After three days he wrote:
“Dear Old Man,—I’m back to the sea, so no need to worry. I’ve got just the chance I wanted, a first-rate sailing-ship wanting another deck-hand. I made a lucky purchase of a very drunken old sailor-man’s papers. No questions were asked as they were short of hands, and I soon convinced them I knew my job. Naturally I have dropped the family name pro tem. and won’t be sporting our coat-of-arms at present. I’ve sent a line to Scotland Yard to tell them I’ve got a nice opening in the haberdashery line in the Midlands, and so won’t be looking them up for a bit. I’ll send you a name and address to write to as soon as there is any chance of knowing a port of call in advance. Tell Louisa not to fret too much, and I’ll try to bring you home a nice parrot instead of the pigeon I damaged. This time I’m going to be a real good, sensible boy, and get on and all the rest of it. Honestly, dry land seems to burn the soles of my feet after a few days.
“Very many thanks to you for all you’ve done. This is bound to be a long trip, and though I mayn’t see you again for a year or two, you may be sure of my real honest love. I shall make a bee line for your place whenever I do come home.”
This parting was a wrench to me, and my home seemed very dull and miserable for a time. I had had my second sentimental tragedy, for I had loved, and for a short time had been happy in my love. It had all ended in disillusion and suffering for me, and again Edmund had been my solace. Until he had gone I did not know how much I was dependent on him.
Nevertheless I had again the feeling that he had behaved well. The incident of the papers purchased from the drunken sailor troubled my conscience a little, but I really scarcely knew what was involved in this, or to what extent it might have been a fair bargain. I trusted Edmund not to have done anything mean, and his sailing under a false name was to me nothing but the breach of a social convention. I had come to look upon most conventions as things made for the guidance of fools, to be disregarded by sensible men as soon as they became inconvenient.
I know it may be argued that this theory of mine is exactly that of the criminal. It is; but the criminal is only a fool with some independence of judgment—an exception.
The majority of fools walk between the clipped hedges. The wise minority wanders in safety and at large, being careful that the fools do not witness their excursions. We have our own boundaries which we do not transgress.
In the meantime the deaths of two of our Irish cousins from diphtheria had placed me quite near succession to the entailed portion of the family estate, but the present incumbent being a young vigorous man about to marry an heiress, I had never regarded the possibility of my inheriting.
It was only a few months after Edmund’s departure that this youth went fishing in waders when he should have been in bed, and died very suddenly of appendicitis. I was amazed and rather horrified to find myself an Irish landlord.
I resigned my living and went over to Ireland, but neither the place nor the prospect of that life attracted me. I did not understand it, and felt a stranger and usurper. Everything was in the hands of a most capable firm of land-agents in Dublin.