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added, “don’t let me be a failure on my one small mission for the university.”
    (Anything but that, My child.)
    Lucy curled up in the rough, clammy sheets and stale-smelling doggy blanket provided for Braithwaite’s guests. Not quite enough to defeat the chill. Lucy exhaled a few times, alarmed that she could almost see her breath. She got up and put on her sweater and climbed back in bed.
    It was all so English! How exciting it was to be in Oxford!
    J UNE 21 ST
    Lucy awoke at dawn, still not adapted to her new time zone. She read some more in her guidebook and then made her way to the shower stall across the landing, a freezing mildewed compartment with a door that wouldn’t lock.
    Lucy later returned to her room to find a servant vacuuming it and her suitcase gone without a trace. The servant declared repeatedly, “Wouldn’t know anythin’ about it, love.” Lucy, clutching her bathrobe and shivering, passed on the stairway an attractive, tall brunette in a beret, wearing a short skirt with her long legs in magenta stockings, on her way up, holding an empty champagne bottle, perhaps just now coming home from a party.
    â€œI’ve been moved out of the room upstairs,” Lucy said.
    â€œHow beastly,” said the girl warmly, in a crisp, posh accent. “If he won’t let you back in, come knock me up here and I’ll give him a proper bollocking for you.”
    Lucy continued through the quads and confronted the new porter at the lodge.
    â€œSo you’re the one in the Guest Room,” he said accusingly. “We thought you’d gone off without paying your bill. Heh-heh, we’ve held your things for ransom…” With a sweep of his hand, she saw behind him, in the porter’s lodge, her carpetbag and suitcase.
    â€œMay I have them, please?” she said, entirely annoyed, her teeth chattering with the chill.
    Not before paying the £6.25 room bill, and for storing her things, an extra fine of £1, which Lucy grouchily paid to get her things back.
    â€œYou should’ve seen to this bill last night, miss,” he mumbled.
    â€œI paid yesterday, for your information.”
    â€œIs you stayin’ tonight?”
    â€œI suppose.”
    â€œSo you’re payin’ me now for tonight, aren’t you?”
    â€œAre you going to give me my suitcase?”
    The porter lugged her suitcase and carpetbag to the door and Lucy frowned at the prospect of carrying them up the stairs again.
    â€œOh, and miss?” he said. “I suppose you’ll be wantin’ a breakfast ticket.”
    She thought about it. Breakfast might be nice. Yes, an English breakfast, scones and richly brewed Earl Grey tea in pewter teapots … “How much?”
    â€œThat’s £1.95, a real bargain, it is.”
    â€œOkay, I’ll take one.”
    He pointed to the main stone edifice on the side of the well-groomed quad. “That’s Hall right there, can’t miss it. Be there at the door at 8:20 on the dot.”
    Lucy trudged back to her room, dragging her suitcase up the stairway, dressed hurriedly, put on two sweaters hoping for warmth, and ran down the stairs to report at the Hall at 8:20 on the dot. She heard the noises of students filing in, the clattering of plates and silverware, but the door she stood before wasn’t open. She knocked, and as there was no answer, she circled the building and found a small, unheralded entrance on the other side.
    â€œAnd where do you think you’re going?” snarled another Dickensian relic, also with bulbous nose and red alcoholic cheeks.
    â€œTo breakfast?” she suggested.
    â€œLet’s see your ’alf-ticket.”
    Lucy showed him her ticket, untorn, with a dotted line down the middle.
    â€œAh, you can’t use that.”
    Lucy met him with an impatient American glare. “Why not?”
    â€œWell, ye didn’t post one ’alf of it in advance.