With the beginning of the next term Harry embarked on the task of setting himself right with the world. He found it on the whole easier than he had expected. He had only to make a few formal apologies, as in the cases of Shep McGee and Junius LeGrand, and let it become generally known that he had definitely given up drinking, et cetera, to make the cohorts of the commonplace glad to receive him in their ranks once more.
Reinstatement in the social life of New Haven followed quite easily—almost as a matter of course, for he had not actively offended any members of what might be described as the entertaining classes. The female element, practically all of whom knew him, or at least of him, through his family connection, had evolved a mythical but interesting conception of him as "rather a fast young man"; and that, alas! served to endear him to their hearts rather than otherwise.
So the last months of his college course passed in a sort of sunset haze of enjoyment, marred only by one thing, indecision as to his subsequent career. His friends were inclined to look rather askance at this; one or two, in a tactful way, pointed out to him the danger of "drifting." In reality there was small danger of this; although his inherited income would make him independent of his own efforts for livelihood during the rest of his natural life, Harry would never "drift" very far. His brain was too active, his ambition too lively, his sense of the seriousness of life too deep to allow that. He could never be content doing nothing. He wanted, in turn, to do very nearly everything; the professions of lawyer, doctor, "business man," engineer, clergyman, soldier, sailor—tinker and tailor, even were considered and rejected in turn.
"It's not that I don't want to do all these things," he explained to Trotty, who sometimes showed impatience at his vagueness; "the trouble is that I can't do any of them. I'm not fitted for them—I'm not worthy of them, if you like to put it that way. If I were a conscienceless wretch, now, it would be different!"
One Sunday afternoon in June, rather saddened by the feeling of his apparent uselessness in the world, he went to call on Madge Elliston.
"Well, what are you going to do this summer?" she began. "That seems to be the one topic of conversation at this time of year."
"This summer? Oh, I'm going to walk, with the rest of my class, in the more mountainous portions of Europe. At present I am under engagement to walk through the hilly parts of England, Scotland and Wales, the Black Forest, the Alps, the Tyrol, the Dolomites and some of the cooler portions of the Apennines; but the Cévennes and the Caucasus are still open, if you care to engage them.... In between times I expect to roister, shamelessly, in some of the livelier resorts of the Continent. That's all quite simple; what I'm worrying about is what I'm going to do next winter."
"Why don't you write, if I may be pardoned for asking so obvious a question?" asked Madge.
"One simple but sufficient reason—I haven't got anything to write about," answered Harry, smiling. "That's what everybody asks, and the answer is always the same. This prevalent belief in my literary ability is flattering, but unfortunately it's wholly unfounded."
"I shouldn't say so. I've read most of what you've written in college, and it seems to me extremely clever."