during that interval?

No personal communication with either--written communication only with
my sister. Clara's letters to me were frequent. They studiously
avoided anything like a reproach for my long absence; and were
confined almost exclusively to such details of country life as the
writer thought likely to interest me. Their tone was as
affectionate--nay, more affectionate, if possible--than usual; but
Clara's gaiety and quiet humour, as a correspondent, were gone. My
conscience taught me only too easily and too plainly how to account
for this change--my conscience told me who had altered the tone of my
sister's letters, by altering all the favourite purposes and favourite
pleasures of her country life.

I was selfishly enough devoted to my own passions and my own
interests, at this period of my life; but I was not so totally dead to
every one of the influences which had guided me since childhood, as to
lose all thought of Clara and my father, and the ancient house that
was associated with my earliest and happiest recollections. Sometimes,
even in Margaret's beloved presence, a thought of Clara put away from
me all other thoughts. And, sometimes, in the lonely London house, I
dreamed--with the strangest sleeping oblivion of my marriage, and of
all the new interests which it had crowded into my life--of country
rides with my sister, and of quiet conversations in the old gothic
library at the Hall. Under such influences as these, I twice resolved
to make amends for my long absence, by joining my father and my sister
in the country, even though it were only for a few days--and, each
time, I failed in my resolution. On the second occasion, I had
actually mustered firmness enough to get as far as the railway
station; and only at the last moment faltered and hung back. The