wrung from me by a sudden conviction that _there_ only was the road of
salvation, the clear way out for an uneasy conscience. The finishing
of "The Nigger" brought to my troubled mind the comforting sense of
an accomplished task, and the first consciousness of a certain sort
of mastery which could accomplish something with the aid of propitious
stars. Why I did not return to "The Rescue" at once then, was not for
the reason that I had grown afraid of it. Being able now to assume a
firm attitude I said to myself deliberately: "That thing can wait." At
the same time I was just as certain in my mind that "Youth," a story
which I had then, so to speak, on the tip of my pen, could _not_ wait.
Neither could "Heart of Darkness" be put off; for the practical reason
that Mr. Wm. Blackwood having requested me to write something for the
No. M of his magazine I had to stir up at once the subject of that tale
which had been long lying quiescent in my mind, because, obviously, the
venerable Maga at her patriarchal age of 1000 numbers could not be kept
waiting. Then "Lord Jim," with about seventeen pages already written at
odd times, put in his claim which was irresistible. Thus every stroke
of the pen was taking me further away from the abandoned "Rescue," not
without some compunction on my part but with a gradually diminishing
resistance; till at last I let myself go as if recognising a superior
influence against which it was useless to contend.

The years passed and the pages grew in number, and the long reveries of
which they were the outcome stretched wide between me and the deserted
"Rescue" like the smooth hazy spaces of a dreamy sea. Yet I never
actually lost sight of that dark speck in the misty distance. It
had grown very small but it asserted itself with the appeal of old
associations. It seemed to me that it would be a base thing for me to
slip out of the world leaving it out there all alone, waiting for its
fate--that would never come?