feat_summary_path: finished_summaries/cliffnotes/Lord Jim/section_13_part_0.txt
feat_book_id: Lord Jim.chapters 18-19
feat_summary_id: chapters 18-19
feat_summary: {"name": "Chapters 18-19", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20201219145744/https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/l/lord-jim/summary-and-analysis/chapters-1819", "summary": "Six months later, while Marlow was in Hong Kong, he received a letter from a Mr. Denver, the owner of a rice mill, the friend to whom he recommended Jim. Denver, an eccentric, middle-aged bachelor, wrote quietly but glowingly about Jim; he was especially fond of Jim's quality of \"freshness\" -- his quiet, naive, generous nature. Marlow smiled to himself. He was right to send Jim to his friend. Perhaps, he speculated, Jim might inherit a good sum of money from the old bachelor. Marlow then made a trip northward, and when he returned to Hong Kong, another letter from Denver was awaiting him. Denver was furious: Jim had vanished. Also in the pile of letters, there was a note from Jim. He was working in a seaport town seven hundred miles south, and he wrote that he had no choice; he had to leave Denver's rice mill. The second engineer from the Patna unexpectedly turned up at Denver's mill and was given temporary employment. Shortly thereafter, this man began making insinuations about Jim's past, threatening blackmail unless he were put on full-time at the mill. Jim said that he could \"no longer stand the familiarity of the little beast,\" so he left. He asked Marlow for another letter of recommendation. He had found temporary work as a \"runner,\" or a water-clerk, for a ship-chandler, and he wanted permanence as soon as possible. Some months later, Marlow was in port and met Jim. He seemed to be happy and busy and popular. Marlow had a good feeling about the future of the young man. Then, six months afterward, Marlow was again in port and inquired about Jim at Egstrom & Blake, the ship-chandlers who employed him. Egstrom told Marlow that suddenly one day, Jim left -- without an explanation. Jim was his best runner, he says; there was no better water-clerk in port than Jim. He told Marlow that he offered Jim more money, emphasizing that business was exceptionally good: \"This business ain't going to sink,\" Egstrom told Jim. Marlow asked pointedly if anyone mentioned anything about the Patna just prior to Jim's disappearance. Egstrom remembered that one of the old sea captains had expounded on the whole disgraceful business of the Patna. Marlow told the ship-chandler that that explained it: Jim was the first mate of the Patna on the night of \"the incident.\" The ship-chandler was puzzled. \"Who the devil cares about that?\" he asked. Then he added that if Jim were that sensitive about his past, then even the earth itself \"wouldn't be big enough\" for him to hide in. Jim continued running, and it was not long before he became known as \"a rolling stone,\" Marlow says. In fact, Jim even became \"notorious\" within the sphere of about three thousand miles that he traversed. All around that area, people recognized his name and knew all about the secret that he considered so shameful. Jim, of course, never dreamed that so many people knew so many details about the secret that he kept so tightly hidden within his breast. One night, however, during a brawl in a hotel billiards room, Jim got an inkling that a lot of people knew a great deal more about him than he cared for them to know. He was playing billiards with a Navy officer, a cross-eyed Dane who was employed by the Royal Siamese Navy. The fellow had drunk too much, and he made a slurring reference to Jim's part in the Patna fiasco. Jim reacted like a madman. He broke a billiard cue in half and then threw the naval officer off the verandah and into the Menam River. Marlow realized that after that incident, Jim was no doubt beginning to think that all jobs would eventually be dead ends for him. There would be money paid to him for a job well done, but the situation itself would never be satisfying. What Jim needed was a challenge for his soul, not a job for his hands. Marlow, therefore, went to see \"the most trustworthy man\" he knew -- a Mr. Stein. Stein was very wealthy and very respected, and he had trading posts all over the world. Moreover, he was a learned man -- in particular, an internationally known expert on beetles and butterflies. Marlow felt that it was time to discuss Jim's problems with another person, someone who could see the enormous guilt that Jim insisted on living with. Marlow was looking for someone who could offer Jim a job that would be entirely different from the sort of menial laboring that might lend itself to ridicule and third-class status.", "analysis": "In these two chapters, Marlow relates three episodes involving Jim, and the episodes occurred at immense geographical distances from each other. In each case where some connection or comment was made about the Patna episode, Jim would literally flee. For example, in his first job where he had earned the respect of his employer, Mr. Denver stood to reap great financial rewards; the happenstance appearance of the second mate was bad enough, but when this second mate tried to become intimate with Jim, Jim could not \"stand the familiarity of the little beast.\" After all, Jim was a gentleman, and furthermore, after the sinking of the Patna, the second mate and his fellow officers had considered killing Jim. Likewise, at Jim's next job -- one in which he was extremely successful and well liked -- he fled immediately when someone began discussing the Patna episode, and his final adventure was with the Dane in the Siamese Navy. All three of these episodes represent what must have been dozens more , and thus Jim's almost obsessive, almost pathological sense of guilt has made him known over thousands of miles all through the South Pacific. It is ironic that Jim feels his guilt more than other people. His innate sensitivity makes him feel that everyone condemns him, and then we hear that Egstrom did not care at all. Egstrom says, \"And who the devil cares about that?\" Furthermore, the physical attack on the Dane represents the one time that Jim did not behave as though he was \"one of us.\" After one episode when Marlow brings Jim aboard his ship, Jim constantly remains below deck and is quiet and reticent. Note that when Marlow asks him if he would like to go to California, Jim responds, \"What difference would it make?\" In other words, Jim cannot escape from himself even if it be across continents and oceans; instead, he is looking for an opportunity to prove himself to himself."}
text: 
  'Six months afterwards my friend (he was a cynical, more than
  middle-aged bachelor, with a reputation for eccentricity, and owned
  a rice-mill) wrote to me, and judging, from the warmth of my
  recommendation, that I would like to hear, enlarged a little upon Jim's
  perfections. These were apparently of a quiet and effective sort.
  "Not having been able so far to find more in my heart than a resigned
  toleration for any individual of my kind, I have lived till now alone
  in a house that even in this steaming climate could be considered as too
  big for one man. I have had him to live with me for some time past. It
  seems I haven't made a mistake." It seemed to me on reading this letter
  that my friend had found in his heart more than tolerance for Jim--that
  there were the beginnings of active liking. Of course he stated his
  grounds in a characteristic way. For one thing, Jim kept his freshness
  in the climate. Had he been a girl--my friend wrote--one could have
  said he was blooming--blooming modestly--like a violet, not like some of
  these blatant tropical flowers. He had been in the house for six weeks,
  and had not as yet attempted to slap him on the back, or address him
  as "old boy," or try to make him feel a superannuated fossil. He had
  nothing of the exasperating young man's chatter. He was good-tempered,
  had not much to say for himself, was not clever by any means, thank
  goodness--wrote my friend. It appeared, however, that Jim was clever
  enough to be quietly appreciative of his wit, while, on the other hand,
  he amused him by his naiveness. "The dew is yet on him, and since I
  had the bright idea of giving him a room in the house and having him
  at meals I feel less withered myself. The other day he took it into his
  head to cross the room with no other purpose but to open a door for
  me; and I felt more in touch with mankind than I had been for years.
  Ridiculous, isn't it? Of course I guess there is something--some awful
  little scrape--which you know all about--but if I am sure that it is
  terribly heinous, I fancy one could manage to forgive it. For my part,
  I declare I am unable to imagine him guilty of anything much worse than
  robbing an orchard. Is it much worse? Perhaps you ought to have told me;
  but it is such a long time since we both turned saints that you may have
  forgotten we, too, had sinned in our time? It may be that some day I
  shall have to ask you, and then I shall expect to be told. I don't care
  to question him myself till I have some idea what it is. Moreover, it's
  too soon as yet. Let him open the door a few times more for me. . . ."
  Thus my friend. I was trebly pleased--at Jim's shaping so well, at the
  tone of the letter, at my own cleverness. Evidently I had known what
  I was doing. I had read characters aright, and so on. And what if
  something unexpected and wonderful were to come of it? That evening,
  reposing in a deck-chair under the shade of my own poop awning (it
  was in Hong-Kong harbour), I laid on Jim's behalf the first stone of a
  castle in Spain.
  
