'I slept little, hurried over my breakfast, and after a slight
hesitation gave up my early morning visit to my ship. It was really
very wrong of me, because, though my chief mate was an excellent man all
round, he was the victim of such black imaginings that if he did not get
a letter from his wife at the expected time he would go quite distracted
with rage and jealousy, lose all grip on the work, quarrel with all
hands, and either weep in his cabin or develop such a ferocity of temper
as all but drove the crew to the verge of mutiny. The thing had always
seemed inexplicable to me: they had been married thirteen years; I had a
glimpse of her once, and, honestly, I couldn't conceive a man abandoned
enough to plunge into sin for the sake of such an unattractive person. I
don't know whether I have not done wrong by refraining from putting
that view before poor Selvin: the man made a little hell on earth for
himself, and I also suffered indirectly, but some sort of, no doubt,
false delicacy prevented me. The marital relations of seamen would make
an interesting subject, and I could tell you instances. . . . However,
this is not the place, nor the time, and we are concerned with Jim--who
was unmarried. If his imaginative conscience or his pride; if all the
extravagant ghosts and austere shades that were the disastrous familiars
of his youth would not let him run away from the block, I, who of course
can't be suspected of such familiars, was irresistibly impelled to go
and see his head roll off. I wended my way towards the court. I didn't
hope to be very much impressed or edified, or interested or even
frightened--though, as long as there is any life before one, a jolly
good fright now and then is a salutary discipline. But neither did I
expect to be so awfully depressed. The bitterness of his punishment was
in its chill and mean atmosphere. The real significance of crime is in
its being a breach of faith with the community of mankind, and from
that point of view he was no mean traitor, but his execution was a
hole-and-corner affair. There was no high scaffolding, no scarlet cloth
(did they have scarlet cloth on Tower Hill? They should have had), no
awe-stricken multitude to be horrified at his guilt and be moved to
tears at his fate--no air of sombre retribution. There was, as I walked
along, the clear sunshine, a brilliance too passionate to be consoling,
the streets full of jumbled bits of colour like a damaged kaleidoscope:
yellow, green, blue, dazzling white, the brown nudity of an undraped
shoulder, a bullock-cart with a red canopy, a company of native infantry
in a drab body with dark heads marching in dusty laced boots, a native
policeman in a sombre uniform of scanty cut and belted in patent
leather, who looked up at me with orientally pitiful eyes as though his
migrating spirit were suffering exceedingly from that unforeseen--what
d'ye call 'em?--avatar--incarnation. Under the shade of a lonely tree
in the courtyard, the villagers connected with the assault case sat in a
picturesque group, looking like a chromo-lithograph of a camp in a book
of Eastern travel. One missed the obligatory thread of smoke in the
foreground and the pack-animals grazing. A blank yellow wall rose behind
overtopping the tree, reflecting the glare. The court-room was sombre,
seemed more vast. High up in the dim space the punkahs were swaying
short to and fro, to and fro. Here and there a draped figure, dwarfed
by the bare walls, remained without stirring amongst the rows of empty
benches, as if absorbed in pious meditation. The plaintiff, who had
been beaten,--an obese chocolate-coloured man with shaved head, one
fat breast bare and a bright yellow caste-mark above the bridge of his
nose,--sat in pompous immobility: only his eyes glittered, rolling
in the gloom, and the nostrils dilated and collapsed violently as he
breathed. Brierly dropped into his seat looking done up, as though
he had spent the night in sprinting on a cinder-track. The pious
sailing-ship skipper appeared excited and made uneasy movements, as
if restraining with difficulty an impulse to stand up and exhort
us earnestly to prayer and repentance. The head of the magistrate,
delicately pale under the neatly arranged hair, resembled the head of a
hopeless invalid after he had been washed and brushed and propped up in
bed. He moved aside the vase of flowers--a bunch of purple with a few
pink blossoms on long stalks--and seizing in both hands a long sheet of
bluish paper, ran his eye over it, propped his forearms on the edge of
the desk, and began to read aloud in an even, distinct, and careless
voice.

'By Jove! For all my foolishness about scaffolds and heads rolling
off--I assure you it was infinitely worse than a beheading. A heavy
sense of finality brooded over all this, unrelieved by the hope of rest
and safety following the fall of the axe. These proceedings had all the
cold vengefulness of a death-sentence, and the cruelty of a sentence of
exile. This is how I looked at it that morning--and even now I seem to
see an undeniable vestige of truth in that exaggerated view of a common
occurrence. You may imagine how strongly I felt this at the time.
Perhaps it is for that reason that I could not bring myself to admit
the finality. The thing was always with me, I was always eager to take
opinion on it, as though it had not been practically settled: individual
opinion--international opinion--by Jove! That Frenchman's, for instance.
His own country's pronouncement was uttered in the passionless and
definite phraseology a machine would use, if machines could speak. The
head of the magistrate was half hidden by the paper, his brow was like
alabaster.

'There were several questions before the court. The first as to whether
the ship was in every respect fit and seaworthy for the voyage. The
court found she was not. The next point, I remember, was, whether up
to the time of the accident the ship had been navigated with proper and
seamanlike care. They said Yes to that, goodness knows why, and then
they declared that there was no evidence to show the exact cause of
the accident. A floating derelict probably. I myself remember that a
Norwegian barque bound out with a cargo of pitch-pine had been given up
as missing about that time, and it was just the sort of craft that would
capsize in a squall and float bottom up for months--a kind of maritime
ghoul on the prowl to kill ships in the dark. Such wandering corpses are
common enough in the North Atlantic, which is haunted by all the terrors
of the sea,--fogs, icebergs, dead ships bent upon mischief, and long
sinister gales that fasten upon one like a vampire till all the strength
and the spirit and even hope are gone, and one feels like the empty
shell of a man. But there--in those seas--the incident was rare enough
to resemble a special arrangement of a malevolent providence, which,
unless it had for its object the killing of a donkeyman and the bringing
of worse than death upon Jim, appeared an utterly aimless piece of
devilry. This view occurring to me took off my attention. For a time I
was aware of the magistrate's voice as a sound merely; but in a moment
it shaped itself into distinct words . . . "in utter disregard of their
plain duty," it said. The next sentence escaped me somehow, and
then . . . "abandoning in the moment of danger the lives and property
confided to their charge" . . . went on the voice evenly, and stopped. A
pair of eyes under the white forehead shot darkly a glance above the
edge of the paper. I looked for Jim hurriedly, as though I had expected
him to disappear. He was very still--but he was there. He sat pink and
fair and extremely attentive. "Therefore, . . ." began the voice
emphatically. He stared with parted lips, hanging upon the words of the
man behind the desk. These came out into the stillness wafted on the
wind made by the punkahs, and I, watching for their effect upon him,
caught only the fragments of official language. . . . "The Court . . .
Gustav So-and-so . . . master . . . native of Germany . . . James
So-and-so . . . mate . . . certificates cancelled." A silence fell. The
magistrate had dropped the paper, and, leaning sideways on the arm of
his chair, began to talk with Brierly easily. People started to move
out; others were pushing in, and I also made for the door. Outside I
stood still, and when Jim passed me on his way to the gate, I caught at
his arm and detained him. The look he gave discomposed me, as though I
had been responsible for his state he looked at me as if I had been the
embodied evil of life. "It's all over," I stammered. "Yes," he said
thickly. "And now let no man . . ." He jerked his arm out of my grasp. I
watched his back as he went away. It was a long street, and he remained
in sight for some time. He walked rather slow, and straddling his legs a
little, as if he had found it difficult to keep a straight line. Just
before I lost him I fancied he staggered a bit.

