At last, one day, like a bolt from the blue, came the publishers’ letter, offering alternative terms for the book, the usual royalty the firm paid to unknown authors, or eighty pounds down for the copyright, to be paid on publication. It aroused him, with a shock, from his torpor. That night he could not sleep. He got up and wandered about the veldt through the dewy grasses, under the bright African starlight, his veins alive with a new excitement. Perhaps he had found a vocation—one to bring him money, congenial work, the right at last to take his forfeited place in a civilised land. He returned to the house at daybreak, worn out with fatigue, but throbbing with wild schemes for the future. And the following evening, as soon as the toil of the day was over, he lit his small, smoking lamp, and sat down in feverish haste to begin a new story, the scheme of which he had half-heartedly worked out soon after Noakes’s death. The copyright of the other he sold for the eighty pounds.
And then gradually the longing for England grew more insistent, until at last it took the form of a settled determination. One day he saddled a rough farm-pony and rode to the good Samaritan who had taken him in during his illness. The farmer, a hard-headed Scotchman, shook his head dubiously when Joyce unfolded his plan.
“Stick to the farm and buy Wilson out. You ’ll mak’ more money, and then you can retire in a few years.”
“The profits are nearly swallowed up in improvements and transit,” said Joyce. “It is a bare subsistence.”
“That’s because you don’t go the right way to work. If I had the land, I’d make it pay soon enough.”
“You are a practical farmer, and I am not,” said Joyce. “Even if I desired to gain experience, it is precious little I could gain with Wilson—and I long for home again.”
“That’s all very well—but if you fail with your writing? I have heard it is a precarious trade.”
“I’m used to failure,” replied Joyce. “That’s what I came into the world for. You can’t say that I am a conspicuous success as a colonist.”
“Sell out from Wilson, and come here,” said the farmer, “on the metayer system. I will put you up to a few things.”
Joyce looked round him; they were sitting on the verandah of the nicely-built house. Everything had the trim appearance of scientific English farming—the outbuildings solid and clean, the fields high with grain, the dams in perfect repair, the yard spick and span. A flower garden lay beneath him. A well-trimmed vine covered the lattice-work of the verandah. All was a striking contrast to his own ramshackle, neglected surroundings. A month ago he would have leaped at the offer. But now he declined it. He distrusted himself, his power of content. If he once put his hand to the plough, he would not be able to draw back. And he held ploughs in cordial detestation. He rode back, having thanked his friend and obtained his consent to act as arbiter, if need were, between Wilson and himself.