  'I made a trip to the northward, and when I returned I found another
  letter from my friend waiting for me. It was the first envelope I tore
  open. "There are no spoons missing, as far as I know," ran the first
  line; "I haven't been interested enough to inquire. He is gone, leaving
  on the breakfast-table a formal little note of apology, which is either
  silly or heartless. Probably both--and it's all one to me. Allow me to
  say, lest you should have some more mysterious young men in reserve,
  that I have shut up shop, definitely and for ever. This is the last
  eccentricity I shall be guilty of. Do not imagine for a moment that I
  care a hang; but he is very much regretted at tennis-parties, and for
  my own sake I've told a plausible lie at the club. . . ." I flung the
  letter aside and started looking through the batch on my table, till
  I came upon Jim's handwriting. Would you believe it? One chance in a
  hundred! But it is always that hundredth chance! That little second
  engineer of the Patna had turned up in a more or less destitute state,
  and got a temporary job of looking after the machinery of the mill. "I
  couldn't stand the familiarity of the little beast," Jim wrote from a
  seaport seven hundred miles south of the place where he should have been
  in clover. "I am now for the time with Egstrom & Blake, ship-chandlers,
  as their--well--runner, to call the thing by its right name. For
  reference I gave them your name, which they know of course, and if you
  could write a word in my favour it would be a permanent employment." I
  was utterly crushed under the ruins of my castle, but of course I wrote
  as desired. Before the end of the year my new charter took me that way,
  and I had an opportunity of seeing him.
  