'"Man overboard," said a deep voice behind me. Turning round, I saw a
fellow I knew slightly, a West Australian; Chester was his name. He,
too, had been looking after Jim. He was a man with an immense girth of
chest, a rugged, clean-shaved face of mahogany colour, and two blunt
tufts of iron-grey, thick, wiry hairs on his upper lip. He had
been pearler, wrecker, trader, whaler too, I believe; in his own
words--anything and everything a man may be at sea, but a pirate. The
Pacific, north and south, was his proper hunting-ground; but he had
wandered so far afield looking for a cheap steamer to buy. Lately he
had discovered--so he said--a guano island somewhere, but its approaches
were dangerous, and the anchorage, such as it was, could not be
considered safe, to say the least of it. "As good as a gold-mine," he
would exclaim. "Right bang in the middle of the Walpole Reefs, and if
it's true enough that you can get no holding-ground anywhere in less
than forty fathom, then what of that? There are the hurricanes, too. But
it's a first-rate thing. As good as a gold-mine--better! Yet there's not
a fool of them that will see it. I can't get a skipper or a shipowner
to go near the place. So I made up my mind to cart the blessed stuff
myself." . . . This was what he required a steamer for, and I knew he
was just then negotiating enthusiastically with a Parsee firm for an
old, brig-rigged, sea-anachronism of ninety horse-power. We had met and
spoken together several times. He looked knowingly after Jim. "Takes
it to heart?" he asked scornfully. "Very much," I said. "Then he's no
good," he opined. "What's all the to-do about? A bit of ass's skin. That
never yet made a man. You must see things exactly as they are--if you
don't, you may just as well give in at once. You will never do anything
in this world. Look at me. I made it a practice never to take anything
to heart." "Yes," I said, "you see things as they are." "I wish I could
see my partner coming along, that's what I wish to see," he said. "Know
my partner? Old Robinson. Yes; _the_ Robinson. Don't _you_ know? The
notorious Robinson. The man who smuggled more opium and bagged more
seals in his time than any loose Johnny now alive. They say he used to
board the sealing-schooners up Alaska way when the fog was so thick that
the Lord God, He alone, could tell one man from another. Holy-Terror
Robinson. That's the man. He is with me in that guano thing. The best
chance he ever came across in his life." He put his lips to my ear.
"Cannibal?--well, they used to give him the name years and years ago.
You remember the story? A shipwreck on the west side of Stewart Island;
that's right; seven of them got ashore, and it seems they did not get
on very well together. Some men are too cantankerous for anything--don't
know how to make the best of a bad job--don't see things as they are--as
they _are_, my boy! And then what's the consequence? Obvious! Trouble,
trouble; as likely as not a knock on the head; and serve 'em right too.
That sort is the most useful when it's dead. The story goes that a boat
of Her Majesty's ship Wolverine found him kneeling on the kelp, naked as
the day he was born, and chanting some psalm-tune or other; light snow
was falling at the time. He waited till the boat was an oar's length
from the shore, and then up and away. They chased him for an hour up and
down the boulders, till a marihe flung a stone that took him behind
the ear providentially and knocked him senseless. Alone? Of course. But
that's like that tale of sealing-schooners; the Lord God knows the right
and the wrong of that story. The cutter did not investigate much. They
wrapped him in a boat-cloak and took him off as quick as they could,
with a dark night coming on, the weather threatening, and the ship
firing recall guns every five minutes. Three weeks afterwards he was as
well as ever. He didn't allow any fuss that was made on shore to upset
him; he just shut his lips tight, and let people screech. It was bad
enough to have lost his ship, and all he was worth besides, without
paying attention to the hard names they called him. That's the man for
me." He lifted his arm for a signal to some one down the street. "He's
got a little money, so I had to let him into my thing. Had to! It
would have been sinful to throw away such a find, and I was cleaned out
myself. It cut me to the quick, but I could see the matter just as
it was, and if I _must_ share--thinks I--with any man, then give me
Robinson. I left him at breakfast in the hotel to come to court, because
I've an idea. . . . Ah! Good morning, Captain Robinson. . . . Friend of
mine, Captain Robinson."

'An emaciated patriarch in a suit of white drill, a solah topi with a
green-lined rim on a head trembling with age, joined us after crossing
the street in a trotting shuffle, and stood propped with both hands on
the handle of an umbrella. A white beard with amber streaks hung lumpily
down to his waist. He blinked his creased eyelids at me in a bewildered
way. "How do you do? how do you do?" he piped amiably, and tottered. "A
little deaf," said Chester aside. "Did you drag him over six thousand
miles to get a cheap steamer?" I asked. "I would have taken him twice
round the world as soon as look at him," said Chester with immense
energy. "The steamer will be the making of us, my lad. Is it my fault
that every skipper and shipowner in the whole of blessed Australasia
turns out a blamed fool? Once I talked for three hours to a man in
Auckland. 'Send a ship,' I said, 'send a ship. I'll give you half of the
first cargo for yourself, free gratis for nothing--just to make a good
start.' Says he, 'I wouldn't do it if there was no other place on
earth to send a ship to.' Perfect ass, of course. Rocks, currents, no
anchorage, sheer cliff to lay to, no insurance company would take the
risk, didn't see how he could get loaded under three years. Ass! I
nearly went on my knees to him. 'But look at the thing as it is,' says
I. 'Damn rocks and hurricanes. Look at it as it is. There's guano there
Queensland sugar-planters would fight for--fight for on the quay, I
tell you.' . . . What can you do with a fool? . . . 'That's one of your
little jokes, Chester,' he says. . . . Joke! I could have wept. Ask
Captain Robinson here. . . . And there was another shipowning fellow--a
fat chap in a white waistcoat in Wellington, who seemed to think I was
up to some swindle or other. 'I don't know what sort of fool you're
looking for,' he says, 'but I am busy just now. Good morning.' I longed
to take him in my two hands and smash him through the window of his own
office. But I didn't. I was as mild as a curate. 'Think of it,' says I.
'_Do_ think it over. I'll call to-morrow.' He grunted something about
being 'out all day.' On the stairs I felt ready to beat my head against
the wall from vexation. Captain Robinson here can tell you. It was awful
to think of all that lovely stuff lying waste under the sun--stuff that
would send the sugar-cane shooting sky-high. The making of Queensland!
The making of Queensland! And in Brisbane, where I went to have a last
try, they gave me the name of a lunatic. Idiots! The only sensible man
I came across was the cabman who drove me about. A broken-down swell he
was, I fancy. Hey! Captain Robinson? You remember I told you about my
cabby in Brisbane--don't you? The chap had a wonderful eye for things.
He saw it all in a jiffy. It was a real pleasure to talk with him. One
evening after a devil of a day amongst shipowners I felt so bad that,
says I, 'I must get drunk. Come along; I must get drunk, or I'll go
mad.' 'I am your man,' he says; 'go ahead.' I don't know what I would
have done without him. Hey! Captain Robinson."

'He poked the ribs of his partner. "He! he! he!" laughed the Ancient,
looked aimlessly down the street, then peered at me doubtfully with sad,
dim pupils. . . . "He! he! he!" . . . He leaned heavier on the umbrella,
and dropped his gaze on the ground. I needn't tell you I had tried to
get away several times, but Chester had foiled every attempt by simply
catching hold of my coat. "One minute. I've a notion." "What's your
infernal notion?" I exploded at last. "If you think I am going in with
you . . ." "No, no, my boy. Too late, if you wanted ever so much. We've
got a steamer." "You've got the ghost of a steamer," I said. "Good
enough for a start--there's no superior nonsense about us. Is there,
Captain Robinson?" "No! no! no!" croaked the old man without lifting
his eyes, and the senile tremble of his head became almost fierce with
determination. "I understand you know that young chap," said Chester,
with a nod at the street from which Jim had disappeared long ago. "He's
been having grub with you in the Malabar last night--so I was told."

