‘Oh, I never was one of your tragical heroes,’ said Hillyard; ‘better luck next time is always my motto; though, mind you, I’m not so sure that one is bound to live in spite of everything. I don’t see the necessity. If there’s anything better to go to, why shouldn’t one have a try for it? And if there isn’t, what does it matter? It’s a man’s own responsibility. If he likes to face it, let him, and don’t abuse the poor devil as if he were a pickpocket. Why, there was a fellow the other day,--and, by the way, I am taking his things home to his mother, which is a nice commission,--who squared off his fate with a bullet, by my side. I must say, I can’t blame him for one. Things could not well be worse up there,’ said this savage philosopher, waving his hand vaguely towards the roof, ‘than they were down below. But this is a queer sort of talk when one has just come home, and to a favourite of fortune like you.’
‘I am not much of a favourite of fortune just now,’ said Ben, with a certain longing for human sympathy. ‘But I’ll tell you about that afterwards. Now you have come home, are you going to stay in town, or what do you mean to do?’
The question was asked not quite in good faith, for it glided vaguely across Ben’s mind that the plans of a man who had long lived on his wits might suggest something for his own aid; and the answer was not more ingenuous, for it naturally occurred to Hillyard that his friend, who had the liberal hospitality of a great country-house to fall back on, and the probability of a shooting-box somewhere of his own, might intend to offer him an invitation, and so bridge over some portion of those autumn months, which were of so little use to a man who is looking for something to do.
‘I shall get along, I suppose, in the old way,’ he said, shrugging his shoulders. ‘I’ll serve up my Australian experiences for the papers, perhaps; or do them philosophically, with all their chances and dangers for intending emigrants, for the “Monthly,” if I can get hold of Rathbone; or go in as a coach. I flatter myself I could give the Colonial Secretary a hint or two if I could get at him. A little tall talk hurts no one. The fact is, I don’t know what I am going to be about,’ he added with a sigh. ‘Living on one’s wits is hard work enough. I have kept up nothing of old days except the club, which is always a kind of haven; though, I daresay, that sounds strange to you.’