For an hour after leaving Charles’s office, Nicholas could do no work. He sat at his desk, thinking about the beautiful young woman still inside with Charles and Ned. The time passed very slowly. Then at last, Ned Cheeryble came out of Charles’s office.
‘Is she better?’ asked Nicholas.
‘Who?’ replied Ned.
‘Oh, yes, she’s fine now.’
Nicholas tried to find out more about her from him, but Ned was strangely silent all that afternoon.
During the next few days, the young lady came and went many times. Her talks with the Cheeryble brothers were always secret, and they always happened inside Ned’s or Charles’s office, behind closed doors. Nicholas often tried to find out more about her, but the Cheeryble brothers never talked about her with him. Day after day Nicholas thought of her more and more. He wanted to tell his sister about her. But what could he say? He didn’t even know the young woman’s name.
But in the middle of all this, Nicholas didn’t forget his friends. The Browdies were leaving London soon to go back to Yorkshire. So he invited them to dinner. They came to the house the next night, and at first it was a happy evening. They talked for a long time about Squeers and smike, and how Browdie helped Smike to escape. They all laughed when Browdie described how angry Squeers looked when he found the lock, the screwdriver, the empty bed and no Smike in the room. Smike laughed more than the rest. Mrs Nickleby thanked John Browdis more than twenty times for treating her son so kindly in Yorkshire.
It was eleven o’clock, and the Browdies were leaving, when they heard a loud knock at the door.
‘Who could that be so late?’ said Mrs Nickleby, going to open it. Outside the door stood Ralph Nickleby, with Squeers, and a third man. They all came at once into the house.
‘I’ve got something important to say to you all,’ said Ralph Nickleby.
‘You have nothing to say to us, and we have nothing to say to you,’ said Nicholas angrily, walking towards his uncle John Browdie stopped him.
‘Let’s hear what he has to say,’ he said.
‘Yes, listen. You’ll find it very interesting,’ said Squeers.
‘It’s very simple,’ said Ralph Nickleby. ‘My nephew Nicholas took Smike away from school in Yorkshire.’ Ralph Nickleby now pointed at the third man. ‘This gentleman here is Mr Snawley. He’s young Smike’s father, and he wants Smike to go back to that school.’
Mr Snawley then walked over to Smike. ‘My dearest son, come to your father,’ he said while he embraced him. Nicholas and John Browdie looked at each other in surprise.