e is not much accounting for the vagaries of a man like that. Your
father thought to be ironic when he had you called Ishmael; he saw every
man's hand against you--you the youngest and the one against so many.
And you have made a strong, secure life for yourself and your children,
and it is Archelaus who wanders...."

"Archelaus would always have wandered. He has it in his soul. Do you
remember the day Killigrew was classifying men by whether they wandered
or stayed at home? He was right about Archelaus then. Da Boase--you
don't think I could have behaved any differently to him, do you? He
wouldn't be friends. That time in the wood ... you know ... I always
knew in my heart that he had hit out at me, though I was so afraid of
really knowing it that I never spoke of it even to you. And then when he
came home after my marriage to poor little Phoebe--he made the first
advances, it's true, but I never felt happy about them, although he
seemed so altered. I've reproached myself sometimes that I was glad when
he went away after she died. I always hoped he wouldn't come back any
more. What else could I do, Da Boase?"

"I too hope he will never come home any more," said the Parson slowly,
"and yet ... if he does, try and remember, Ishmael ... not that he is
your brother--that would not make things easier--but that he is not
quite an ordinary man, that in him the old brutalities dormant in most
of us have always been strong and that he has had nothing to counteract
them. He is not quite as we are. If we cannot understand we should not
judge."

Again a little silence fell. Then Ishmael said suddenly:

"What does feed your soul, Da Boase? I shouldn't have asked you that,"
he added swiftly. "Besides, I know. But though I know, and though I
believe in it too, yet I can't yet find all I want in it."

Boase lay silent, looking out of the rainy window at the wash of green
and pearly grey without. His hand caressed Ishmael's as though he had
been a little boy again.

"That feeds my soul from which my soul came ..." he said slowly, "and
daily the vision draws nearer to me and its reflection here strengthens
even to my earthly eyes. This world is dear and sweet, but only because
I know that it is not all, or even the most important part. Each day is
the sweeter to me because each day I can say 'Come quickly, O Lord
Jesus.' I do not need to say to you all that knowledge means."

The rain had blown away when Ishmael went home again,