Mr.Corbeck seemed to be in a retrospective rather than a speculative mood.

I was myself rather inclined to be gay; the relief from certain anxiety regarding Margaret was sufficient for me for the time.
As to Mr.Trelawny he seemed less changed than any.

Perhaps this was only natural, as he had had in his mind the intention for so many years of doing that in which we were tonight engaged, that any event connected with it could only seem to him as an episode, a step to the end.

His was that commanding nature which looks so to the end of an undertaking that all else is of secondary importance.

Even now, though his terrible sternness relaxed under the relief from the strain, he never flagged nor faltered for a moment in his purpose.