“‘I couldn’t clear out,’ Jim began. ‘The skipper did—that’s all very well for him. I couldn’t, and I wouldn’t. They all got out of it in one way or another, but it wouldn’t do for me.’
“I listened with concentrated attention, not daring to stir in my chair; I wanted to know—and to this day I don’t know, I can only guess. He would be confident and depressed all in the same breath, as if some conviction of innate blamelessness had checked the truth writhing within him at every turn. He began by saying, in the tone in which a man would admit his inability to jump a twenty-foot wall, that he could never go home now; and this declaration recalled to my mind what Brierly had said, ‘that the old parson in Essex seemed to fancy his sailor son not a little.’
“I can’t tell you whether Jim knew he was especially ‘fancied,’ but the tone of his references to ‘my Dad’ was calculated to give me a notion that the good old rural dean was about the finest man that ever had been worried by the cares of a large family since the beginning of the world. This, though never stated, was implied with an anxiety that there should be no mistake about it, which was really very true and charming, but added a poignant sense of lives far off to the other elements of the story. ‘He has seen it all in the home papers by this time,’ said Jim. ‘I can never face the poor old chap.’ I did not dare to lift my eyes at this till I heard him add, ‘I could never explain. He wouldn’t understand.’ Then I looked up. He was smoking reflectively, and after a moment, rousing himself, began to talk again. He discovered at once a desire that I should not confound him with his partners in—in crime, let us call it. He was not one of them; he was altogether of another sort. I gave no sign of dissent. I had no intention, for the sake of barren truth, to rob him of the smallest particle of any saving grace that would come in his way. I didn’t know how much of it he believed himself. I didn’t know what he was playing up to—if he was playing up to anything at all—and I suspect he did not know either; for it is my belief no man ever understands quite his own artful dodges to escape from the grim shadow of self-knowledge. I made no sound all the time he was wondering what he had better do after ‘that stupid inquiry was over.’
“Apparently he shared Brierly’s contemptuous opinion of these proceedings ordained by law. He would not know where to turn, he confessed, clearly thinking aloud rather than talking to me. Certificate gone, career broken, no money to get away, no work that he could obtain as far as he could see. At home he could perhaps get something; but it meant going to his people for help, and that he would not do. He saw nothing for it but ship before the mast—could get perhaps a quartermaster’s billet in some steamer. Would do for a quartermaster…’Do you think you would?’ I asked, pitilessly. He jumped up, and going to the stone balustrade looked out into the night. In a moment he was back, towering above my chair with his youthful face clouded yet by the pain of a conquered emotion. He had understood very well I did not doubt his ability to steer a ship. In a voice that quavered a bit he asked me, ‘Why did I say that? I had been “no end kind” to him. I had not even laughed at him when’—here he began to mumble—’that mistake, you know—made a confounded ass of myself.’ I broke in by saying rather warmly that for me such a mistake was not a matter to laugh at. He sat down and drank deliberately some coffee, emptying the small cup to the last drop. ‘That does not mean I admit for a moment the cap fitted,’ he declared, distinctly. ‘No?’ I said. ‘No,’ he affirmed with quiet decision. ‘Do you know what you would have done? Do you? And you don’t think yourself’…he gulped something…’you don’t think yourself a—a—cur?’