'I said that was true, and after remarking that he too liked to live
well and in style, only that, for the present, he had to be saving of
every penny--"none too many for the business! Isn't that so, Captain
Robinson?"--he squared his shoulders and stroked his dumpy moustache,
while the notorious Robinson, coughing at his side, clung more than ever
to the handle of the umbrella, and seemed ready to subside passively
into a heap of old bones. "You see, the old chap has all the money,"
whispered Chester confidentially. "I've been cleaned out trying to
engineer the dratted thing. But wait a bit, wait a bit. The good time is
coming." . . . He seemed suddenly astonished at the signs of impatience
I gave. "Oh, crakee!" he cried; "I am telling you of the biggest thing
that ever was, and you . . ." "I have an appointment," I pleaded mildly.
"What of that?" he asked with genuine surprise; "let it wait." "That's
exactly what I am doing now," I remarked; "hadn't you better tell me
what it is you want?" "Buy twenty hotels like that," he growled to
himself; "and every joker boarding in them too--twenty times over." He
lifted his head smartly "I want that young chap." "I don't understand,"
I said. "He's no good, is he?" said Chester crisply. "I know nothing
about it," I protested. "Why, you told me yourself he was taking it to
heart," argued Chester. "Well, in my opinion a chap who . . . Anyhow, he
can't be much good; but then you see I am on the look-out for somebody,
and I've just got a thing that will suit him. I'll give him a job on
my island." He nodded significantly. "I'm going to dump forty coolies
there--if I've to steal 'em. Somebody must work the stuff. Oh! I mean
to act square: wooden shed, corrugated-iron roof--I know a man in Hobart
who will take my bill at six months for the materials. I do. Honour
bright. Then there's the water-supply. I'll have to fly round and get
somebody to trust me for half-a-dozen second-hand iron tanks. Catch
rain-water, hey? Let him take charge. Make him supreme boss over the
coolies. Good idea, isn't it? What do you say?" "There are whole years
when not a drop of rain falls on Walpole," I said, too amazed to laugh.
He bit his lip and seemed bothered. "Oh, well, I will fix up something
for them--or land a supply. Hang it all! That's not the question."

'I said nothing. I had a rapid vision of Jim perched on a shadowless
rock, up to his knees in guano, with the screams of sea-birds in his
ears, the incandescent ball of the sun above his head; the empty sky and
the empty ocean all a-quiver, simmering together in the heat as far as
the eye could reach. "I wouldn't advise my worst enemy . . ." I began.
"What's the matter with you?" cried Chester; "I mean to give him a good
screw--that is, as soon as the thing is set going, of course. It's as
easy as falling off a log. Simply nothing to do; two six-shooters in his
belt . . . Surely he wouldn't be afraid of anything forty coolies could
do--with two six-shooters and he the only armed man too! It's much
better than it looks. I want you to help me to talk him over." "No!"
I shouted. Old Robinson lifted his bleared eyes dismally for a moment,
Chester looked at me with infinite contempt. "So you wouldn't advise
him?" he uttered slowly. "Certainly not," I answered, as indignant as
though he had requested me to help murder somebody; "moreover, I am sure
he wouldn't. He is badly cut up, but he isn't mad as far as I know." "He
is no earthly good for anything," Chester mused aloud. "He would just
have done for me. If you only could see a thing as it is, you would
see it's the very thing for him. And besides . . . Why! it's the most
splendid, sure chance . . ." He got angry suddenly. "I must have a man.
There! . . ." He stamped his foot and smiled unpleasantly. "Anyhow, I
could guarantee the island wouldn't sink under him--and I believe he
is a bit particular on that point." "Good morning," I said curtly. He
looked at me as though I had been an incomprehensible fool. . . . "Must
be moving, Captain Robinson," he yelled suddenly into the old man's ear.
"These Parsee Johnnies are waiting for us to clinch the bargain." He
took his partner under the arm with a firm grip, swung him round, and,
unexpectedly, leered at me over his shoulder. "I was trying to do him
a kindness," he asserted, with an air and tone that made my blood boil.
"Thank you for nothing--in his name," I rejoined. "Oh! you are devilish
smart," he sneered; "but you are like the rest of them. Too much in the
clouds. See what you will do with him." "I don't know that I want to
do anything with him." "Don't you?" he spluttered; his grey moustache
bristled with anger, and by his side the notorious Robinson, propped
on the umbrella, stood with his back to me, as patient and still as a
worn-out cab-horse. "I haven't found a guano island," I said. "It's
my belief you wouldn't know one if you were led right up to it by the
hand," he riposted quickly; "and in this world you've got to see a thing
first, before you can make use of it. Got to see it through and through
at that, neither more nor less." "And get others to see it, too," I
insinuated, with a glance at the bowed back by his side. Chester snorted
at me. "His eyes are right enough--don't you worry. He ain't a puppy."
"Oh, dear, no!" I said. "Come along, Captain Robinson," he shouted, with
a sort of bullying deference under the rim of the old man's hat; the
Holy Terror gave a submissive little jump. The ghost of a steamer was
waiting for them, Fortune on that fair isle! They made a curious pair
of Argonauts. Chester strode on leisurely, well set up, portly, and of
conquering mien; the other, long, wasted, drooping, and hooked to his
arm, shuffled his withered shanks with desperate haste.''I did not start in search of Jim at once, only because I had really an
appointment which I could not neglect. Then, as ill-luck would have
it, in my agent's office I was fastened upon by a fellow fresh from
Madagascar with a little scheme for a wonderful piece of business. It
had something to do with cattle and cartridges and a Prince Ravonalo
something; but the pivot of the whole affair was the stupidity of some
admiral--Admiral Pierre, I think. Everything turned on that, and the
chap couldn't find words strong enough to express his confidence. He had
globular eyes starting out of his head with a fishy glitter, bumps on
his forehead, and wore his long hair brushed back without a parting.
He had a favourite phrase which he kept on repeating triumphantly, "The
minimum of risk with the maximum of profit is my motto. What?" He made
my head ache, spoiled my tiffin, but got his own out of me all right;
and as soon as I had shaken him off, I made straight for the water-side.
I caught sight of Jim leaning over the parapet of the quay. Three native
boatmen quarrelling over five annas were making an awful row at his
elbow. He didn't hear me come up, but spun round as if the slight
contact of my finger had released a catch. "I was looking," he
stammered. I don't remember what I said, not much anyhow, but he made no
difficulty in following me to the hotel.

