As the summer came nearer and nearer, Mrs. Vanstone’s spirits, in spite of her resolute efforts to control them, became more and more depressed.

“I do my best,” she said to Miss Garth; “I set an example of cheerfulness to my husband and my children—­but I dread July.”  Norah’s secret misgivings on her sister’s account rendered her more than usually serious and uncommunicative, as the year advanced.  Even Mr. Vanstone, when July drew nearer, lost something of his elasticity of spirit.  He kept up appearances in his wife’s presence—­but on all other occasions there was now a perceptible shade of sadness in his look and manner.  Magdalen was so changed since Frank’s departure that she helped the general depression, instead of relieving it.  All her movements had grown languid; all her usual occupations were pursued with the same weary indifference; she spent hours alone in her own room; she lost her interest in being brightly and prettily dressed; her eyes were heavy, her nerves were irritable, her complexion was altered visibly for the worse—­in one word, she had become an oppression and a weariness to herself and to all about her.  Stoutly as Miss Garth contended with these growing domestic difficulties, her own spirits suffered in the effort.  Her memory reverted, oftener and oftener, to the March morning when the master and mistress of the house had departed for London, and then the first serious change, for many a year past, had stolen over the family atmosphere.  When was that atmosphere to be clear again?  When were the clouds of change to pass off before the returning sunshine of past and happier times?

The spring and the early summer wore away.  The dreaded month of July came, with its airless nights, its cloudless mornings, and its sultry days.

On the fifteenth of the month, an event happened which took every one but Norah by surprise.  For the second time, without the slightest apparent reason—­for the second time, without a word of warning beforehand—­Frank suddenly re-appeared at his father’s cottage.

Mr. Clare’s lips opened to hail his son’s return, in the old character of the “bad shilling”; and closed again without uttering a word.  There was a portentous composure in Frank’s manner which showed that he had other news to communicate than the news of his dismissal.  He answered his father’s sardonic look of inquiry by at once explaining that a very important proposal for his future benefit had been made to him, that morning, at the office.  His first idea had been to communicate the details in writing; but the partners had, on reflection, thought that the necessary decision might be more readily obtained by a personal interview with his father and his friends.  He had laid aside the pen accordingly, and had resigned himself to the railway on the spot.

After this preliminary statement, Frank proceeded to describe the proposal which his employers had addressed to him, with every external appearance of viewing it in the light of an intolerable hardship.