  'He was still with Egstrom & Blake, and we met in what they called
  "our parlour" opening out of the store. He had that moment come in from
  boarding a ship, and confronted me head down, ready for a tussle. "What
  have you got to say for yourself?" I began as soon as we had shaken
  hands. "What I wrote you--nothing more," he said stubbornly. "Did the
  fellow blab--or what?" I asked. He looked up at me with a troubled
  smile. "Oh, no! He didn't. He made it a kind of confidential business
  between us. He was most damnably mysterious whenever I came over to the
  mill; he would wink at me in a respectful manner--as much as to say 'We
  know what we know.' Infernally fawning and familiar--and that sort of
  thing . . ." He threw himself into a chair and stared down his legs.
  "One day we happened to be alone and the fellow had the cheek to say,
  'Well, Mr. James'--I was called Mr. James there as if I had been the
  son--'here we are together once more. This is better than the old
  ship--ain't it?' . . . Wasn't it appalling, eh? I looked at him, and
  he put on a knowing air. 'Don't you be uneasy, sir,' he says. 'I know
  a gentleman when I see one, and I know how a gentleman feels. I hope,
  though, you will be keeping me on this job. I had a hard time of it too,
  along of that rotten old Patna racket.' Jove! It was awful. I don't know
  what I should have said or done if I had not just then heard Mr. Denver
  calling me in the passage. It was tiffin-time, and we walked together
  across the yard and through the garden to the bungalow. He began to
  chaff me in his kindly way . . . I believe he liked me . . ."
  
  'Jim was silent for a while.
  
  '"I know he liked me. That's what made it so hard. Such a splendid man!
  . . . That morning he slipped his hand under my arm. . . . He, too, was
  familiar with me." He burst into a short laugh, and dropped his chin on
  his breast. "Pah! When I remembered how that mean little beast had been
  talking to me," he began suddenly in a vibrating voice, "I couldn't bear
  to think of myself . . . I suppose you know . . ." I nodded. . . . "More
  like a father," he cried; his voice sank. "I would have had to tell him.
  I couldn't let it go on--could I?" "Well?" I murmured, after waiting a
  while. "I preferred to go," he said slowly; "this thing must be buried."
  
  'We could hear in the shop Blake upbraiding Egstrom in an abusive,
  strained voice. They had been associated for many years, and every day
  from the moment the doors were opened to the last minute before closing,
  Blake, a little man with sleek, jetty hair and unhappy, beady eyes,
  could be heard rowing his partner incessantly with a sort of scathing
  and plaintive fury. The sound of that everlasting scolding was part of
  the place like the other fixtures; even strangers would very soon come
  to disregard it completely unless it be perhaps to mutter "Nuisance," or
  to get up suddenly and shut the door of the "parlour." Egstrom himself,
  a raw-boned, heavy Scandinavian, with a busy manner and immense blonde
  whiskers, went on directing his people, checking parcels, making out
  bills or writing letters at a stand-up desk in the shop, and comported
  himself in that clatter exactly as though he had been stone-deaf. Now
  and again he would emit a bothered perfunctory "Sssh," which neither
  produced nor was expected to produce the slightest effect. "They are
  very decent to me here," said Jim. "Blake's a little cad, but Egstrom's
  all right." He stood up quickly, and walking with measured steps to a
  tripod telescope standing in the window and pointed at the roadstead,
  he applied his eye to it. "There's that ship which has been becalmed
  outside all the morning has got a breeze now and is coming in," he
  remarked patiently; "I must go and board." We shook hands in silence,
  and he turned to go. "Jim!" I cried. He looked round with his hand on
  the lock. "You--you have thrown away something like a fortune." He came
  back to me all the way from the door. "Such a splendid old chap," he
  said. "How could I? How could I?" His lips twitched. "Here it does not
  matter." "Oh! you--you--" I began, and had to cast about for a suitable
  word, but before I became aware that there was no name that would just
  do, he was gone. I heard outside Egstrom's deep gentle voice saying
  cheerily, "That's the Sarah W. Granger, Jimmy. You must manage to be
  first aboard"; and directly Blake struck in, screaming after the manner
  of an outraged cockatoo, "Tell the captain we've got some of his mail
  here. That'll fetch him. D'ye hear, Mister What's-your-name?" And there
  was Jim answering Egstrom with something boyish in his tone. "All right.
  I'll make a race of it." He seemed to take refuge in the boat-sailing
  part of that sorry business.
  
