And now her purpose grew firm within her. All was at an end between her and Pomeroy. She had only herself to consult. In hard work she might, perchance, find an anodyne for her wound. In any case, she would try to do so.
"I suppose, my dear, that you won't object to give me a month this autumn?" said Lady Dudgeon to her husband, as they sat together one morning, about a couple of days before their projected return to London.
"Oh, ho! it's come to that, has it?" answered the baronet. "Well, I suppose you must have your own way in the matter, although you know that I hate both the place and the class of people one meets there. I suppose we can take Eleanor with us? It will be a treat to her, and company for you."
"Possibly so; you know best, I dare say."
"She tells me that she is going to leave us."
Sir Thomas looked quite dumbfounded. At this moment Eleanor entered the room.
"What is this I hear, little one?" he cried. "You are not going to leave us, surely?"
"For a little while, dear Sir Thomas. Perhaps not for long," answered Eleanor.
"I'm sorry for that--very sorry indeed. I had grown to like you almost as much as if you were a daughter of my own."
Tears came into Eleanor's eyes. She crossed the room, and taking Sir Thomas's hand in both hers, pressed it to her lips.
"My gratitude--my love, if you care for it--will always be yours! I can never repay even a tithe of the kindness shown me by Lady Dudgeon and yourself."
"Eleanor, I have no patience with you!" cried Lady Dudgeon, dipping her pen viciously in the inkstand.
"But where is the girl going, and what is she going to do?" asked the baronet.
"You will think it very strange of me, I dare say," said Eleanor; "but Miss Mulhouse, whose name is no doubt familiar to you, has offered to find me a position in one of the Homes for Destitute Girls, which she is trying to establish in different parts of London."
"Heaven bless us!" exclaimed Sir Thomas. "You don't mean to say that you are going to leave a place like Stammars on purpose to spend your days in a back slum in the east end of London?"
"I am going to try to find something to do," said Eleanor. "I am going to try to make myself of some little use in the world."
"A madcap scheme, my dear--I can call it nothing else," said the old gentleman, with a melancholy shake of the head "If you feel charitably disposed, a twenty-pound note at Christmas, judiciously laid out, will go a long way--a very long way, indeed."