Muhlen, if the yacht were his,
would flaunt these ladies about the streets. The American, in keeping
them secluded on board, betrayed a sense of shame, almost of delicacy;
a sense of his obligations towards society which, so far as it went,
was rather a laudable trait of character than otherwise.
And then--the difference between himself and the millionaire in life,
training, antecedents! A career such as van Koppen's called for
qualities different, often actually antagonistic, to his own. You could
not possibly expect to find in a successful American merchant those
features which go to form a successful English ecclesiastic. Certain
human attributes were mutually exclusive--avarice and generosity, for
instance; others no doubt mysteriously but inextricably intertwined. A
man was an individual; he could not be divided or taken to pieces; he
could not be expected to possess virtues incompatible with the rest of
his mental equipment, however desirable such virtues might be. Who
knows? Van Koppen's doubtful acts might be an unavoidable expression of
his personality, an integral part of that nature under whose ferocious
stimulus he had climbed to his present enviable position.
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