  'I did not see him again that trip, but on my next (I had a six months'
  charter) I went up to the store. Ten yards away from the door Blake's
  scolding met my ears, and when I came in he gave me a glance of utter
  wretchedness; Egstrom, all smiles, advanced, extending a large bony
  hand. "Glad to see you, captain. . . . Sssh. . . . Been thinking you
  were about due back here. What did you say, sir? . . . Sssh. . . . Oh!
  him! He has left us. Come into the parlour." . . . After the slam of the
  door Blake's strained voice became faint, as the voice of one scolding
  desperately in a wilderness. . . . "Put us to a great inconvenience,
  too. Used us badly--I must say . . ." "Where's he gone to? Do you
  know?" I asked. "No. It's no use asking either," said Egstrom, standing
  bewhiskered and obliging before me with his arms hanging down his sides
  clumsily, and a thin silver watch-chain looped very low on a rucked-up
  blue serge waistcoat. "A man like that don't go anywhere in particular."
  I was too concerned at the news to ask for the explanation of that
  pronouncement, and he went on. "He left--let's see--the very day a
  steamer with returning pilgrims from the Red Sea put in here with
  two blades of her propeller gone. Three weeks ago now." "Wasn't there
  something said about the Patna case?" I asked, fearing the worst. He
  gave a start, and looked at me as if I had been a sorcerer. "Why, yes!
  How do you know? Some of them were talking about it here. There was a
  captain or two, the manager of Vanlo's engineering shop at the harbour,
  two or three others, and myself. Jim was in here too, having a sandwich
  and a glass of beer; when we are busy--you see, captain--there's no time
  for a proper tiffin. He was standing by this table eating sandwiches,
  and the rest of us were round the telescope watching that steamer come
  in; and by-and-by Vanlo's manager began to talk about the chief of the
  Patna; he had done some repairs for him once, and from that he went on
  to tell us what an old ruin she was, and the money that had been made
  out of her. He came to mention her last voyage, and then we all struck
  in. Some said one thing and some another--not much--what you or any
  other man might say; and there was some laughing. Captain O'Brien of the
  Sarah W. Granger, a large, noisy old man with a stick--he was sitting
  listening to us in this arm-chair here--he let drive suddenly with his
  stick at the floor, and roars out, 'Skunks!' . . . Made us all jump.
  Vanlo's manager winks at us and asks, 'What's the matter, Captain
  O'Brien?' 'Matter! matter!' the old man began to shout; 'what are you
  Injuns laughing at? It's no laughing matter. It's a disgrace to human
  natur'--that's what it is. I would despise being seen in the same room
  with one of those men. Yes, sir!' He seemed to catch my eye like, and
  I had to speak out of civility. 'Skunks!' says I, 'of course, Captain
  O'Brien, and I wouldn't care to have them here myself, so you're quite
  safe in this room, Captain O'Brien. Have a little something cool to
  drink.' 'Dam' your drink, Egstrom,' says he, with a twinkle in his eye;
  'when I want a drink I will shout for it. I am going to quit. It stinks
  here now.' At this all the others burst out laughing, and out they go
  after the old man. And then, sir, that blasted Jim he puts down the
  sandwich he had in his hand and walks round the table to me; there was
  his glass of beer poured out quite full. 'I am off,' he says--just like
  this. 'It isn't half-past one yet,' says I; 'you might snatch a smoke
  first.' I thought he meant it was time for him to go down to his work.
  When I understood what he was up to, my arms fell--so! Can't get a man
  like that every day, you know, sir; a regular devil for sailing a boat;
  ready to go out miles to sea to meet ships in any sort of weather. More
  than once a captain would come in here full of it, and the first thing
  he would say would be, 'That's a reckless sort of a lunatic you've got
  for water-clerk, Egstrom. I was feeling my way in at daylight under
  short canvas when there comes flying out of the mist right under my
  forefoot a boat half under water, sprays going over the mast-head, two
  frightened niggers on the bottom boards, a yelling fiend at the tiller.
  Hey! hey! Ship ahoy! ahoy! Captain! Hey! hey! Egstrom & Blake's man
  first to speak to you! Hey! hey! Egstrom & Blake! Hallo! hey! whoop!
  Kick the niggers--out reefs--a squall on at the time--shoots ahead
  whooping and yelling to me to make sail and he would give me a lead
  in--more like a demon than a man. Never saw a boat handled like that in
  all my life. Couldn't have been drunk--was he? Such a quiet, soft-spoken
  chap too--blush like a girl when he came on board. . . .' I tell you,
  Captain Marlow, nobody had a chance against us with a strange ship when
  Jim was out. The other ship-chandlers just kept their old customers, and
  . . ."
  
