The Crystallizing Moment — Middlemarch

That evening Lydgate tells Rosamond about Mrs. Casaubon's devotion to her older husband. Rosamond thinks it not very melancholy to be mistress of Lowick with a man likely to die soon, then notes Lydgate's practice spreading to the Casaubons. Town eyes are watching their flirtation. Mrs. Bulstrode learns from Mrs. Plymdale that everyone assumes Lydgate and Rosamond are engaged. She visits Rosamond, warns that Lydgate is poor and proud, and asks directly whether there is an understanding. Rosamond will not say yes and will not say no.

Mrs. Bulstrode has her husband probe Lydgate, who speaks as no man would with matrimonial intent. She then warns Lydgate that frequenting a house may militate against a girl's desirable settlement and block other offers. He pushes his hair back, fuming, while her spaniel refuses his hollow caresses. Farebrother jokes that Lydgate is lashing himself to the mast; the words now sound like accusation. Lydgate resolves to visit the Vincys only on business.

Rosamond spends ten proud, miserable days imagining a fatal sponge wiping out her hopes. On the eleventh day Lydgate calls with a message about Featherstone's health when her father is out. Formal, embarrassed, he rises to leave; she drops her chain-work; he picks it up and sees helpless tears. "What is the matter? you are distressed. Tell me, pray." That moment of naturalness was the crystallizing feather-touch: it shook flirtation into love. In half an hour he leaves engaged, his soul no longer his own but the woman's to whom he has bound himself.