‘I am sure they would be so glad to see you at Hope Farm,’ said I, eagerly.  ’In fact, they’ve asked me to bring you several times:  only I thought you would find it dull.’

’Not at all.  I can’t go yet though, even if you do get me an invitation; for the ——­ Company want me to go to the ——­ Valley, and look over the ground a bit for them, to see if it would do for a branch line; it’s a job which may take me away for some time; but I shall be backwards and forwards, and you’re quite up to doing what is needed in my absence; the only work that may be beyond you is keeping old Jevons from drinking.’  He went on giving me directions about the management of the men employed on the line, and no more was said then, or for several months, about his going to Rope Farm.  He went off into ——­ Valley, a dark overshadowed dale, where the sun seemed to set behind the hills before four o’clock on midsummer afternoon.  Perhaps it was this that brought on the attack of low fever which he had soon after the beginning of the new year; he was very ill for many weeks, almost many months; a married sister—­his only relation, I think—­came down from London to nurse him, and I went over to him when I could, to see him, and give him ’masculine news,’ as he called it; reports of the progress of the line, which, I am glad to say, I was able to carry on in his absence, in the slow gradual way which suited the company best, while trade was in a languid state, and money dear in the market.  Of course, with this occupation for my scanty leisure, I did not often go over to Hope Farm.  Whenever I did go, I met with a thorough welcome; and many inquiries were made as to Holdsworth’s illness, and the progress of his recovery.

At length, in June I think it was, he was sufficiently recovered to come back to his lodgings at Eltham, and resume part at least of his work.  His sister, Mrs Robinson, had been obliged to leave him some weeks before, owing to some epidemic amongst her own children.  As long as I had seen Mr Holdsworth in the rooms at the little inn at Hensleydale, where I had been accustomed to look upon him as an invalid, I had not been aware of the visible shake his fever had given to his health.  But, once back in the old lodgings, where I had always seen him so buoyant, eloquent, decided, and vigorous in former days, my spirits sank at the change in one whom I had always regarded with a strong feeling of admiring affection.  He sank into silence and despondency after the least exertion; he seemed as if he could not make up his mind to any action, or else that, when it was made up, he lacked strength to carry out his purpose.  Of course, it was but the natural state of slow convalescence, after so sharp an illness; but, at the time, I did not know this, and perhaps I represented his state as more serious than it was to my kind relations at Hope Farm; who, in their grave, simple, eager way, immediately thought of the only help they could give.