  'Egstrom appeared overcome with emotion.
  
  '"Why, sir--it seemed as though he wouldn't mind going a hundred miles
  out to sea in an old shoe to nab a ship for the firm. If the business
  had been his own and all to make yet, he couldn't have done more in
  that way. And now . . . all at once . . . like this! Thinks I to myself:
  'Oho! a rise in the screw--that's the trouble--is it?' 'All right,' says
  I, 'no need of all that fuss with me, Jimmy. Just mention your figure.
  Anything in reason.' He looks at me as if he wanted to swallow something
  that stuck in his throat. 'I can't stop with you.' 'What's that blooming
  joke?' I asks. He shakes his head, and I could see in his eye he was as
  good as gone already, sir. So I turned to him and slanged him till all
  was blue. 'What is it you're running away from?' I asks. 'Who has been
  getting at you? What scared you? You haven't as much sense as a rat;
  they don't clear out from a good ship. Where do you expect to get a
  better berth?--you this and you that.' I made him look sick, I can tell
  you. 'This business ain't going to sink,' says I. He gave a big jump.
  'Good-bye,' he says, nodding at me like a lord; 'you ain't half a
  bad chap, Egstrom. I give you my word that if you knew my reasons you
  wouldn't care to keep me.' 'That's the biggest lie you ever told in your
  life,' says I; 'I know my own mind.' He made me so mad that I had to
  laugh. 'Can't you really stop long enough to drink this glass of beer
  here, you funny beggar, you?' I don't know what came over him; he didn't
  seem able to find the door; something comical, I can tell you, captain.
  I drank the beer myself. 'Well, if you're in such a hurry, here's luck
  to you in your own drink,' says I; 'only, you mark my words, if you keep
  up this game you'll very soon find that the earth ain't big enough to
  hold you--that's all.' He gave me one black look, and out he rushed with
  a face fit to scare little children."
  
  'Egstrom snorted bitterly, and combed one auburn whisker with knotty
  fingers. "Haven't been able to get a man that was any good since. It's
  nothing but worry, worry, worry in business. And where might you have
  come across him, captain, if it's fair to ask?"
  
  '"He was the mate of the Patna that voyage," I said, feeling that I
  owed some explanation. For a time Egstrom remained very still, with his
  fingers plunged in the hair at the side of his face, and then exploded.
  "And who the devil cares about that?" "I daresay no one," I began . . .
  "And what the devil is he--anyhow--for to go on like this?" He stuffed
  suddenly his left whisker into his mouth and stood amazed. "Jee!" he
  exclaimed, "I told him the earth wouldn't be big enough to hold his
  caper."'
  
  'I have told you these two episodes at length to show his manner of
  dealing with himself under the new conditions of his life. There were
  many others of the sort, more than I could count on the fingers of my
  two hands. They were all equally tinged by a high-minded absurdity of
  intention which made their futility profound and touching. To fling away
  your daily bread so as to get your hands free for a grapple with a ghost
  may be an act of prosaic heroism. Men had done it before (though we who
  have lived know full well that it is not the haunted soul but the hungry
  body that makes an outcast), and men who had eaten and meant to eat
  every day had applauded the creditable folly. He was indeed unfortunate,
  for all his recklessness could not carry him out from under the shadow.
  There was always a doubt of his courage. The truth seems to be that
  it is impossible to lay the ghost of a fact. You can face it or shirk
  it--and I have come across a man or two who could wink at their familiar
  shades. Obviously Jim was not of the winking sort; but what I could
  never make up my mind about was whether his line of conduct amounted to
  shirking his ghost or to facing him out.
  
