"Want a sundae--I mean a jigger?" asked Kerry.
"Sure."
They suppered heavily and then, still sauntering, eased back to 12.
"Wonderful night."
"It's a whiz."
"You men going to unpack?"
"Guess so. Come on, Burne."
Amory decided to sit for a while on the front steps, so he bade them good
night.
The great tapestries of trees had darkened to ghosts back at the last
edge of twilight. The early moon had drenched the arches with pale blue,
and, weaving over the night, in and out of the gossamer rifts of moon,
swept a song, a song with more than a hint of sadness, infinitely
transient, infinitely regretful.
He remembered that an alumnus of the nineties had told him of one of
Booth Tarkington's amusements: standing in mid-campus in the small hours
and singing tenor songs to the stars, arousing mingled emotions in the
couched undergraduates according to the sentiment of their moods.
Now, far down the shadowy line of University Place a white-clad phalanx
broke the gloom, and marching figures, white-shirted, white-trousered,
swung rhythmically up the street, with linked arms and heads thrown back:
"Going back--going back,
Going--back--to--Nas-sau--Hall,
Going back--going back--
To the--Best--Old--Place--of--All.
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