"No, thank God!" said Pip simply. "An office would just kill me. If I had any chance of a post I should of course have to apply; but I haven't, so I needn't."
There was another pause.
"If," said Ham reflectively, "there was any prospect of your sunken capital rising to the surface again, say in two or three years' time, and it was simply a matter of hanging on till then, you could afford to spend the intervening period in a very interesting fashion."
"As how?"
"Go and see the world for yourself, above and below, inside and out. Knock about and rub shoulders with all sorts of folk. Plunge beneath the surface and see things as they are. Make your way everywhere, and if possible live by the work of your own two hands. You would acquire a knowledge of mankind that few men possess. At the worst you could hang on and make a living somehow until your ship came in—if it were only as a dock-hand or a railway porter. It would be a grand chance, Pip. Most men are so unenterprising. Those at the top never want to see what things are like below, and those below are so afraid of staying there forever that their eyes are constantly turned upwards and they miss a lot. I'd give something to be a vagabond for a year or two."
"What fearful sentiments for a respectable house-master!" said Pipette severely; but Pip's eyes glowed.
"However," continued Hanbury more soberly, "Pip can't afford to waste time observing life in a purely academic way down in the basement. He must start getting upstairs at once."
"Hear, hear!" said the chairwoman.
"As a matter of fact," said Pip, "the scheme I have in my eye rather meets the case, I think."
"What is it?"