“That’s a collie,” said Stephen, listening.
“I wish you’d have some breakfast before starting.”
“No food, thanks. But you know” He paused. “It’s all been a muddle, and I’ve no objection to your coming along with me.”
The cloud descended lower.
“Come with me as a man,” said Stephen, already out in the mist. “Not as a brother; who cares what people did years back? We’re alive together, and the rest is cant. Here am I, Rickie, and there are you, a fair wreck. They’ve no use for you here,—never had any, if the truth was known,—and they’ve only made you beastly. This house, so to speak, has the rot. It’s common-sense that you should come.”
“Stephen, wait a minute. What do you mean?”
“Wait’s what we won’t do,” said Stephen at the gate.
“I must ask—”
He did wait for a minute, and sobs were heard, faint, hopeless, vindictive. Then he trudged away, and Rickie soon lost his colour and his form. But a voice persisted, saying, “Come, I do mean it. Come; I will take care of you, I can manage you.”
The words were kind; yet it was not for their sake that Rickie plunged into the impalpable cloud. In the voice he had found a surer guarantee. Habits and sex may change with the new generation, features may alter with the play of a private passion, but a voice is apart from these. It lies nearer to the racial essence and perhaps to the divine; it can, at all events, overleap one grave.