I went on without hesitating, without even a thought of turning back.  I had said that the honour of my family should not suffer by the calamity which had fallen on me; and, while life remained, I was determined that nothing should prevent me from holding to my word.  It was from this resolution that I drew the faith in myself, the confidence in my endurance, the sustaining calmness under my father’s sentence of exclusion, which nerved me to go on.  I must inevitably see Mr. Sherwin (perhaps even suffer the humiliation of seeing her!)—­must inevitably speak such words, disclose such truths, as should show him that deceit was henceforth useless.  I must do this and more, I must be prepared to guard the family to which—­though banished from it—­I still belonged, from every conspiracy against them that detected crime or shameless cupidity could form, whether in the desire of revenge, or in the hope of gain..  A hard, almost an impossible task—­but, nevertheless, a task that must be done!

I kept the thought of this necessity before my mind unceasingly; not only as a duty, but as a refuge from another thought, to which I dared not for a moment turn.  The still, pale face which I had seen lying hushed on my father’s breast—­CLARA!—­That way, lay the grief that weakens, the yearning and the terror that are near despair; that way was not it for me.

The servant was at the garden-gate of North Villa—­the same servant whom I had seen and questioned in the first days of my fatal delusion.  She was receiving a letter from a man, very poorly dressed, who walked away the moment I approached.  Her confusion and surprise were so great as she let me in, that she could hardly look at, or speak to me.  It was only when I was ascending the door-steps that she said—­

“Miss Margaret”—­(she still gave her that name!)—­“Miss Margaret is upstairs, Sir.  I suppose you would like—­”

“I have no wish to see her:  I want to speak to Mr. Sherwin.”

Looking more bewildered, and even frightened, than before, the girl hurriedly opened one of the doors in the passage.  I saw, as I entered, that she had shown me, in her confusion, into the wrong room.  Mr. Sherwin, who was in the apartment, hastily drew a screen across the lower end of it, apparently to hide something from me; which, however, I had not seen as I came in.

He advanced, holding out his hand; but his restless eyes wandered unsteadily, looking away from me towards the screen.

“So you have come at last, have you?  Just let’s step into the drawing-room:  the fact is—­I thought I wrote to you about it—?”

He stopped suddenly, and his outstretched arm fell to his side.  I had not said a word.  Something in my look and manner must have told him already on what errand I had come.

“Why don’t you speak?” he said, after a moment’s pause.  “What are you looking at me like that for?  Stop!  Let’s say our say in the other room.”  He walked past me towards the door, and half opened it.