'He followed me as manageable as a little child, with an obedient air,
with no sort of manifestation, rather as though he had been waiting
for me there to come along and carry him off. I need not have been so
surprised as I was at his tractability. On all the round earth, which to
some seems so big and that others affect to consider as rather smaller
than a mustard-seed, he had no place where he could--what shall I
say?--where he could withdraw. That's it! Withdraw--be alone with his
loneliness. He walked by my side very calm, glancing here and there, and
once turned his head to look after a Sidiboy fireman in a cutaway coat
and yellowish trousers, whose black face had silky gleams like a lump
of anthracite coal. I doubt, however, whether he saw anything, or even
remained all the time aware of my companionship, because if I had not
edged him to the left here, or pulled him to the right there, I believe
he would have gone straight before him in any direction till stopped by
a wall or some other obstacle. I steered him into my bedroom, and sat
down at once to write letters. This was the only place in the world
(unless, perhaps, the Walpole Reef--but that was not so handy) where he
could have it out with himself without being bothered by the rest of
the universe. The damned thing--as he had expressed it--had not made
him invisible, but I behaved exactly as though he were. No sooner in my
chair I bent over my writing-desk like a medieval scribe, and, but for
the movement of the hand holding the pen, remained anxiously quiet. I
can't say I was frightened; but I certainly kept as still as if there
had been something dangerous in the room, that at the first hint of a
movement on my part would be provoked to pounce upon me. There was not
much in the room--you know how these bedrooms are--a sort of four-poster
bedstead under a mosquito-net, two or three chairs, the table I was
writing at, a bare floor. A glass door opened on an upstairs verandah,
and he stood with his face to it, having a hard time with all possible
privacy. Dusk fell; I lit a candle with the greatest economy of movement
and as much prudence as though it were an illegal proceeding. There is
no doubt that he had a very hard time of it, and so had I, even to the
point, I must own, of wishing him to the devil, or on Walpole Reef at
least. It occurred to me once or twice that, after all, Chester was,
perhaps, the man to deal effectively with such a disaster. That strange
idealist had found a practical use for it at once--unerringly, as it
were. It was enough to make one suspect that, maybe, he really could see
the true aspect of things that appeared mysterious or utterly hopeless
to less imaginative persons. I wrote and wrote; I liquidated all the
arrears of my correspondence, and then went on writing to people who had
no reason whatever to expect from me a gossipy letter about nothing at
all. At times I stole a sidelong glance. He was rooted to the spot,
but convulsive shudders ran down his back; his shoulders would heave
suddenly. He was fighting, he was fighting--mostly for his breath, as it
seemed. The massive shadows, cast all one way from the straight flame of
the candle, seemed possessed of gloomy consciousness; the immobility of
the furniture had to my furtive eye an air of attention. I was becoming
fanciful in the midst of my industrious scribbling; and though, when the
scratching of my pen stopped for a moment, there was complete silence
and stillness in the room, I suffered from that profound disturbance
and confusion of thought which is caused by a violent and menacing
uproar--of a heavy gale at sea, for instance. Some of you may know what
I mean: that mingled anxiety, distress, and irritation with a sort of
craven feeling creeping in--not pleasant to acknowledge, but which gives
a quite special merit to one's endurance. I don't claim any merit
for standing the stress of Jim's emotions; I could take refuge in the
letters; I could have written to strangers if necessary. Suddenly, as I
was taking up a fresh sheet of notepaper, I heard a low sound, the first
sound that, since we had been shut up together, had come to my ears in
the dim stillness of the room. I remained with my head down, with my
hand arrested. Those who have kept vigil by a sick-bed have heard such
faint sounds in the stillness of the night watches, sounds wrung from a
racked body, from a weary soul. He pushed the glass door with such force
that all the panes rang: he stepped out, and I held my breath, straining
my ears without knowing what else I expected to hear. He was really
taking too much to heart an empty formality which to Chester's rigorous
criticism seemed unworthy the notice of a man who could see things as
they were. An empty formality; a piece of parchment. Well, well. As to
an inaccessible guano deposit, that was another story altogether. One
could intelligibly break one's heart over that. A feeble burst of many
voices mingled with the tinkle of silver and glass floated up from the
dining-room below; through the open door the outer edge of the light
from my candle fell on his back faintly; beyond all was black; he stood
on the brink of a vast obscurity, like a lonely figure by the shore of
a sombre and hopeless ocean. There was the Walpole Reef in it--to
be sure--a speck in the dark void, a straw for the drowning man. My
compassion for him took the shape of the thought that I wouldn't have
liked his people to see him at that moment. I found it trying myself.
His back was no longer shaken by his gasps; he stood straight as an
arrow, faintly visible and still; and the meaning of this stillness sank
to the bottom of my soul like lead into the water, and made it so heavy
that for a second I wished heartily that the only course left open for
me was to pay for his funeral. Even the law had done with him. To bury
him would have been such an easy kindness! It would have been so much
in accordance with the wisdom of life, which consists in putting out of
sight all the reminders of our folly, of our weakness, of our mortality;
all that makes against our efficiency--the memory of our failures, the
hints of our undying fears, the bodies of our dead friends. Perhaps he
did take it too much to heart. And if so then--Chester's offer. . . . At
this point I took up a fresh sheet and began to write resolutely. There
was nothing but myself between him and the dark ocean. I had a sense of
responsibility. If I spoke, would that motionless and suffering youth
leap into the obscurity--clutch at the straw? I found out how difficult
it may be sometimes to make a sound. There is a weird power in a spoken
word. And why the devil not? I was asking myself persistently while I
drove on with my writing. All at once, on the blank page, under the very
point of the pen, the two figures of Chester and his antique partner,
very distinct and complete, would dodge into view with stride and
gestures, as if reproduced in the field of some optical toy. I would
watch them for a while. No! They were too phantasmal and extravagant
to enter into any one's fate. And a word carries far--very far--deals
destruction through time as the bullets go flying through space. I said
nothing; and he, out there with his back to the light, as if bound
and gagged by all the invisible foes of man, made no stir and made no
sound.'

'The time was coming when I should see him loved, trusted, admired, with
a legend of strength and prowess forming round his name as though he
had been the stuff of a hero. It's true--I assure you; as true as
I'm sitting here talking about him in vain. He, on his side, had that
faculty of beholding at a hint the face of his desire and the shape
of his dream, without which the earth would know no lover and no
adventurer. He captured much honour and an Arcadian happiness (I won't
say anything about innocence) in the bush, and it was as good to him
as the honour and the Arcadian happiness of the streets to another man.
Felicity, felicity--how shall I say it?--is quaffed out of a golden cup
in every latitude: the flavour is with you--with you alone, and you can
make it as intoxicating as you please. He was of the sort that would
drink deep, as you may guess from what went before. I found him, if not
exactly intoxicated, then at least flushed with the elixir at his lips.
He had not obtained it at once. There had been, as you know, a period of
probation amongst infernal ship-chandlers, during which he had suffered
and I had worried about--about--my trust--you may call it. I don't
know that I am completely reassured now, after beholding him in all his
brilliance. That was my last view of him--in a strong light, dominating,
and yet in complete accord with his surroundings--with the life of the
forests and with the life of men. I own that I was impressed, but I must
admit to myself that after all this is not the lasting impression. He
was protected by his isolation, alone of his own superior kind, in close
touch with Nature, that keeps faith on such easy terms with her lovers.
But I cannot fix before my eye the image of his safety. I shall always
remember him as seen through the open door of my room, taking, perhaps,
too much to heart the mere consequences of his failure. I am pleased,
of course, that some good--and even some splendour--came out of my
endeavours; but at times it seems to me it would have been better for my
peace of mind if I had not stood between him and Chester's confoundedly
generous offer. I wonder what his exuberant imagination would have made
of Walpole islet--that most hopelessly forsaken crumb of dry land on the
face of the waters. It is not likely I would ever have heard, for I must
tell you that Chester, after calling at some Australian port to patch
up his brig-rigged sea-anachronism, steamed out into the Pacific with a
crew of twenty-two hands all told, and the only news having a possible
bearing upon the mystery of his fate was the news of a hurricane which
is supposed to have swept in its course over the Walpole shoals, a month
or so afterwards. Not a vestige of the Argonauts ever turned up; not a
sound came out of the waste. Finis! The Pacific is the most discreet of
live, hot-tempered oceans: the chilly Antarctic can keep a secret too,
but more in the manner of a grave.

'And there is a sense of blessed finality in such discretion, which is
what we all more or less sincerely are ready to admit--for what else is
it that makes the idea of death supportable? End! Finis! the potent word
that exorcises from the house of life the haunting shadow of fate. This
is what--notwithstanding the testimony of my eyes and his own earnest
assurances--I miss when I look back upon Jim's success. While there's
life there is hope, truly; but there is fear too. I don't mean to say
that I regret my action, nor will I pretend that I can't sleep o' nights
in consequence; still, the idea obtrudes itself that he made so much of
his disgrace while it is the guilt alone that matters. He was not--if I
may say so--clear to me. He was not clear. And there is a suspicion he
was not clear to himself either. There were his fine sensibilities,
his fine feelings, his fine longings--a sort of sublimated, idealised
selfishness. He was--if you allow me to say so--very fine; very
fine--and very unfortunate. A little coarser nature would not have borne
the strain; it would have had to come to terms with itself--with a sigh,
with a grunt, or even with a guffaw; a still coarser one would have
remained invulnerably ignorant and completely uninteresting.

'But he was too interesting or too unfortunate to be thrown to the dogs,
or even to Chester. I felt this while I sat with my face over the paper
and he fought and gasped, struggling for his breath in that terribly
stealthy way, in my room; I felt it when he rushed out on the verandah
as if to fling himself over--and didn't; I felt it more and more all the
time he remained outside, faintly lighted on the background of night, as
if standing on the shore of a sombre and hopeless sea.

