Duty then would have been duty; sentiment would have been sentiment; her youth would not have been so wretchedly misspent. She would have given up her heart betimes; doubtless it would have learned to beat to a decent and satisfied measure; but now it had throbbed to a finer music, a melody that would ring in her ears forever. Thinking of what her conscience might have done, however, brought her to thinking of what it might still do. While she turned in her pain, angrily questioning it, Mrs. Keith knocked at the door. Nora repaired to the dressing-glass, to efface the traces of her tears; and while she stood there, she saw in her open dressing-case her last letter from her cousin. It gave her the help she was vaguely groping for. By the time she had crossed the room and opened the door she had welcomed and blessed this help; and while she gravely shook her head in response to Mrs. Keith’s softly urgent, “Nora, dear, won’t you let me come to you?” she had passionately made it her own. “I would rather be alone,” she said: “I thank you very much.” It was past six o’clock; Mrs. Keith was dressed for the evening. It was her gracious practice on Sundays to dine with her mother-in-law. Nora knew, therefore, that if her companion accepted this present dismissal, she would be alone for several hours. “Can’t I do something for you?” Mrs. Keith inquired, soothingly. “Nothing at all, thank you. You are very kind.” Mrs. Keith looked at her, wondering whether this was the irony of bitter grief; but a certain cold calmness in the young girl’s face, overlying her agitation, seemed to intimate that she had taken a wise resolve. And, in fact, Nora was now soaring sublime on the wings of purpose, and viewed Mrs. Keith’s offence as a diminished fact. Mrs. Keith took her hands. “Write him a line, my dear,” she gently urged. Nora nodded. “Yes, I will write him a line.” “And when I come back, it will be all over?” “Yes,—all over.”