used to be 'next week,' now it has come to 'next month,' and so on--soon
it will be next spring, for all I know."

Noticing a stranger listening to him with a vacant grin, he explained,
stretching out his legs cynically, that this queer old Hagberd, a
retired coasting-skipper, was waiting for the return of a son of his.
The boy had been driven away from home, he shouldn't wonder; had run
away to sea and had never been heard of since. Put to rest in Davy
Jones's locker this many a day, as likely as not. That old man came
flying to Colebrook three years ago all in black broadcloth (had lost
his wife lately then), getting out of a third-class smoker as if the
devil had been at his heels; and the only thing that brought him down
was a letter--a hoax probably. Some joker had written to him about a
seafaring man with some such name who was supposed to be hanging about
some girl or other, either in Colebrook or in the neighbourhood. "Funny,
ain't it?" The old chap had been advertising in the London papers for
Harry Hagberd, and offering rewards for any sort of likely information.
And the barber would go on to describe with sardonic gusto, how that
stranger in mourning had been seen exploring the country, in carts, on
foot, taking everybody into his confidence, visiting all the inns
and alehouses for miles around, stopping people on the road with his
questions, looking into the very ditches almost; first in the greatest
excitement, then with a plodding sort of perseverance, growing slower
and slower; and he could not even tell you plainly how his son looked.
The sailor was supposed to be one of two that had left a timber
ship, and to have been seen dangling after some girl; but the old man
described a boy of fourteen or so--"a clever-looking, high-spirited
boy." And when people only smiled at this he would rub his forehead in
a confused sort of way before he slunk off, looking offended. He found
nobody, of course; not a trace of anybody--never heard of anything worth