'An abrupt heavy rumble made me lift my head. The noise seemed to roll
away, and suddenly a searching and violent glare fell on the blind face
of the night. The sustained and dazzling flickers seemed to last for an
unconscionable time. The growl of the thunder increased steadily while I
looked at him, distinct and black, planted solidly upon the shores of a
sea of light. At the moment of greatest brilliance the darkness leaped
back with a culminating crash, and he vanished before my dazzled eyes as
utterly as though he had been blown to atoms. A blustering sigh passed;
furious hands seemed to tear at the shrubs, shake the tops of the
trees below, slam doors, break window-panes, all along the front of
the building. He stepped in, closing the door behind him, and found me
bending over the table: my sudden anxiety as to what he would say was
very great, and akin to a fright. "May I have a cigarette?" he asked. I
gave a push to the box without raising my head. "I want--want--tobacco,"
he muttered. I became extremely buoyant. "Just a moment." I grunted
pleasantly. He took a few steps here and there. "That's over," I heard
him say. A single distant clap of thunder came from the sea like a
gun of distress. "The monsoon breaks up early this year," he remarked
conversationally, somewhere behind me. This encouraged me to turn round,
which I did as soon as I had finished addressing the last envelope. He
was smoking greedily in the middle of the room, and though he heard the
stir I made, he remained with his back to me for a time.

'"Come--I carried it off pretty well," he said, wheeling suddenly.
"Something's paid off--not much. I wonder what's to come." His face did
not show any emotion, only it appeared a little darkened and swollen, as
though he had been holding his breath. He smiled reluctantly as it
were, and went on while I gazed up at him mutely. . . . "Thank you,
though--your room--jolly convenient--for a chap--badly hipped." . . .
The rain pattered and swished in the garden; a water-pipe (it must
have had a hole in it) performed just outside the window a parody of
blubbering woe with funny sobs and gurgling lamentations, interrupted
by jerky spasms of silence. . . . "A bit of shelter," he mumbled and
ceased.

'A flash of faded lightning darted in through the black framework of the
windows and ebbed out without any noise. I was thinking how I had best
approach him (I did not want to be flung off again) when he gave a
little laugh. "No better than a vagabond now" . . . the end of
the cigarette smouldered between his fingers . . . "without a
single--single," he pronounced slowly; "and yet . . ." He paused; the
rain fell with redoubled violence. "Some day one's bound to come upon
some sort of chance to get it all back again. Must!" he whispered
distinctly, glaring at my boots.

'I did not even know what it was he wished so much to regain, what it
was he had so terribly missed. It might have been so much that it was
impossible to say. A piece of ass's skin, according to Chester. . . .
He looked up at me inquisitively. "Perhaps. If life's long enough," I
muttered through my teeth with unreasonable animosity. "Don't reckon too
much on it."

'"Jove! I feel as if nothing could ever touch me," he said in a tone
of sombre conviction. "If this business couldn't knock me over, then
there's no fear of there being not enough time to--climb out, and . . ."
He looked upwards.

'It struck me that it is from such as he that the great army of waifs
and strays is recruited, the army that marches down, down into all the
gutters of the earth. As soon as he left my room, that "bit of shelter,"
he would take his place in the ranks, and begin the journey towards the
bottomless pit. I at least had no illusions; but it was I, too, who a
moment ago had been so sure of the power of words, and now was afraid to
speak, in the same way one dares not move for fear of losing a slippery
hold. It is when we try to grapple with another man's intimate need that
we perceive how incomprehensible, wavering, and misty are the beings
that share with us the sight of the stars and the warmth of the sun. It
is as if loneliness were a hard and absolute condition of existence; the
envelope of flesh and blood on which our eyes are fixed melts before the
outstretched hand, and there remains only the capricious, unconsolable,
and elusive spirit that no eye can follow, no hand can grasp. It was
the fear of losing him that kept me silent, for it was borne upon me
suddenly and with unaccountable force that should I let him slip away
into the darkness I would never forgive myself.

'"Well. Thanks--once more. You've been--er--uncommonly--really there's
no word to . . . Uncommonly! I don't know why, I am sure. I am afraid
I don't feel as grateful as I would if the whole thing hadn't been so
brutally sprung on me. Because at bottom . . . you, yourself . . ." He
stuttered.

'"Possibly," I struck in. He frowned.

'"All the same, one is responsible." He watched me like a hawk.

'"And that's true, too," I said.

'"Well. I've gone with it to the end, and I don't intend to let any man
cast it in my teeth without--without--resenting it." He clenched his
fist.

'"There's yourself," I said with a smile--mirthless enough, God
knows--but he looked at me menacingly. "That's my business," he said.
An air of indomitable resolution came and went upon his face like a vain
and passing shadow. Next moment he looked a dear good boy in trouble,
as before. He flung away the cigarette. "Good-bye," he said, with the
sudden haste of a man who had lingered too long in view of a pressing
bit of work waiting for him; and then for a second or so he made not the
slightest movement. The downpour fell with the heavy uninterrupted rush
of a sweeping flood, with a sound of unchecked overwhelming fury that
called to one's mind the images of collapsing bridges, of uprooted
trees, of undermined mountains. No man could breast the colossal and
headlong stream that seemed to break and swirl against the dim stillness
in which we were precariously sheltered as if on an island. The
perforated pipe gurgled, choked, spat, and splashed in odious ridicule
of a swimmer fighting for his life. "It is raining," I remonstrated,
"and I . . ." "Rain or shine," he began brusquely, checked himself, and
walked to the window. "Perfect deluge," he muttered after a while: he
leaned his forehead on the glass. "It's dark, too."

'"Yes, it is very dark," I said.

'He pivoted on his heels, crossed the room, and had actually opened the
door leading into the corridor before I leaped up from my chair. "Wait,"
I cried, "I want you to . . ." "I can't dine with you again to-night,"
he flung at me, with one leg out of the room already. "I haven't the
slightest intention to ask you," I shouted. At this he drew back his
foot, but remained mistrustfully in the very doorway. I lost no time
in entreating him earnestly not to be absurd; to come in and shut the
door.'

'He came in at last; but I believe it was mostly the rain that did it;
it was falling just then with a devastating violence which quieted
down gradually while we talked. His manner was very sober and set; his
bearing was that of a naturally taciturn man possessed by an idea. My
talk was of the material aspect of his position; it had the sole aim of
saving him from the degradation, ruin, and despair that out there close
so swiftly upon a friendless, homeless man; I pleaded with him to
accept my help; I argued reasonably: and every time I looked up at that
absorbed smooth face, so grave and youthful, I had a disturbing sense of
being no help but rather an obstacle to some mysterious, inexplicable,
impalpable striving of his wounded spirit.

'"I suppose you intend to eat and drink and to sleep under shelter in
the usual way," I remember saying with irritation. "You say you won't
touch the money that is due to you." . . . He came as near as his sort
can to making a gesture of horror. (There were three weeks and five
days' pay owing him as mate of the Patna.) "Well, that's too little to
matter anyhow; but what will you do to-morrow? Where will you turn? You
must live . . ." "That isn't the thing," was the comment that escaped
him under his breath. I ignored it, and went on combating what I assumed
to be the scruples of an exaggerated delicacy. "On every conceivable
ground," I concluded, "you must let me help you." "You can't," he said
very simply and gently, and holding fast to some deep idea which I
could detect shimmering like a pool of water in the dark, but which
I despaired of ever approaching near enough to fathom. I surveyed his
well-proportioned bulk. "At any rate," I said, "I am able to help what
I can see of you. I don't pretend to do more." He shook his head
sceptically without looking at me. I got very warm. "But I can," I
insisted. "I can do even more. I _am_ doing more. I am trusting
you . . ." "The money . . ." he began. "Upon my word you deserve being
told to go to the devil," I cried, forcing the note of indignation. He
was startled, smiled, and I pressed my attack home. "It isn't a question
of money at all. You are too superficial," I said (and at the same time
I was thinking to myself: Well, here goes! And perhaps he is, after
all). "Look at the letter I want you to take. I am writing to a man of
whom I've never asked a favour, and I am writing about you in terms that
one only ventures to use when speaking of an intimate friend. I make
myself unreservedly responsible for you. That's what I am doing. And
really if you will only reflect a little what that means . . ."

