I had left Margaret and Mr. Mannion both well--I returned, and found
them both ill. Surely this was something that had taken place in my
absence, though they all said that nothing had happened. But trifling
illnesses seemed to be little regarded at North Villa--perhaps,
because serious illness was perpetually present there, in the person
of Mrs. Sherwin.

VI.

About six weeks after I had left the Hall, my father and Clara
returned to London for the season.

It is not my intention to delay over my life either at home or at
North Villa, during the spring and summer. This would be merely to
repeat much of what has been already related. It is better to proceed
at once to the closing period of my probation; to a period which it
taxes my resolution severely to write of at all. A few weeks more of
toil at my narrative, and the penance of this poor task-work will be
over.

* * * * * *

Imagine then, that the final day of my long year of expectation has
arrived; and that on the morrow, Margaret, for whose sake I have
sacrificed and suffered so much, is at last really to be mine.

On the eve of the great change in my life that was now to take place,
the relative positions in which I, and the different persons with whom
I was associated, stood towards each other, may be sketched thus:--