  'I strained my mental eyesight only to discover that, as with the
  complexion of all our actions, the shade of difference was so delicate
  that it was impossible to say. It might have been flight and it might
  have been a mode of combat. To the common mind he became known as a
  rolling stone, because this was the funniest part: he did after a time
  become perfectly known, and even notorious, within the circle of his
  wanderings (which had a diameter of, say, three thousand miles), in the
  same way as an eccentric character is known to a whole countryside. For
  instance, in Bankok, where he found employment with Yucker Brothers,
  charterers and teak merchants, it was almost pathetic to see him go
  about in sunshine hugging his secret, which was known to the very
  up-country logs on the river. Schomberg, the keeper of the hotel where
  he boarded, a hirsute Alsatian of manly bearing and an irrepressible
  retailer of all the scandalous gossip of the place, would, with both
  elbows on the table, impart an adorned version of the story to any guest
  who cared to imbibe knowledge along with the more costly liquors. "And,
  mind you, the nicest fellow you could meet," would be his generous
  conclusion; "quite superior." It says a lot for the casual crowd that
  frequented Schomberg's establishment that Jim managed to hang out
  in Bankok for a whole six months. I remarked that people, perfect
  strangers, took to him as one takes to a nice child. His manner was
  reserved, but it was as though his personal appearance, his hair, his
  eyes, his smile, made friends for him wherever he went. And, of course,
  he was no fool. I heard Siegmund Yucker (native of Switzerland), a
  gentle creature ravaged by a cruel dyspepsia, and so frightfully lame
  that his head swung through a quarter of a circle at every step he took,
  declare appreciatively that for one so young he was "of great gabasidy,"
  as though it had been a mere question of cubic contents. "Why not send
  him up country?" I suggested anxiously. (Yucker Brothers had concessions
  and teak forests in the interior.) "If he has capacity, as you say,
  he will soon get hold of the work. And physically he is very fit. His
  health is always excellent." "Ach! It's a great ting in dis goundry
  to be vree vrom tispep-shia," sighed poor Yucker enviously, casting a
  stealthy glance at the pit of his ruined stomach. I left him drumming
  pensively on his desk and muttering, "Es ist ein' Idee. Es ist ein'
  Idee." Unfortunately, that very evening an unpleasant affair took place
  in the hotel.
  
  'I don't know that I blame Jim very much, but it was a truly regrettable
  incident. It belonged to the lamentable species of bar-room scuffles,
  and the other party to it was a cross-eyed Dane of sorts whose
  visiting-card recited, under his misbegotten name: first lieutenant in
  the Royal Siamese Navy. The fellow, of course, was utterly hopeless at
  billiards, but did not like to be beaten, I suppose. He had had enough
  to drink to turn nasty after the sixth game, and make some scornful
  remark at Jim's expense. Most of the people there didn't hear what
  was said, and those who had heard seemed to have had all precise
  recollection scared out of them by the appalling nature of the
  consequences that immediately ensued. It was very lucky for the Dane
  that he could swim, because the room opened on a verandah and the Menam
  flowed below very wide and black. A boat-load of Chinamen, bound, as
  likely as not, on some thieving expedition, fished out the officer of
  the King of Siam, and Jim turned up at about midnight on board my ship
  without a hat. "Everybody in the room seemed to know," he said, gasping
  yet from the contest, as it were. He was rather sorry, on general
  principles, for what had happened, though in this case there had been,
  he said, "no option." But what dismayed him was to find the nature of
  his burden as well known to everybody as though he had gone about all
  that time carrying it on his shoulders. Naturally after this he couldn't
  remain in the place. He was universally condemned for the brutal
  violence, so unbecoming a man in his delicate position; some maintained
  he had been disgracefully drunk at the time; others criticised his want
  of tact. Even Schomberg was very much annoyed. "He is a very nice young
  man," he said argumentatively to me, "but the lieutenant is a first-rate
  fellow too. He dines every night at my table d'hote, you know. And
  there's a billiard-cue broken. I can't allow that. First thing this
  morning I went over with my apologies to the lieutenant, and I think
  I've made it all right for myself; but only think, captain, if everybody
  started such games! Why, the man might have been drowned! And here I
  can't run out into the next street and buy a new cue. I've got to write
  to Europe for them. No, no! A temper like that won't do!" . . . He was
  extremely sore on the subject.
  
  'This was the worst incident of all in his--his retreat. Nobody could
  deplore it more than myself; for if, as somebody said hearing him
  mentioned, "Oh yes! I know. He has knocked about a good deal out here,"
  yet he had somehow avoided being battered and chipped in the process.
  This last affair, however, made me seriously uneasy, because if his
  exquisite sensibilities were to go the length of involving him in
  pot-house shindies, he would lose his name of an inoffensive, if
  aggravating, fool, and acquire that of a common loafer. For all my
  confidence in him I could not help reflecting that in such cases
  from the name to the thing itself is but a step. I suppose you will
  understand that by that time I could not think of washing my hands
  of him. I took him away from Bankok in my ship, and we had a longish
  passage. It was pitiful to see how he shrank within himself. A seaman,
  even if a mere passenger, takes an interest in a ship, and looks at
  the sea-life around him with the critical enjoyment of a painter,
  for instance, looking at another man's work. In every sense of the
  expression he is "on deck"; but my Jim, for the most part, skulked down
  below as though he had been a stowaway. He infected me so that I avoided
  speaking on professional matters, such as would suggest themselves
  naturally to two sailors during a passage. For whole days we did
  not exchange a word; I felt extremely unwilling to give orders to my
  officers in his presence. Often, when alone with him on deck or in the
  cabin, we didn't know what to do with our eyes.
  
