That night, having gone up to his room, Shelton filled his pipe for his unpleasant duty. He had resolved to hint to Ferrand that he had better go. He was still debating whether to write or go himself to the young foreigner, when there came a knock and Ferrand himself appeared. “I should be sorry,” he said, breaking an awkward silence, “if you were to think me ungrateful, but I see no future for me here. It would be better for me to go. I should never be content to pass my life in teaching languages 'ce n'est guere dans mon caractre'.”
As soon as what he had been cudgelling his brains to find a way of saying had thus been said for him, Shelton experienced a sense of disapproval.
“What do you expect to get that's better?” he said, avoiding Ferrand's eyes.
“Thanks to your kindness,” replied the latter, “I find myself restored. I feel that I ought to make some good efforts to dominate my social position.”
“I should think it well over, if I were you!” said Shelton.
“I have, and it seems to me that I'm wasting my time. For a man with any courage languages are no career; and, though I 've many defects, I still have courage.”
Shelton let his pipe go out, so pathetic seemed to him this young man's faith in his career; it was no pretended faith, but neither was it, he felt, his true motive for departure. “He's tired,” he thought; “that 's it. Tired of one place.” And having the instinctive sense that nothing would keep Ferrand, he redoubled his advice.
“I should have thought,” he said, “that you would have done better to have held on here and saved a little before going off to God knows what.”
“To save,” said Ferrand, “is impossible for me, but, thanks to you and your good friends, I 've enough to make front to first necessities. I'm in correspondence with a friend; it's of great importance for me to reach Paris before all the world returns. I 've a chance to get, a post in one of the West African companies. One makes fortunes out there—if one survives, and, as you know, I don't set too much store by life.”
“We have a proverb,” said Shelton, “'A bird in the hand is worth two birds in the bush!'.rdquo;
“That,” returned Ferrand, “like all proverbs, is just half true. This is an affair of temperament. It 's not in my character to dandle one when I see two waiting to be caught; 'voyager, apprendre, c'est plus fort que moi'.” He paused; then, with a nervous goggle of the eyes and an ironic smile he said: “Besides, 'mon cher monsieur', it is better that I go. I have never been one to hug illusions, and I see pretty clearly that my presence is hardly acceptable in this house.”
“What makes you say that?” asked, Shelton, feeling that the murder was now out.”
“My dear sir, all the world has not your understanding and your lack of prejudice, and, though your friends have been extremely kind to me, I am in a false position; I cause them embarrassment, which is not extraordinary when you reflect what I have been, and that they know my history.”
“Not through me,” said Shelton quickly, “for I don't know it myself.”
“It's enough,” the vagrant said, “that they feel I'm not a bird of their feather. They cannot change, neither can I. I have never wanted to remain where I 'm not welcome.”
Shelton turned to the window, and stared into the darkness; he would never quite understand this vagabond, so delicate, so cynical, and he wondered if Ferrand had been swallowing down the words, “Why, even you won't be sorry to see my back!”
“Well,” he said at last, “if you must go, you must. When do you start?”
“I 've arranged with a man to carry my things to the early train. I think it better not to say good-bye. I 've written a letter instead; here it is. I left it open for you to read if you should wish.”
“Then,” said Shelton, with a curious mingling of relief, regret, good-will, “I sha'n'. see you again?”
Ferrand gave his hand a stealthy rub, and held it out.
“I shall never forget what you have done for me,” he said.
“Mind you write,” said Shelton.
“Yes, yes”—the vagrant's face was oddly twisted—“you don't know what a difference it makes to have a correspondent; it gives one courage. I hope to remain a long time in correspondence with you.”
“I dare say you do,” thought Shelton grimly, with a certain queer emotion.
“You will do me the justice to remember that I have never asked you for anything,” said Ferrand. “Thank you a thousand times. Good-bye!”
He again wrung his patron's hand in his damp grasp, and, going out, left Shelton with an odd sensation in his throat. “You will do me the justice to remember that I have never asked you for anything.” The phrase seemed strange, and his mind flew back over all this queer acquaintanceship. It was a fact: from the beginning to the end the youth had never really asked for anything. Shelton sat down on his bed, and began to read the letter in his hand. It was in French.
DEAR MADAME (it ran),
It will be insupportable to me, after your kindness, if you take me for ungrateful. Unfortunately, a crisis has arrived which plunges me into the necessity of leaving your hospitality. In all lives, as you are well aware, there arise occasions that one cannot govern, and I know that you will pardon me that I enter into no explanation on an event which gives me great chagrin, and, above all, renders me subject to an imputation of ingratitude, which, believe me, dear Madame, by no means lies in my character. I know well enough that it is a breach of politeness to leave you without in person conveying the expression of my profound reconnaissance, but if you consider how hard it is for me to be compelled to abandon all that is so distinguished in domestic life, you will forgive my weakness. People like me, who have gone through existence with their eyes open, have remarked that those who are endowed with riches have a right to look down on such as are not by wealth and breeding fitted to occupy the same position. I shall never dispute a right so natural and salutary, seeing that without this distinction, this superiority, which makes of the well-born and the well-bred a race apart, the rest of the world would have no standard by which to rule their lives, no anchor to throw into the depths of that vast sea of fortune and of misfortune on which we others drive before the wind. It is because of this, dear Madame, that I regard myself so doubly fortunate to have been able for a few minutes in this bitter pilgrimage called life, to sit beneath the tree of safety. To have been able, if only for an hour, to sit and set the pilgrims pass, the pilgrims with the blistered feet and ragged clothes, and who yet, ............