Norrell waits until Childermass has left, frozen awkwardly slightly cringed away from Nancy until he finally moves -- turns to pick up a tin of biscuits and hesitantly opens it and offers one to her.

"Perhaps something to eat might steady you?" he offers, a little hopeful that at some point all the crying might stop. Norrell is not particularly good with displays of emotion, or much good with women at all to be quite honest. His only understanding is what he knows of himself -- that a drink and a biscuit sometimes helps him calm down!

Unfortunately sometimes such a cure does not scale to larger problems.