"But I must go to the castle, and tell my poor Dixon that he is reprieved--I am so tired! Will you ask Mr.Johnson to get me leave to see him?
He will know all about it." She threw herself down on the bed in the spare room; the bed with the heavy blue curtains.

After an unheeded remonstrance, Miss Monro went to do her bidding.

But it was now late afternoon, and Mr.Johnson said that it would be impossible for him to get permission from the sheriff that night.
"Besides," said he, courteously, "one scarcely knows whether Miss Wilkins may not give the old man false hopes--whether she has not been excited to have false hopes herself; it might be a cruel kindness to let her see him, without more legal certainty as to what his sentence, or reprieve, is to be.

By to-morrow morning, if I have properly understood her story, which was a little confused--" "She is so dreadfully tired, poor creature," put in Miss Monro, who never could bear the shadow of a suspicion that Ellinor was not wisest, best, in all relations and situations of life.
Mr.Johnson went on, with a deprecatory bow: "Well, then--it really is the only course open to her besides--persuade her to rest for this evening.

By to-morrow morning I will have obtained the sheriff's leave, and he will most likely have heard from London." "Thank you! I believe that will be best." "It is the only course," said he.
When Miss Monro returned to the bedroom, Ellinor was in a heavy feverish slumber; so feverish and so uneasy did she appear, that, after the hesitation of a moment or two, Miss Monro had no scruple in wakening her.
But she did not appear to understand the answer to her request; she did not seem even to remember that she had made any request.
The journey to England, the misery, the surprises, had been too much for her.