Lo, thy course
Lies straight before thee as the arrow flies,
Right to the ocean-plains. Away, away!
Thy parent waits thee, and her sunset dyes
Are ruffled for thy coming, and the gray
Of all her glittering borders flashes high
Against the glittering rocks: oh, haste, and fly!

PART III.--HIS MANHOOD.

CHAPTER I. IN THE DESERT.

A life lay behind Robert Falconer, and a life lay before him. He stood
on a shoal between.

The life behind him was in its grave. He had covered it over and turned
away. But he knew it would rise at night.

The life before him was not yet born; and what should issue from that
dull ghastly unrevealing fog on the horizon, he did not care. Thither
the tide setting eastward would carry him, and his future must be born.
All he cared about was to leave the empty garments of his dead behind
him--the sky and the fields, the houses and the gardens which those dead
had made alive with their presence. Travel, motion, ever on, ever away,
was the sole impulse in his heart. Nor had the thought of finding his
father any share in his restlessness.

He told his grandmother that he was going back to Aberdeen. She looked
in his face with surprise, but seeing trouble there, asked no questions.
As if walking in a dream, he found himself at Dr. Anderson's door.

'Why, Robert,' said the good man, 'what has brought you back? Ah! I see.
Poor Ericson! I am very sorry, my boy. What can I do for you?'

'I can't go on with my studies now, sir,' answered Robert. 'I have taken
a great longing for travel. Will you give me a little money and let me
go?'

'To be sure I will. Where do you want to go?'

'I don't know. Perhaps as I go I shall find myself wanting to go
somewhere. You're not afraid to trust me, are you, sir?'

'Not in the least, Robert. I trust you perfectly. You shall do just as
you please.--Have you any idea, how much money you will want?'

'No. Give me what you are willing I should spend: I will go by that.'

'Come along to the bank then. I will give you enough to start with.
Write at once when you want more. Don't be too saving. Enjoy yourself as
well as you can. I shall not grudge it.'

Robert smiled a wan smile at the idea of enjoying himself. His friend
saw it, but let it pass. There was no good in persuading a man whose
grief was all he had left, that he must ere long part with that too.
That would have been in lowest deeps of sorrow to open a yet lo