’If you talk of such a thing I will swear that I will never go to Monkhams.  You will find that I shall manage it.  It may be that I shall do something very shocking so that all your patronage will hardly be able to bring me round afterwards; but I will do something that will serve my purpose.  I have not gone so far as this to be turned back now.’  Nora, as she spoke of having ‘gone so far,’ was looking at Mr Glascock, who was seated in an easy arm-chair close to the girl whom he was to make his wife on the morrow, and she was thinking, no doubt, of the visit which he had made to Nuncombe Putney, and of the first irretrievable step which she had taken when she told him that her love was given to another.  That had been her Rubicon.  And though there had been periods with her since the passing of it, in which she had felt that she had crossed it in vain, that she had thrown away the splendid security of the other bank without obtaining the perilous object of her ambition, though there had been moments in which she had almost regretted her own courage and noble action, still, having passed the river, there was nothing for her but to go on to Rome.  She was not going to be stopped now by the want of a house in which to hide herself for a few weeks.  She was without money, except so much as her mother might be able, almost surreptitiously, to give her.  She was without friends to help her except these who were now with her, whose friendship had come to her in so singular a mariner, and whose power to aid her at the present moment was cruelly curtailed by their own circumstances.  Nothing was settled as to her own marriage.  In consequence of the promise that had been extorted from her that she should not correspond with Stanbury, she knew nothing of his present wishes or intention.  Her father was so offended by her firmness that he would hardly speak to her.  And it was evident to her that her mother, though disposed to yield, was still in hopes that her daughter, in the press and difficulty of the moment, would allow herself to be carried away with the rest of the family to the other side of the world.  She knew all this, but she had made up her mind that she would not be carried away.  It was not very pleasant, the thought that she would be obliged at last to ask her young man, as she called him, to provide for her; but she would do that and trust herself altogether in his hands sooner than be taken to the Antipodes.  ’I can be very resolute if I please, my dear,’ she said, looking at Caroline.  Mr Glascock almost thought that she must have intended to address him.

They sat there discussing the matter for some time through the long, cool, evening hours, but nothing could be settled further except that Nora would write to her friend as soon as her affairs had begun to shape themselves after her return to England.  At last Caroline went into the house, and for a few minutes Mr Glascock was alone with Nora.  He had remained, determining that the moment should come, but now that it was there he was for awhile unable to say the words that he wished to utter.  At last he spoke.  ’Miss Rowley, Caroline is so eager to be your friend.’