I was satisfied, and then and there resolved to hire this brig and sail quickly for that far-off ice-clad island. I sat down on one of the lockers and asked the captain to take pen and paper, and we talked about what would be required, making notes, and reckoning up the expenses till I bethought me of my engagement with Mr. Hoskins. And with reluctance and a hearty handshake took my leave.
I was rowed ashore, and on the way to the boarding-house called at the bank whose manager had been my father's clerk. He was astonished and delighted to see me; he had known me, indeed, ever since I was an Eton schoolboy. I had no time on this occasion to enter fully into the cause of my being at the Cape; my immediate purpose was served when he assured me that I was welcome to draw upon the bank to the amount I wanted.
At five o'clock Mr. Hoskins drove up to the boarding-house, and we at once started for the cemetery. He was alone in a closed carriage, and was dressed in mourning as deep as man's apparel will express grief. I, too, had been careful to clothe myself in black. I had not seen Mr. Hoskins since the arrival of the 'Cambrian,' and his voice and presence carried me on board again, renewed the quiet incidents of the passage, and returned me in imagination to Southampton on that memorable day of my departure. He was pale and melancholy, and his spirits seemed depressed with thought of the distressing ceremony we were bent upon.
'I am sorry now,' said he as he drove along, 'that I solicited permission to inspect the remains. The photographs were perfectly convincing, and still I felt it--I feel it--my duty to make as sure as opportunity admits. Captain Oilier will expect me to tell him all that it was in my power to learn. Nor, perhaps, should I feel perfectly satisfied to erect the monument I intend for my poor child without looking into her coffin to see that it is she herself who will be under it.'
I answered that this melancholy undertaking was even less needful to me than to him; but that, like himself, I saw the necessity of confirming my own opinion by every possible testimony, for the peace of my own heart as well as for the satisfaction of Miss Otway's father.
We then talked of my chances of finding Marie in the hull upon the island, and I told him how I had hired the brig 'Albatross' and intended myself to sail in her as soon as she discharged her cargo and was ready for sea, which I hoped would be about the close of the following week.