that is possible. We all seem a
little mad to each other; an excellent arrangement for the bulk of
humanity which finds in it an easy motive of forgiveness. Flora crossed
the quarter-deck with a rapidity born of apprehension. It had grown
unbearable. She wanted this business over. She was thankful on looking
back to see he was following her. "If he bolts away," she thought, "then
I shall know that I am of no account indeed! That no one loves me, that
words and actions and protestations and everything in the world is
false--and I shall jump into the dock. _That_ at least won't lie."

Well I don't know. If it had come to that she would have been most
likely fished out, what with her natural want of luck and the good many
people on the quay and on board. And just where the _Ferndale_ was
moored there hung on a wall (I know the berth) a coil of line, a pole,
and a life-buoy kept there on purpose to save people who tumble into the
dock. It's not so easy to get away from life's betrayals as she thought.
However it did not come to that. He followed her with his quick gliding
walk. Mr. Smith! The liberated convict de Barral passed off the solid
earth for the last time, vanished for ever, and there was Mr. Smith added
to that world of waters which harbours so many queer fishes. An old
gentleman in a silk hat, darting wary glances. He followed, because mere
existence has its claims which are obeyed mechanically. I have no doubt
he presented a respectable figure. Father-in-law. Nothing more
respectable. But he carried in his heart the confused pain of dismay and
affection, of involuntary repulsion and pity. Very much like his
daughter. Only in addition he felt a furious jealousy of the man he was
going to see.

A residue of egoism remains in every affection--even paternal. And this
man in the seclusion of his prison had thought himself into such a sense
of ownership of that single human being he had to think about, as may
well be inconceivable to us who have not had to serve a long (and
wickedly unjust) sentence of penal servitude. She was positively the
only thing, the one point where his thoughts found a resting-place, for
years. She was the only outlet for his imagination. He had not much of
that faculty to be sure, but there was in it the force of concentration.
He felt outraged, and perhaps it was an absurdity on his part, but I
venture to suggest rather in degree than in kind. I have a notion that