And, the demon of logic at his heels, we both went off like inspired
lunatics into a world of hypotheses where never man had set foot. He was
examining no longer, he was inventing and intoxicating himself with
deductions. No one was right or wrong. We were reasoning about
chimeras, he radiant, I cool, before his gently tickled colleagues. I
never realized till then what imagination a jurist's head could contain.

Perspiring freely, he set down a white mark, having exceeded by ten
minutes the recognized time for examination.

The second examiner was less enthusiastic. He made very few
suppositions, and devoted all his art to convicting me of a contradiction
between page seventeen and page seventy-nine. He kept repeating, "It's a
serious matter, sir, very serious." But, nevertheless, he bestowed a
second white mark on me. I only got half white from the third. The rest
of the examination was taken up in matters extraneous to the subject of
my essay, a commonplace trial of strength, in which I replied with
threadbare arguments to outworn objections.

And then it ended. Two hours had passed.

I left the room while the examiners made up their minds.

A few friends came up to me.

"Congratulations, old man, I bet on six whites."

"Hallo, Larive! I never noticed you."