One learns to have compassion for fools, by studying them:  and the fool, though Nature is wise, is next door to Nature.  He is naked in his simplicity; he can tell us much, and suggest more.  My excuse for dwelling upon him is, that he holds the link of my story.  Where fools are numerous, one of them must be prominent now and then in a veracious narration.  There comes an hour when the veil drops on him, he not being always clean to the discreeter touch.

Algernon was late at the Bank next day, and not cheerful, though he received his customary reprimand with submission.  This day was after the pattern of the day preceding, except that he did not visit the Park; the night likewise.

On Wednesday morning, he arose with the conviction that England was no place for him to dwell in.  What if Rhoda were to accompany him to one of the colonies?  The idea had been gradually taking shape in his mind from the moment that he had possessed the Thousand.  Could she not make butter and cheeses capitally, while he rode on horseback through space?  She was a strong girl, a loyal girl, and would be a grateful wife.

“I’ll marry her,” he said; and hesitated.  “Yes, I’ll marry her.”  But it must be done immediately.

He resolved to run down to Wrexby, rejoice her with a declaration of love, astound her with a proposal of marriage, bewilder her little brain with hurrying adjectives, whisk her up to London, and in little more than a week be sailing on the high seas, new born; nothing of civilization about him, save a few last very first-rate cigars which he projected to smoke on the poop of the vessel, and so dream of the world he left behind.

He went down to the Bank in better spirits, and there wrote off a straightforward demand of an interview, to Rhoda, hinting at the purpose of it.  While at his work, he thought of Harry Latters and Lord Suckling, and the folly of his dining with men in his present position.  Settling-day, it or yesterday might be, but a colonist is not supposed to know anything of those arrangements.  One of his fellow-clerks reminded him of a loan he had contracted, and showed him his name written under obligatory initials.  He paid it, ostentatiously drawing out one of his fifties.  Up came another, with a similar strip of paper.  “You don’t want me to change this, do you?” said Algernon; and heard a tale of domestic needs—­and a grappling landlady.  He groaned inwardly:  “Odd that I must pay for his landlady being a vixen!” The note was changed; the debt liquidated.  On the door-step, as he was going to lunch, old Anthony waylaid him, and was almost noisily persistent in demanding his one pound three and his five pound ten.  Algernon paid the sums, ready to believe that there was a suspicion abroad of his intention to become a colonist.

He employed the luncheon hour in a visit to a colonial shipping office, and nearly ran straight upon Sedgett at the office-door.  The woman who had hailed him from the cab, was in Sedgett’s company, but Sedgett saw no one.  His head hung and his sullen brows were drawn moodily.  Algernon escaped from observation.  His first inquiry at the office was as to the business of the preceding couple, and he was satisfied by hearing that Sedgett wanted berths for himself and wife.