'He lifted his head. The rain had passed away; only the water-pipe went
on shedding tears with an absurd drip, drip outside the window. It was
very quiet in the room, whose shadows huddled together in corners, away
from the still flame of the candle flaring upright in the shape of a
dagger; his face after a while seemed suffused by a reflection of a soft
light as if the dawn had broken already.

'"Jove!" he gasped out. "It is noble of you!"

'Had he suddenly put out his tongue at me in derision, I could not have
felt more humiliated. I thought to myself--Serve me right for a sneaking
humbug. . . . His eyes shone straight into my face, but I perceived
it was not a mocking brightness. All at once he sprang into jerky
agitation, like one of those flat wooden figures that are worked by a
string. His arms went up, then came down with a slap. He became another
man altogether. "And I had never seen," he shouted; then suddenly bit
his lip and frowned. "What a bally ass I've been," he said very slow
in an awed tone. . . . "You are a brick!" he cried next in a muffled
voice. He snatched my hand as though he had just then seen it for the
first time, and dropped it at once. "Why! this is what I--you--I . . ."
he stammered, and then with a return of his old stolid, I may say
mulish, manner he began heavily, "I would be a brute now if I . . ." and
then his voice seemed to break. "That's all right," I said. I was almost
alarmed by this display of feeling, through which pierced a strange
elation. I had pulled the string accidentally, as it were; I did not
fully understand the working of the toy. "I must go now," he said.
"Jove! You _have_ helped me. Can't sit still. The very thing . . ." He
looked at me with puzzled admiration. "The very thing . . ."

'Of course it was the thing. It was ten to one that I had saved him from
starvation--of that peculiar sort that is almost invariably associated
with drink. This was all. I had not a single illusion on that score, but
looking at him, I allowed myself to wonder at the nature of the one he
had, within the last three minutes, so evidently taken into his bosom.
I had forced into his hand the means to carry on decently the serious
business of life, to get food, drink, and shelter of the customary kind
while his wounded spirit, like a bird with a broken wing, might hop and
flutter into some hole to die quietly of inanition there. This is what
I had thrust upon him: a definitely small thing; and--behold!--by the
manner of its reception it loomed in the dim light of the candle like
a big, indistinct, perhaps a dangerous shadow. "You don't mind me not
saying anything appropriate," he burst out. "There isn't anything one
could say. Last night already you had done me no end of good. Listening
to me--you know. I give you my word I've thought more than once the top
of my head would fly off. . ." He darted--positively darted--here and
there, rammed his hands into his pockets, jerked them out again, flung
his cap on his head. I had no idea it was in him to be so airily
brisk. I thought of a dry leaf imprisoned in an eddy of wind, while a
mysterious apprehension, a load of indefinite doubt, weighed me down in
my chair. He stood stock-still, as if struck motionless by a discovery.
"You have given me confidence," he declared, soberly. "Oh! for God's
sake, my dear fellow--don't!" I entreated, as though he had hurt me.
"All right. I'll shut up now and henceforth. Can't prevent me thinking
though. . . . Never mind! . . . I'll show yet . . ." He went to the
door in a hurry, paused with his head down, and came back, stepping
deliberately. "I always thought that if a fellow could begin with a
clean slate . . . And now you . . . in a measure . . . yes . . . clean
slate." I waved my hand, and he marched out without looking back; the
sound of his footfalls died out gradually behind the closed door--the
unhesitating tread of a man walking in broad daylight.

'But as to me, left alone with the solitary candle, I remained strangely
unenlightened. I was no longer young enough to behold at every turn
the magnificence that besets our insignificant footsteps in good and in
evil. I smiled to think that, after all, it was yet he, of us two, who
had the light. And I felt sad. A clean slate, did he say? As if the
initial word of each our destiny were not graven in imperishable
characters upon the face of a rock.'
'Six months afterwards my friend (he was a cynical, more than
middle-aged bachelor, with a reputation for eccentricity, and owned
a rice-mill) wrote to me, and judging, from the warmth of my
recommendation, that I would like to hear, enlarged a little upon Jim's
perfections. These were apparently of a quiet and effective sort.
"Not having been able so far to find more in my heart than a resigned
toleration for any individual of my kind, I have lived till now alone
in a house that even in this steaming climate could be considered as too
big for one man. I have had him to live with me for some time past. It
seems I haven't made a mistake." It seemed to me on reading this letter
that my friend had found in his heart more than tolerance for Jim--that
there were the beginnings of active liking. Of course he stated his
grounds in a characteristic way. For one thing, Jim kept his freshness
in the climate. Had he been a girl--my friend wrote--one could have
said he was blooming--blooming modestly--like a violet, not like some of
these blatant tropical flowers. He had been in the house for six weeks,
and had not as yet attempted to slap him on the back, or address him
as "old boy," or try to make him feel a superannuated fossil. He had
nothing of the exasperating young man's chatter. He was good-tempered,
had not much to say for himself, was not clever by any means, thank
goodness--wrote my friend. It appeared, however, that Jim was clever
enough to be quietly appreciative of his wit, while, on the other hand,
he amused him by his naiveness. "The dew is yet on him, and since I
had the bright idea of giving him a room in the house and having him
at meals I feel less withered myself. The other day he took it into his
head to cross the room with no other purpose but to open a door for
me; and I felt more in touch with mankind than I had been for years.
Ridiculous, isn't it? Of course I guess there is something--some awful
little scrape--which you know all about--but if I am sure that it is
terribly heinous, I fancy one could manage to forgive it. For my part,
I declare I am unable to imagine him guilty of anything much worse than
robbing an orchard. Is it much worse? Perhaps you ought to have told me;
but it is such a long time since we both turned saints that you may have
forgotten we, too, had sinned in our time? It may be that some day I
shall have to ask you, and then I shall expect to be told. I don't care
to question him myself till I have some idea what it is. Moreover, it's
too soon as yet. Let him open the door a few times more for me. . . ."
Thus my friend. I was trebly pleased--at Jim's shaping so well, at the
tone of the letter, at my own cleverness. Evidently I had known what
I was doing. I had read characters aright, and so on. And what if
something unexpected and wonderful were to come of it? That evening,
reposing in a deck-chair under the shade of my own poop awning (it
was in Hong-Kong harbour), I laid on Jim's behalf the first stone of a
castle in Spain.

'I made a trip to the northward, and when I returned I found another
letter from my friend waiting for me. It was the first envelope I tore
open. "There are no spoons missing, as far as I know," ran the first
line; "I haven't been interested enough to inquire. He is gone, leaving
on the breakfast-table a formal little note of apology, which is either
silly or heartless. Probably both--and it's all one to me. Allow me to
say, lest you should have some more mysterious young men in reserve,
that I have shut up shop, definitely and for ever. This is the last
eccentricity I shall be guilty of. Do not imagine for a moment that I
care a hang; but he is very much regretted at tennis-parties, and for
my own sake I've told a plausible lie at the club. . . ." I flung the
letter aside and started looking through the batch on my table, till
I came upon Jim's handwriting. Would you believe it? One chance in a
hundred! But it is always that hundredth chance! That little second
engineer of the Patna had turned up in a more or less destitute state,
and got a temporary job of looking after the machinery of the mill. "I
couldn't stand the familiarity of the little beast," Jim wrote from a
seaport seven hundred miles south of the place where he should have been
in clover. "I am now for the time with Egstrom & Blake, ship-chandlers,
as their--well--runner, to call the thing by its right name. For
reference I gave them your name, which they know of course, and if you
could write a word in my favour it would be a permanent employment." I
was utterly crushed under the ruins of my castle, but of course I wrote
as desired. Before the end of the year my new charter took me that way,
and I had an opportunity of seeing him.

