IXNevertheless, a man hasn't finished his life at forty. He may, however, have finished one great phase of his life.
And Alexander Hepburn was not the man to live alone. All our troubles, says somebody wise, come upon us because we cannot be alone. And that is all very well. We must all be ABLE to be alone, otherwise we are just victims. But when we ARE able to be alone, then we realize that the only thing to do is to start a new relationship with another—or even the same—human being. That people should all be stuck up apart, like so many telegraph–poles, is nonsense.
So with our dear captain. He had his convulsion into a sort of telegraph–pole isolation: which was absolutely necessary for him. But then he began to bud with a new yearning for—for what? For love?
It was a question he kep
