The day at Sotherton, with all its imperfections, afforded the Miss
Bertrams much more agreeable feelings than were derived from the
letters from Antigua, which soon afterwards reached Mansfield. It was
much pleasanter to think of Henry Crawford than of their father; and to
think of their father in England again within a certain period, which
these letters obliged them to do, was a most unwelcome exercise.

November was the black month fixed for his return. Sir Thomas wrote of
it with as much decision as experience and anxiety could authorise.
His business was so nearly concluded as to justify him in proposing to
take his passage in the September packet, and he consequently looked
forward with the hope of being with his beloved family again early in
November.

Maria was more to be pitied than Julia; for to her the father brought a
husband, and the return of the friend most solicitous for her happiness
would unite her to the lover, on whom she had chosen that happiness
should depend. It was a gloomy prospect, and all she could do was to
throw a mist over it, and hope when the mist cleared away she should
see something else. It would hardly be early in November, there were
generally delays, a bad passage or something; that favouring
something which everybody who shuts their eyes while they look, or
their understandings while they reason, feels the comfort of. It would
probably be the middle of November at least; the middle of November was
three months off. Three months comprised thirteen weeks. Much might
happen in thirteen weeks.