I was restrained from following him only by the consideration that I should expose myself to the criticisms of our companions, who, I had observed, were fond of making merry at the expense of their absent friends; and as I was beginning to feel very sensitive to ridicule, I determined not to give them an opportunity of exercising their wit upon me.
When Forrester was gone, they immediately took him to pieces. His character, habits, life, and opinions, furnished them with abundant materials for commentary, which they were all the less scrupulous in dealing freely with because they really knew little or nothing about him. One said that there was a mysterious something about Forrester that he couldn't make out—it might be all right, but, for his part, he liked people to be candid with you and above-board; another remarked, that a man who lived nobody knew exactly how, and who disappeared every night at pretty much the same hour, and was so very incommunicative about his pursuits, laid himself open to suspicion, at all events; a third suggested that, probably, he had experienced some blight, which had spoiled him for company—perhaps he had been crossed in love (here there was a general laugh, and a rapid succession of puns); while a fourth, who made it a rule never to form a judgment on any man's character without knowing him thoroughly, could not help observing that Mr. Forrester certainly held some rather extraordinary doctrines about ghosts and other nonsense of that sort, which, to be sure, was no imputation on his character, but—here the speaker stopped short, and shook his head in a very significant manner.
These opinions, delivered off-hand, puzzled me exceedingly, for I could not arrive at their meaning. It was evident that Forrester was an object of mystery to our friends—and so he was to me. But neither they nor I could get any farther in the matter. They, however, dismissed him from their minds with the drain of their glasses, while I lay restlessly all night ruminating on what had occurred.
I was passing through a state of transition from the seclusion in which my faculties had been kept dormant into a section of society which was eminently calculated to awaken and sharpen them for use. I was already getting into a habit of reasoning with myself, of trying to trace effects to causes, and examining with suspicion many things which I had hitherto taken upon trust. At first I committed numerous blunders, and fell into all sorts of mistakes, in my eagerness to emulate the cleverness of the experienced individuals with whom I was in the habit of associating. And I could not have dropped upon a clique better qualified or disposed to ride roughshod over the whole region of romance. They were generally practical men and some of them were worldly men; for although not one of them was able to do any thing for himself, they were all adepts in the knowledge of what other people ought to do. They looked with supreme contempt upon sentimental people, and took infinite pleasure in running them down. They were not the sort of men to be tricked by appearances or clap-trap. They despised finery, and ostentation, and outside manners. They loved to look at things as they were, and to call them by their proper names; never, by any accident, over-rating an excellence, but very frequently exaggerating a defect, which they considered as an error on the right side. In this severe school I acquired a few harsh practical views of life, and was beginning to feel its realities growing up about me; but in the progress from the visionary to the real there were many shapes of darkness yet to be struggled with.
A few nights afterward I met Forrester on his way to the rendezvous. There was the same unaccountable reserve in his manner which he betrayed at our last abrupt parting; but my anxiety, awakened more by his looks than his words, would not brook delay. I resolved to get an explanation on the spot.
"Forrester," I said, "you have inflicted a pain upon me which no man has a right to inflict upon another, without giving him at the same time his full confidence. You have made use of strange allusions and hints, which you are bound to explain. You seem to know more about me than I have myself ever confided to you, or than you could have known through any channels with which I am acquainted. I ask you to satisfy me at once whether it is so, or not?"
"It is so," he replied. "You see I am as frank as you are curious."
"But that does not satisfy me. You say you know more about me than I have thought it necessary or desirable to impart to you. What is it that you know?"
"Little," he returned with a singularly disagreeable smile.
"Then it will be the sooner told. What is that little?" and I uttered the last word with rather a bitter and satirical emphasis.