Читать книгу The Carcellini Emerald, With Other Tales онлайн

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But then even Mrs. Oliver told her son that his chum was the only “possible” college-mate he had ever brought under the patrimonial roof-tree!

When the crash of Tom’s prospects came as to finances Carmichael was disagreeably taken by surprise. The manifestation to his friend of the exact condition of his feelings on this subject was, on the whole, more trying to Tom than the original blow.

The first public move in the disintegration of their friendship was Tom’s withdrawal from the expensive rooms they had occupied together since freshman year into much cheaper lodgings.

Ash promptly installed in his place a wealthy and inane classmate whom the “crowd” had antecedently styled “Miss Willie.” There was a groan of derision among the fellows for this substitute for Tom; and at an impromptu meeting of leading spirits in Tom’s new rooms, in an old and shabby quarter, it was voted to give Carmichael henceforth what they called the “icy nod.”

After the Christmas holidays, which Ash spent with “Miss Willie’s” family, something occurred to bring upon Tom’s former chum a ban more serious than what had preceded it. The offense, the discovery of it, the discussion, and the verdict were known to only a few of Tom Oliver’s most devoted henchmen. Outsiders, aware of some dark mystery in process of solution, talked of it—speculated curiously—but got no farther. That Carmichael had done something awfully shady was generally believed. What that something was nobody could find out. But during the whole time of the agitation Tom went about black as a thunder-cloud and silent as the grave.