When Love Gets Rejected — North and South

Thornton leaves the Hale house blinded by shock and wounded pride. He had gone expecting, at worst, a gentle deflection; he received instead a clear, calm, rational refusal. He tries to process it by replaying every memory of Margaret, in the hope that the exercise will diminish her hold on him. It does the reverse: the more he catalogues, the more he realises how thoroughly she has occupied his attention. At home, his mother has registered his distress before he enters the room. She tries to offer comfort by implying Margaret is not worth his regard; Thornton cannot accept this version of events and barely speaks. He comes round behind her chair, bends down to kiss her, and tells her that no one loves him or cares for him except her. His mother is moved but limited in what she can give him, because her love for him has always been partly a love that excluded rivals, and Margaret was always a rival. The chapter ends with both of them performing composure for each other's sake, their voices calm and cold, each carrying the weight of what cannot yet be said. A stranger watching them would see two people who barely know each other. Gaskell gives us the irony: they know each other too well, and the knowledge that goes unspoken between them is the most significant conversation the chapter contains.