'He was still with Egstrom & Blake, and we met in what they called
"our parlour" opening out of the store. He had that moment come in from
boarding a ship, and confronted me head down, ready for a tussle. "What
have you got to say for yourself?" I began as soon as we had shaken
hands. "What I wrote you--nothing more," he said stubbornly. "Did the
fellow blab--or what?" I asked. He looked up at me with a troubled
smile. "Oh, no! He didn't. He made it a kind of confidential business
between us. He was most damnably mysterious whenever I came over to the
mill; he would wink at me in a respectful manner--as much as to say 'We
know what we know.' Infernally fawning and familiar--and that sort of
thing . . ." He threw himself into a chair and stared down his legs.
"One day we happened to be alone and the fellow had the cheek to say,
'Well, Mr. James'--I was called Mr. James there as if I had been the
son--'here we are together once more. This is better than the old
ship--ain't it?' . . . Wasn't it appalling, eh? I looked at him, and
he put on a knowing air. 'Don't you be uneasy, sir,' he says. 'I know
a gentleman when I see one, and I know how a gentleman feels. I hope,
though, you will be keeping me on this job. I had a hard time of it too,
along of that rotten old Patna racket.' Jove! It was awful. I don't know
what I should have said or done if I had not just then heard Mr. Denver
calling me in the passage. It was tiffin-time, and we walked together
across the yard and through the garden to the bungalow. He began to
chaff me in his kindly way . . . I believe he liked me . . ."

'Jim was silent for a while.

'"I know he liked me. That's what made it so hard. Such a splendid man!
. . . That morning he slipped his hand under my arm. . . . He, too, was
familiar with me." He burst into a short laugh, and dropped his chin on
his breast. "Pah! When I remembered how that mean little beast had been
talking to me," he began suddenly in a vibrating voice, "I couldn't bear
to think of myself . . . I suppose you know . . ." I nodded. . . . "More
like a father," he cried; his voice sank. "I would have had to tell him.
I couldn't let it go on--could I?" "Well?" I murmured, after waiting a
while. "I preferred to go," he said slowly; "this thing must be buried."

'We could hear in the shop Blake upbraiding Egstrom in an abusive,
strained voice. They had been associated for many years, and every day
from the moment the doors were opened to the last minute before closing,
Blake, a little man with sleek, jetty hair and unhappy, beady eyes,
could be heard rowing his partner incessantly with a sort of scathing
and plaintive fury. The sound of that everlasting scolding was part of
the place like the other fixtures; even strangers would very soon come
to disregard it completely unless it be perhaps to mutter "Nuisance," or
to get up suddenly and shut the door of the "parlour." Egstrom himself,
a raw-boned, heavy Scandinavian, with a busy manner and immense blonde
whiskers, went on directing his people, checking parcels, making out
bills or writing letters at a stand-up desk in the shop, and comported
himself in that clatter exactly as though he had been stone-deaf. Now
and again he would emit a bothered perfunctory "Sssh," which neither
produced nor was expected to produce the slightest effect. "They are
very decent to me here," said Jim. "Blake's a little cad, but Egstrom's
all right." He stood up quickly, and walking with measured steps to a
tripod telescope standing in the window and pointed at the roadstead,
he applied his eye to it. "There's that ship which has been becalmed
outside all the morning has got a breeze now and is coming in," he
remarked patiently; "I must go and board." We shook hands in silence,
and he turned to go. "Jim!" I cried. He looked round with his hand on
the lock. "You--you have thrown away something like a fortune." He came
back to me all the way from the door. "Such a splendid old chap," he
said. "How could I? How could I?" His lips twitched. "Here it does not
matter." "Oh! you--you--" I began, and had to cast about for a suitable
word, but before I became aware that there was no name that would just
do, he was gone. I heard outside Egstrom's deep gentle voice saying
cheerily, "That's the Sarah W. Granger, Jimmy. You must manage to be
first aboard"; and directly Blake struck in, screaming after the manner
of an outraged cockatoo, "Tell the captain we've got some of his mail
here. That'll fetch him. D'ye hear, Mister What's-your-name?" And there
was Jim answering Egstrom with something boyish in his tone. "All right.
I'll make a race of it." He seemed to take refuge in the boat-sailing
part of that sorry business.

'I did not see him again that trip, but on my next (I had a six months'
charter) I went up to the store. Ten yards away from the door Blake's
scolding met my ears, and when I came in he gave me a glance of utter
wretchedness; Egstrom, all smiles, advanced, extending a large bony
hand. "Glad to see you, captain. . . . Sssh. . . . Been thinking you
were about due back here. What did you say, sir? . . . Sssh. . . . Oh!
him! He has left us. Come into the parlour." . . . After the slam of the
door Blake's strained voice became faint, as the voice of one scolding
desperately in a wilderness. . . . "Put us to a great inconvenience,
too. Used us badly--I must say . . ." "Where's he gone to? Do you
know?" I asked. "No. It's no use asking either," said Egstrom, standing
bewhiskered and obliging before me with his arms hanging down his sides
clumsily, and a thin silver watch-chain looped very low on a rucked-up
blue serge waistcoat. "A man like that don't go anywhere in particular."
I was too concerned at the news to ask for the explanation of that
pronouncement, and he went on. "He left--let's see--the very day a
steamer with returning pilgrims from the Red Sea put in here with
two blades of her propeller gone. Three weeks ago now." "Wasn't there
something said about the Patna case?" I asked, fearing the worst. He
gave a start, and looked at me as if I had been a sorcerer. "Why, yes!
How do you know? Some of them were talking about it here. There was a
captain or two, the manager of Vanlo's engineering shop at the harbour,
two or three others, and myself. Jim was in here too, having a sandwich
and a glass of beer; when we are busy--you see, captain--there's no time
for a proper tiffin. He was standing by this table eating sandwiches,
and the rest of us were round the telescope watching that steamer come
in; and by-and-by Vanlo's manager began to talk about the chief of the
Patna; he had done some repairs for him once, and from that he went on
to tell us what an old ruin she was, and the money that had been made
out of her. He came to mention her last voyage, and then we all struck
in. Some said one thing and some another--not much--what you or any
other man might say; and there was some laughing. Captain O'Brien of the
Sarah W. Granger, a large, noisy old man with a stick--he was sitting
listening to us in this arm-chair here--he let drive suddenly with his
stick at the floor, and roars out, 'Skunks!' . . . Made us all jump.
Vanlo's manager winks at us and asks, 'What's the matter, Captain
O'Brien?' 'Matter! matter!' the old man began to shout; 'what are you
Injuns laughing at? It's no laughing matter. It's a disgrace to human
natur'--that's what it is. I would despise being seen in the same room
with one of those men. Yes, sir!' He seemed to catch my eye like, and
I had to speak out of civility. 'Skunks!' says I, 'of course, Captain
O'Brien, and I wouldn't care to have them here myself, so you're quite
safe in this room, Captain O'Brien. Have a little something cool to
drink.' 'Dam' your drink, Egstrom,' says he, with a twinkle in his eye;
'when I want a drink I will shout for it. I am going to quit. It stinks
here now.' At this all the others burst out laughing, and out they go
after the old man. And then, sir, that blasted Jim he puts down the
sandwich he had in his hand and walks round the table to me; there was
his glass of beer poured out quite full. 'I am off,' he says--just like
this. 'It isn't half-past one yet,' says I; 'you might snatch a smoke
first.' I thought he meant it was time for him to go down to his work.
When I understood what he was up to, my arms fell--so! Can't get a man
like that every day, you know, sir; a regular devil for sailing a boat;
ready to go out miles to sea to meet ships in any sort of weather. More
than once a captain would come in here full of it, and the first thing
he would say would be, 'That's a reckless sort of a lunatic you've got
for water-clerk, Egstrom. I was feeling my way in at daylight under
short canvas when there comes flying out of the mist right under my
forefoot a boat half under water, sprays going over the mast-head, two
frightened niggers on the bottom boards, a yelling fiend at the tiller.
Hey! hey! Ship ahoy! ahoy! Captain! Hey! hey! Egstrom & Blake's man
first to speak to you! Hey! hey! Egstrom & Blake! Hallo! hey! whoop!
Kick the niggers--out reefs--a squall on at the time--shoots ahead
whooping and yelling to me to make sail and he would give me a lead
in--more like a demon than a man. Never saw a boat handled like that in
all my life. Couldn't have been drunk--was he? Such a quiet, soft-spoken
chap too--blush like a girl when he came on board. . . .' I tell you,
Captain Marlow, nobody had a chance against us with a strange ship when
Jim was out. The other ship-chandlers just kept their old customers, and
. . ."

