix decided that he was.
'Yes. Come on under,' eagerly he replied.
Nevin slipped his arm through Felix's familiarly, just as if he were a fellow club member, thought