‘And don’t let men like that Keene make a fool of you,’ the monitor concluded.  ’Can’t you see that fellows like him’ll hang on and make their profit out of you if you know no better than to let them?  You just keep to yourself, and look after your own future.’

A suggestion that cunning was required of him flattered the youth to some purpose.  He had begun to reflect that after all it might be more profitable to combine work and pleasure.  He agreed to pursue the course planned for him.

So Richard returned to Wanley, carrying with him a small satisfaction and many great anxieties.  Nor did he visit London again until four weeks had gone by; it was understood that the pressure of responsibilities grew daily more severe.  New Wanley, as the industrial settlement in the valley was to be named, was shaping itself in accordance with the ideas of the committee with which Mutimer took counsel, and the undertaking was no small one.

In spite of Emma’s cheerful anticipations, ‘the business’ meanwhile made little progress.  A graver trouble was the state of Jane’s health; the sufferer seemed wasting away.  Emma devoted herself to her sister.  Between her and Mutimer there was no further mention of marriage.  In Emma’s mind a new term had fixed itself—­that of her sister’s recovery; but there were dark moments when dread came to her that not Jane’s recovery, but something else, would set her free.  In the early autumn Richard persuaded her to take the invalid to the sea-side, and to remain with her there for three weeks.  Mrs. Clay during that time lived alone, and was very content to receive her future brother-in-law’s subsidy, without troubling about the work which would not come in.

Autumn had always been a peaceful and bounteous season at Wanley; then the fruit trees bent beneath their golden charge, and the air seemed rich with sweet odours.  But the autumn of this year was unlike any that had visited the valley hitherto.  Blight had fallen upon all produce; the crop of apples and plums was bare beyond precedent.  The west wind breathing up between the hill-sides only brought smoke from newly-built chimneys; the face of the fields was already losing its purity and taking on a dun hue.  Where a large orchard had flourished were two streets of small houses, glaring with new brick and slate The works were extending by degrees, and a little apart rose the walls of a large building which would contain library, reading rooms, and lecture-hall, for the use of the industrial community.  New Wanley was in a fair way to claim for itself a place on the map.