He searched me for a moment as if it was an insulting proposal. I knew he felt it as a distinct shock.
"Wood, I have never allowed myself to think of that time. I am cowardly, I suppose, and then I don't know where to send her, yet. I don't believe she would know how to behave in girl's clothes. She has always dressed as she does now and never has craved the flub-dubs and finery of other girls."
"So much more reason you should not let her go on longer in this way. It is time now for her to come into her education and the refinements of young womanhood."
"Yes, I know you are right, but have I got the courage? I hate to see her go at all, especially without a name. It's a fearful thing, Wood. And into that country that first treated me so well and then turned it to dead-sea fruit. Nothing but ashes inside, bitter, scalding ashes."
"The world, that world, has not finished with you. Perhaps it will yet pronounce you great. You have done pretty well toward retrieving yourself. Bitter thoughts projected into the world are as substantial things as poisoned arrows, dum-dum bullets or atrocities, and may eventually return to plague us. If you can still improve in that direction I predict big things for you. Do you understand me, Howard?"
"Wood, I comprehend;—a short time ago I would not. But the difference between theory and actual practice is great. You give me an awful big order."
"I know it is, but you have already begun to fill it without coaching. Make a mighty effort—such an effort as only Howard Byng can make and the ashes of this dead-sea fruit that you have been eating in pretty good quantities, will turn into a tonic to spur you on to more wonderful things—a magnificent life. I admit it is not a small thing to let little Jim leave you now, but it strikes me it is a real test. Are you going to let the bigness of Howard Byng come to the front?"
"I know you are right," said he, walking, with head down, down along the pier toward his valuable warehouse, "maybe I just need someone like you to prod and goad it into me, to put a rowel into my selfishness and make me wake up, but—but, you see, I don't know yet where and how to send her. I have always thought of taking her myself, but there's no time for that now."
"Are you willing to be guided by me in the matter?"