  'I placed him with De Jongh, as you know, glad enough to dispose of him
  in any way, yet persuaded that his position was now growing intolerable.
  He had lost some of that elasticity which had enabled him to rebound
  back into his uncompromising position after every overthrow. One
  day, coming ashore, I saw him standing on the quay; the water of the
  roadstead and the sea in the offing made one smooth ascending plane, and
  the outermost ships at anchor seemed to ride motionless in the sky.
  He was waiting for his boat, which was being loaded at our feet
  with packages of small stores for some vessel ready to leave. After
  exchanging greetings, we remained silent--side by side. "Jove!" he said
  suddenly, "this is killing work."
  
  'He smiled at me; I must say he generally could manage a smile. I made
  no reply. I knew very well he was not alluding to his duties; he had an
  easy time of it with De Jongh. Nevertheless, as soon as he had spoken
  I became completely convinced that the work was killing. I did not even
  look at him. "Would you like," said I, "to leave this part of the world
  altogether; try California or the West Coast? I'll see what I can
  do . . ." He interrupted me a little scornfully. "What difference would
  it make?" . . . I felt at once convinced that he was right. It would make
  no difference; it was not relief he wanted; I seemed to perceive dimly
  that what he wanted, what he was, as it were, waiting for, was something
  not easy to define--something in the nature of an opportunity. I had
  given him many opportunities, but they had been merely opportunities to
  earn his bread. Yet what more could any man do? The position struck me
  as hopeless, and poor Brierly's saying recurred to me, "Let him creep
  twenty feet underground and stay there." Better that, I thought, than
  this waiting above ground for the impossible. Yet one could not be sure
  even of that. There and then, before his boat was three oars' lengths
  away from the quay, I had made up my mind to go and consult Stein in the
  evening.
  
