“I'd rather be with you than any one in the world—we'll have such times, you and I.”
Perhaps Stephen knew more about the world; perhaps during the years that he had been tumbled and knocked about he had realised that the world was no easy nut to crack and that loaves and fishes don't come to the hungry for the asking. But Peter that night was to be appalled by nothing.
They sat up into the early morning, talking. The noises in the house and in the streets about them rose and fell. Some distant cry would climb into the silence and draw from it other cries set like notes of music to tumble back into a common scheme together.
“Steve, tell me about Zanti. Is he really a scoundrel?”
“A scoundrel? No, poor feller. Why, Mr. Peter, you ought to know better than that. 'E ain't got a spark of malice in him but 'e's always after adventure. 'E knows all the queer people in Europe—and more'n Europe too. There's nothin' 'e don't put 'is nose into in a clumsy, childish way but always, you understand, Mr. Peter, because 'e's after 'is romantic fancies. It was when 'e was after gold down in Cornwall—some old treasure story—that I came across 'im and 'e was kind to me.... 'E was a kind-'earted man, Mr. Zanti, and never meant 'arm to a soul. And 'e's very fond of you, Mr. Peter.”
“Yes, I know.” Peter was vaguely troubled. “I hope I haven't been unkind about him. I suppose it was the shock of the whole thing. But it was time I went anyway. But tell me, Stephen, what you've been doing all these years. And why you let me be all that time without seeing you—”
“Well, Mr. Peter, I didn't think it would be good for you—I was knowing lots o' strange people time and again and then you might have been mixed up with me. I'm safe enough now, I'm thinking, and I'd have been safe enough all the time the way Cornwall was then and every one sympathising with me—”
“But what have you been doing all the time?”
“I was in America a bit and there are few things I haven't worked at in my time—always waiting for 'er to come—and she will come some time—it's only patience that's wanted.”
“Have you ever heard from her?”