“But I have no property, or next to none. No, no, that won’t do.”
“You desire to visit your friends in Ireland.”
“Just as bad. I have as little friends as fortune. Try again.”
“Why should not Captain Dodge have sent for you; you left him very ill, and confined to bed, I understand?”
“He told Sir Gervais to keep me as long as possible; that the air of the hospital was bad for me, and had brought back my ague.”
“If you are so very scrupulous, Sir, as to what people generally regard as a mere conventionality, I should say, pack up and be off without any explanation at all.”
“I believe you are right. It is the old story of paying one’s debts with the topsail sheet. Shabby enough, too, but it can’t be helped. Perhaps, Mr. M’Kinlay, if occasion should occur, you would find means to let Sir Gervais know that I am not the ungrateful dog my want of manners might bespeak me; perhaps you would convey to him that this step of mine had been suggested by yourself.”
“It is possible, Mr. Luttrell, that a fortuitous moment for an explanation of the kind you mention might occur, and, if so, you may rely on my willingness to profit by it. You mean to go at once?”
“I suppose so. Is it not what you advise?”
“Most certainly.”