  'This Stein was a wealthy and respected merchant. His "house" (because
  it was a house, Stein & Co., and there was some sort of partner who,
  as Stein said, "looked after the Moluccas") had a large inter-island
  business, with a lot of trading posts established in the most
  out-of-the-way places for collecting the produce. His wealth and his
  respectability were not exactly the reasons why I was anxious to seek
  his advice. I desired to confide my difficulty to him because he was
  one of the most trustworthy men I had ever known. The gentle light of a
  simple, unwearied, as it were, and intelligent good-nature illumined his
  long hairless face. It had deep downward folds, and was pale as of a
  man who had always led a sedentary life--which was indeed very far from
  being the case. His hair was thin, and brushed back from a massive and
  lofty forehead. One fancied that at twenty he must have looked very much
  like what he was now at threescore. It was a student's face; only the
  eyebrows nearly all white, thick and bushy, together with the resolute
  searching glance that came from under them, were not in accord with his,
  I may say, learned appearance. He was tall and loose-jointed; his slight
  stoop, together with an innocent smile, made him appear benevolently
  ready to lend you his ear; his long arms with pale big hands had rare
  deliberate gestures of a pointing out, demonstrating kind. I speak of
  him at length, because under this exterior, and in conjunction with
  an upright and indulgent nature, this man possessed an intrepidity of
  spirit and a physical courage that could have been called reckless had
  it not been like a natural function of the body--say good digestion, for
  instance--completely unconscious of itself. It is sometimes said of a
  man that he carries his life in his hand. Such a saying would have been
  inadequate if applied to him; during the early part of his existence in
  the East he had been playing ball with it. All this was in the past, but
  I knew the story of his life and the origin of his fortune. He was also
  a naturalist of some distinction, or perhaps I should say a learned
  collector. Entomology was his special study. His collection of
  Buprestidae and Longicorns--beetles all--horrible miniature monsters,
  looking malevolent in death and immobility, and his cabinet of
  butterflies, beautiful and hovering under the glass of cases on
  lifeless wings, had spread his fame far over the earth. The name of this
  merchant, adventurer, sometime adviser of a Malay sultan (to whom he
  never alluded otherwise than as "my poor Mohammed Bonso"), had, on
  account of a few bushels of dead insects, become known to learned
  persons in Europe, who could have had no conception, and certainly would
  not have cared to know anything, of his life or character. I, who knew,
  considered him an eminently suitable person to receive my confidences
  about Jim's difficulties as well as my own.'
feat_summary_name: Chapters 18-19
target: Six months later, while Marlow was in Hong Kong, he received a letter from a Mr. Denver, the owner of a rice mill, the friend to whom he recommended Jim. Denver, an eccentric, middle-aged bachelor, wrote quietly but glowingly about Jim; he was especially fond of Jim's quality of "freshness" -- his quiet, naive, generous nature. Marlow smiled to himself. He was right to send Jim to his friend. Perhaps, he speculated, Jim might inherit a good sum of money from the old bachelor. Marlow then made a trip northward, and when he returned to Hong Kong, another letter from Denver was awaiting him. Denver was furious: Jim had vanished. Also in the pile of letters, there was a note from Jim. He was working in a seaport town seven hundred miles south, and he wrote that he had no choice; he had to leave Denver's rice mill. The second engineer from the Patna unexpectedly turned up at Denver's mill and was given temporary employment. Shortly thereafter, this man began making insinuations about Jim's past, threatening blackmail unless he were put on full-time at the mill. Jim said that he could "no longer stand the familiarity of the little beast," so he left. He asked Marlow for another letter of recommendation. He had found temporary work as a "runner," or a water-clerk, for a ship-chandler, and he wanted permanence as soon as possible. Some months later, Marlow was in port and met Jim. He seemed to be happy and busy and popular. Marlow had a good feeling about the future of the young man. Then, six months afterward, Marlow was again in port and inquired about Jim at Egstrom & Blake, the ship-chandlers who employed him. Egstrom told Marlow that suddenly one day, Jim left -- without an explanation. Jim was his best runner, he says; there was no better water-clerk in port than Jim. He told Marlow that he offered Jim more money, emphasizing that business was exceptionally good: "This business ain't going to sink," Egstrom told Jim. Marlow asked pointedly if anyone mentioned anything about the Patna just prior to Jim's disappearance. Egstrom remembered that one of the old sea captains had expounded on the whole disgraceful business of the Patna. Marlow told the ship-chandler that that explained it: Jim was the first mate of the Patna on the night of "the incident." The ship-chandler was puzzled. "Who the devil cares about that?" he asked. Then he added that if Jim were that sensitive about his past, then even the earth itself "wouldn't be big enough" for him to hide in. Jim continued running, and it was not long before he became known as "a rolling stone," Marlow says. In fact, Jim even became "notorious" within the sphere of about three thousand miles that he traversed. All around that area, people recognized his name and knew all about the secret that he considered so shameful. Jim, of course, never dreamed that so many people knew so many details about the secret that he kept so tightly hidden within his breast. One night, however, during a brawl in a hotel billiards room, Jim got an inkling that a lot of people knew a great deal more about him than he cared for them to know. He was playing billiards with a Navy officer, a cross-eyed Dane who was employed by the Royal Siamese Navy. The fellow had drunk too much, and he made a slurring reference to Jim's part in the Patna fiasco. Jim reacted like a madman. He broke a billiard cue in half and then threw the naval officer off the verandah and into the Menam River. Marlow realized that after that incident, Jim was no doubt beginning to think that all jobs would eventually be dead ends for him. There would be money paid to him for a job well done, but the situation itself would never be satisfying. What Jim needed was a challenge for his soul, not a job for his hands. Marlow, therefore, went to see "the most trustworthy man" he knew -- a Mr. Stein. Stein was very wealthy and very respected, and he had trading posts all over the world. Moreover, he was a learned man -- in particular, an internationally known expert on beetles and butterflies. Marlow felt that it was time to discuss Jim's problems with another person, someone who could see the enormous guilt that Jim insisted on living with. Marlow was looking for someone who could offer Jim a job that would be entirely different from the sort of menial laboring that might lend itself to ridicule and third-class status.
feat_summary_analysis: In these two chapters, Marlow relates three episodes involving Jim, and the episodes occurred at immense geographical distances from each other. In each case where some connection or comment was made about the Patna episode, Jim would literally flee. For example, in his first job where he had earned the respect of his employer, Mr. Denver stood to reap great financial rewards; the happenstance appearance of the second mate was bad enough, but when this second mate tried to become intimate with Jim, Jim could not "stand the familiarity of the little beast." After all, Jim was a gentleman, and furthermore, after the sinking of the Patna, the second mate and his fellow officers had considered killing Jim. Likewise, at Jim's next job -- one in which he was extremely successful and well liked -- he fled immediately when someone began discussing the Patna episode, and his final adventure was with the Dane in the Siamese Navy. All three of these episodes represent what must have been dozens more , and thus Jim's almost obsessive, almost pathological sense of guilt has made him known over thousands of miles all through the South Pacific. It is ironic that Jim feels his guilt more than other people. His innate sensitivity makes him feel that everyone condemns him, and then we hear that Egstrom did not care at all. Egstrom says, "And who the devil cares about that?" Furthermore, the physical attack on the Dane represents the one time that Jim did not behave as though he was "one of us." After one episode when Marlow brings Jim aboard his ship, Jim constantly remains below deck and is quiet and reticent. Note that when Marlow asks him if he would like to go to California, Jim responds, "What difference would it make?" In other words, Jim cannot escape from himself even if it be across continents and oceans; instead, he is looking for an opportunity to prove himself to himself.