104
PARTISAN REYIEW
said. Hilda fixed her eyes on the ground and stood closer to her brilliant
and aggressive camera. Blackburn, teetering on his heels, his hands
behind his back, wholly prelatical and benignly patient, was not abashed
at the silence. At last Howe said,
"If
you'll excuse us, Mr. Blackburn,
we'll go on with the picture."
"Go right ahead, sir. I'm running along." But he only came closer.
"Dr. Howe," he said fervently, "I want to tell you how glad I am that
I was able to satisfy your standards at last."
Howe was surprised at the hard insulting brightness of his own
voice and even Hilda looked up curiously as he said, "Nothing you have
ever done has satisfied me and nothing you could ever do would satisfy
me, Blackburn."
With a glance at Hilda, Blackburn made a gesture as if to hush
Howe-as though all his former bold malice had taken for granted a
kind of understanding between himself and his teacher, a secret which
must not be betrayed to a third person. "I only meant, sir," he said,
"that I was able to pass your course after all."
Howe said, "You didn't pass my course. I passed you out of my
course. I passed you without even reading your paper. I wanted to he
sure the college would be rid of you. And when all the grades were in and
I did read your paper, I saw I was right not to have read it first."
Blackburn presented a stricken face.
"It
was very bad, sir?"
But Howe had turned away. The paper had been fantastic. The
paper had been, if he wished to see it so, mad. It was at this moment
that the Dean came up behind Howe and caught his arm. "Hello, Joseph,"
he said. "We'd better be getting along, it's almost late."
He was not a familiar man, but when he saw Blackburn, who ap·
proached to greet him, he took Blackburn's arm too. "Hello, Theodore,"
he said. Leaning forward on Howe's arm and on Blackburn's, he said,
"Hello, Hilda dear." Hilda replied quietly, "Hello, Uncle George."
Still clinging to their arms, still linking Howe and Blackburn, the
Dean said, "Another year gone, Joe, and we've turned out another crop.
After you've been here a few years, you'll find it reasonably upsetting–
you wonder how there can be so many graduating classes while you stay
the same. But of course you don't stay the same." Then he said, "Well,"
sharply, to dismiss the thought. He pulled Blackburn's arm and swung'
him around to Howe. "Have you heard about Teddy Blackburn?" he
asked. "He has a job already, before graduation, the first man of his
class to be placed." Expectant of congratulations, Blackburn beamed
at Howe. Howe remained silent.
"Isn't that good?" the Dean said. Still Howe did not answer and
the Dean, puzzled and put out, turned to Hilda. "That's a very fine·
looking camera, Hilda." She touched it with affectionate pride.
"Instruments of precision," said a voice. "Instruments of pre·
cision." Of the three with joined arms, Howe was the nearest to Tertan,
whose gaze took in all the scene except the smile and the nod which
