Pearl Gray Sepulchre

a new term has begun and J. Harper Mockmouse is among the missing. He was a small student, nervous by nature, one of those addicted to the sanctity of his own room. But he will ever have a chance to enjoy the fresh shade of pearl gray that now decorates its walls. His failure to survive the term is a lasting tribute to the University's quest for that which is next to godliness.

All was running according to schedule on the afternoon following his first exam. Mockmouse had surrounded himself in this sanctum with the material necessary to atone for three months of leisure. Late into the night he had bent his pudgy frame over Sanskrit 109. Then at four a.m. he had given up and gone to bed.

"Outcha go, buddy", the guy in the spotted white suit was insisting, shaking the bed back and forth. In the other room, another man was shoving the furniture into a corner, and stood poised, about to throw a dirty tarpaulin over the collection. It was eight in the morning and, bleary-eyed and protesting, Mockmouse was sent out into the snow with what books he could collect.

Mockmouse hated libraries. Still he had resolutely trudged from Lamont to Widener, to his house. They were all too noisy, and the air was stagnant. Hayes-Bicks proved no better place to study: Mockmouse wanted his own room. He tried going back late the first night, but the smell of turpentine was too strong.

The once hefty and healthy Mokmouse grew hollow-eyed and desperate. First he flunked his Slavic, then his Sanskrit 109. When he returned to his room, the painters were still there. The necessity of keeping painters working indoors during the winter months was the reason, they explained. There was little point in taking the last exam. So he left a forwarding address, and departed for Mexico to get his education among the natives in an unpainted adobe hut.