'Egstrom appeared overcome with emotion.

'"Why, sir--it seemed as though he wouldn't mind going a hundred miles
out to sea in an old shoe to nab a ship for the firm. If the business
had been his own and all to make yet, he couldn't have done more in
that way. And now . . . all at once . . . like this! Thinks I to myself:
'Oho! a rise in the screw--that's the trouble--is it?' 'All right,' says
I, 'no need of all that fuss with me, Jimmy. Just mention your figure.
Anything in reason.' He looks at me as if he wanted to swallow something
that stuck in his throat. 'I can't stop with you.' 'What's that blooming
joke?' I asks. He shakes his head, and I could see in his eye he was as
good as gone already, sir. So I turned to him and slanged him till all
was blue. 'What is it you're running away from?' I asks. 'Who has been
getting at you? What scared you? You haven't as much sense as a rat;
they don't clear out from a good ship. Where do you expect to get a
better berth?--you this and you that.' I made him look sick, I can tell
you. 'This business ain't going to sink,' says I. He gave a big jump.
'Good-bye,' he says, nodding at me like a lord; 'you ain't half a
bad chap, Egstrom. I give you my word that if you knew my reasons you
wouldn't care to keep me.' 'That's the biggest lie you ever told in your
life,' says I; 'I know my own mind.' He made me so mad that I had to
laugh. 'Can't you really stop long enough to drink this glass of beer
here, you funny beggar, you?' I don't know what came over him; he didn't
seem able to find the door; something comical, I can tell you, captain.
I drank the beer myself. 'Well, if you're in such a hurry, here's luck
to you in your own drink,' says I; 'only, you mark my words, if you keep
up this game you'll very soon find that the earth ain't big enough to
hold you--that's all.' He gave me one black look, and out he rushed with
a face fit to scare little children."

'Egstrom snorted bitterly, and combed one auburn whisker with knotty
fingers. "Haven't been able to get a man that was any good since. It's
nothing but worry, worry, worry in business. And where might you have
come across him, captain, if it's fair to ask?"

'"He was the mate of the Patna that voyage," I said, feeling that I
owed some explanation. For a time Egstrom remained very still, with his
fingers plunged in the hair at the side of his face, and then exploded.
"And who the devil cares about that?" "I daresay no one," I began . . .
"And what the devil is he--anyhow--for to go on like this?" He stuffed
suddenly his left whisker into his mouth and stood amazed. "Jee!" he
exclaimed, "I told him the earth wouldn't be big enough to hold his
caper."'

Marlow, detained by his chief mate , attends the final day of the Inquiry, where the judgment is to be announced. The entire thing, he thinks to himself, has the sense of an exaggerated view of a common occurrence--where the crime was a very subtle, yet worse than a beheading. The judgments come in: the ship is deemed not to have been seaworthy, but it was navigated properly at the time of the accident. The result, for Jim, is that his certificates are cancelled; he is effectively exiled from the sea. After the event, Marlow hears a voice behind him say, "man overboard" . The man is Chester, a West Australian "pearler, wrecker, trader, whaler" in search of a steamer to buy. He nods in Jim's direction and asks Marlow, "Takes it to heart?" . Marlow nods, and Chester, along with his partner Captain Robinson, an "emaciated patriarch in a suit of white drill" and a white beard, are together embarking in a sordid business scheme on a far-off island, to which Chester suggests that Marlow prod Jim to go and work. Marlow defeats the suggestion, offending Chester and Captain Robinson, but then considers it again in his hotel room as he writes his letters. Jim is with him there, like "a little child" . Marlow admits that he can't help but feel responsibility for the young man who, by that point, "stood on the brink of a vast obscurity, like a lonely figure by the shore of a somber, and hopeless ocean" . The reader learns that Chester and his crew, en route for the sordid business, disappeared into a hurricane. The story continues with a storm, a growl of thunder, and Jim in Marlow's hotel room finally taking his seat. Marlow explains that the letter he is writing is to an old friend of his, one who will give him a home and good work. "You must let me help you," Marlow says. Jim likewise at first resists, but he eventually recognizes the value of chance and this chance. He is grateful, and the scene is described through a tangle of weather and emotion. Six months later, Marlow receives a happy letter from his friend, the owner of a rice mill, who has been enjoying Jim's company thoroughly. Marlow describes it as an "active liking," though the friend is very curious about the nature of Jim's guilt . After a trip north, upon returning to Hong Kong harbor, Marlow finds another letter, this time carrying the news that Jim has gone. Yet another letter in the pile is from Jim himself, who explains that the second engineer of the Patna had appeared to take a temporary job overseeing the machinery of the mill. Jim could not stand to be near him, so he left, and he was now employed with Egstrom & Blake, ship-chandlers, as their water-clerk. Marlow eventually finds himself in those parts, and when he sees Jim, Jim expresses how bad he felt having deserted the man who had become "like a father" . On his next trip to the region, however, Marlow finds that Jim left Egstrom & Blake three weeks earlier, when the Sarah W. Granger came in with pilgrims from the Red Sea. Marlow asks if there was talk of the Patna, and Egstrom, surprised, says that there was. Captain O'Brien called the incident a "disgrace to human nature," and he called all the seamen involved "Skunks!" . He followed this with the comment that "it stinks here now," an ambiguous insinuation that he knew exactly who Jim was, though Egstrom had not understood his meaning at the time. Just after the company departed, Jim set his sandwich down and announced that he would be off. Egstrom says it seemed as if he were running away, and at Jim's parting he said, "mark my words, if you keep up this game you'll very soon find that the earth ain't big enough to hold you" . Jim had been uneasy.

The final judgment of the Inquiry is ironic in deeming the steamship not to be seaworthy, since it had proven its mettle in spite of the damage that had been done to it.  Regardless, the result of Jim's commitment to telling the facts of the incident to the best of his knowledge is the cancellation of his certificates.  In other words, he is exiled from work at sea.  Confined to the land with a kind of death sentence--killing the dreams of romantic adventure Jim might have realized--he receives a chance at a fresh start when Marlow insists on offering him help. The first opportunity that Jim has, however, and one that Marlow rejects for him, is an unpleasant one, and it would have led to a definite death at sea .  Marlow, then, figures as Jim's protector or guardian of his fate.  The fact that Jim knows he can never face his father again calls attention to his need for another man to fill that role for him now.  Marlow, in response, sends Jim to a friend of his with a job at a rice mill; since the man is a bachelor and without children, the hope is apparently that Jim will become an adopted son and inherit the rice mill.  Then, when Marlow receives positive word from his friend that all is going well between Jim and the man, Marlow appears to have been right about Jim's worth: Jim has a good heart and a character worth preserving. Jim's humiliation regarding the Patna incident, however, takes the form of a fundamental character flaw.  This character flaw is more than an aspect of his personality; it constitutes a part of his personal history, and he is unable to release himself from the memory of his action and state of mind at a particularly distressing time.  His personality responds to and obsesses over this failure, and Jim runs away from whatever life he is building if news of the failure penetrates the people around him.  Thus he runs from Marlow's friend and his work, and he likewise runs from the ship-chandlers.  In both places, he achieved an amiable intimacy with these other persons, but in both cases his "clean slate" is sullied.  It is too much for him to bear when the second engineer from the Patna arrives at the rice mill for employment, and the ship captain arriving at Egstrom & Blake seems to recognize who Jim is by his comment that "it stinks here now." Having exhausted his other resources, Marlow soon will turn to his friend Stein for help. Jim's behavior evinces a desire to seek and remain in a space that is "a clean slate," free of the memory of his failure.  He seeks to be anonymous and to begin again.  Chester's statement to Marlow was that Jim takes it all too much to heart, and this observation is correct: Jim's failure has become too much a part of his personality.  Although Jim runs, the circulating nature of story of rumor in these colonial reaches means that word of mouth travels far--Egstrom even states that the entire earth will not be big enough to hide from the past.  The question now is: How will Jim mature, given this flaw and the way it has been expressed through his actions?