Fortunately for the success of the measures taken subsequently, no one was present at that moment but the nurse.  She was a young woman, and she was so startled that she was at first quite incapable of interfering.  When she was able to do so her whole services were required by Miss Halcombe, who had for the moment sunk altogether in the effort to keep her own senses under the shock of the discovery.  After waiting a few minutes in the fresh air and the cool shade, her natural energy and courage helped her a little, and she became sufficiently mistress of herself to feel the necessity of recalling her presence of mind for her unfortunate sister’s sake.

She obtained permission to speak alone with the patient, on condition that they both remained well within the nurse’s view.  There was no time for questions—­there was only time for Miss Halcombe to impress on the unhappy lady the necessity of controlling herself, and to assure her of immediate help and rescue if she did so.  The prospect of escaping from the Asylum by obedience to her sister’s directions was sufficient to quiet Lady Glyde, and to make her understand what was required of her.  Miss Halcombe next returned to the nurse, placed all the gold she then had in her pocket (three sovereigns) in the nurse’s hands, and asked when and where she could speak to her alone.

The woman was at first surprised and distrustful.  But on Miss Halcombe’s declaring that she only wanted to put some questions which she was too much agitated to ask at that moment, and that she had no intention of misleading the nurse into any dereliction of duty, the woman took the money, and proposed three o’clock on the next day as the time for the interview.  She might then slip out for half an hour, after the patients had dined, and she would meet the lady in a retired place, outside the high north wall which screened the grounds of the house.  Miss Halcombe had only time to assent, and to whisper to her sister that she should hear from her on the next day, when the proprietor of the Asylum joined them.  He noticed his visitor’s agitation, which Miss Halcombe accounted for by saying that her interview with Anne Catherick had a little startled her at first.  She took her leave as soon after as possible—­that is to say, as soon as she could summon courage to force herself from the presence of her unfortunate sister.

A very little reflection, when the capacity to reflect returned, convinced her that any attempt to identify Lady Glyde and to rescue her by legal means, would, even if successful, involve a delay that might be fatal to her sister’s intellects, which were shaken already by the horror of the situation to which she had been consigned.  By the time Miss Halcombe had got back to London, she had determined to effect Lady Glyde’s escape privately, by means of the nurse.

She went at once to her stockbroker, and sold out of the funds all the little property she possessed, amounting to rather less than seven hundred pounds.  Determined, if necessary, to pay the price of her sister’s liberty with every farthing she had in the world, she repaired the next day, having the whole sum about her in bank-notes, to her appointment outside the Asylum wall.