How it all Came Round by L.T. Meade

Charlotte was quite right in saying that now she could cry; a great tension had been removed, an immediate agony lightened. From the time she had left the doctor's presence until she had met Sandy Wilson, most intolerable had been her feelings. She would sink all pride when she saw him; for her father's sake, she would plead for mercy; but knowing nothing of the character of the man, how could she tell that she would be successful? How could she tell that he might not harden his heart against her plea? When she left him, however, she knew that her cause was won. Charlotte Home was to be the arbitrator of her fate; she had never in all her life seen such a hunger for money in any eyes as she had done in Charlotte's, and yet she felt a moral certainty that with Charlotte she was safe. In the immediate relief of this she could cry, and those tears were delicious to her. Returning from her drive, and in the solitude of her own room, she indulged in them, weeping on until no more tears would flow. They took the maddening pressure of heart and brain, and after them she felt strong and even calm. She had washed her face and smoothed her hair, and though she could not at once remove all trace of the storm through which she had just passed, she still looked better than she had done at breakfast that morning, when a tap came to her door, and Ward, her maid, waited outside.

"If you please, Miss Harman, the dressmaker has called again. Will you have the wedding dress fitted now?"