It surprised her that she still thought of him with heartache.  Her quarrel with Mary Bower seemed an encouragement to the love she kept so secret.  She found a thousand excuses for him; she pitied him deeply; she longed to go and speak to him.  Why could she not do so?  Often and often she rehearsed conversations with him, in which she told him how unworthy it was to fall so, and implored him for his own sake to be a man again.  She might have realised such a dialogue —­though it would have cost her much—­but for the news that he had begun to pay attention to Totty Nancarrow.

Then she knew jealousy.  Of Thyrza she could not be jealous, but to imagine him giving his affection to a girl like Totty Nancarrow made her rebellious and scornful.  How little could any of her work-room companions know what was passing in Lydia’s breast when she had one of her days of quietness and bent with such persistence over her sewing!  If spoken to, she raised the same kind, helpful face as ever; you could not imagine that a minute ago a tear had all but come to her eyes, that in thought she had been uttering words of indignant passion.  They were rare, those days in which she could not be quite herself.  It was not her nature to yield when weakness tempted.

And now he had written to her.  Having read the note, she put it into the bosom of her dress, and, whilst her fingers were busy, she turned over every possible explanation in her mind.  She knew that he had abandoned his evil habits of late, and she could be just enough not to refuse Totty some credit for the change.  Gilbert himself had said that the girl’s influence seemed on the whole good.  But some mystery was now going to reveal itself.  It concerned Thyrza; she was sure it did.  The fact that the note was delivered in this way, and the request for secrecy which it contained, made this certain.

At dinner-time, and again in the evening, Thyrza was still in the same state of depression and feverishness.  Lydia said nothing of the business which would take her out at eight o’clock.  When the time came, and she had to make an excuse, Thyrza said that she too would go out; she wanted to see Totty.

‘You’ll tell Gilbert?’ Lydia replied, afraid to make any opposition herself.

’No.  He’d say it wasn’t good for me to go out, and I want to go.  You won’t say anything, Lyddy?’

’I ought to, dear.  You’re not well enough to go, that’s quite certain.’

‘I won’t be long.  I must go just for half an hour.’

‘Why do you want to see her?’ Lydia asked, masking her curiosity with a half-absent tone.

‘Oh, nothing to explain.  I feel I want to talk, that’s all.’

From time to time—­in her more difficult moments—­Lydia had felt a little hurt that the course of circumstances made no difference in Thyrza’s friendship for Totty.  When her truer mind was restored, she knew that the reproach was a foolish one.  More likely it was she herself who was to blame for having always nourished a prejudice against Totty.  At present, Thyrza’s anxiety to go out was another detail connecting itself with Ackroyd’s summons.  Something unexplained was in progress between those three, Totty and Ackroyd and Thyrza.  Her resentment against the first of them revived.