An hour afterwards Mrs. Cliff, having been restored to her usual condition, came again into Edna’s room, still pale and in a state of excitement.

“Now, I suppose,” she exclaimed, “we can speak out plainly, and tell everybody everything.  And I believe that will be to me a greater delight than any amount of money could possibly be.”

“Speak out!” cried Edna, “of course we cannot.  We have no more right to speak out now than we ever had.  Captain Horn insisted that we should not speak of these affairs until he came, and he has not yet come.”

“No, indeed!” said Mrs. Cliff, “that seems to be the one thing he cannot do.  He can do everything but come here.  And are we to tell nobody that he has arrived in France?—­not even that much?”

“I shall tell Ralph,” replied Edna.  “I shall write to him to come here as soon as possible, but that is all until the captain arrives, and we know everything that has been done, and is to be done.  I don’t wish any one, except you and me and Ralph, even to know that I have heard from him.”

“Not Cheditafa?  Not the professor?  Nor any of your friends?”

“Of course not,” said Edna, a little impatiently.  “Don’t you see how embarrassing, how impossible it would be for me to tell them anything, if I did not tell them everything?  And what is there for me to tell them?  When we have seen Captain Horn, we shall all know who we are, and what we are, and then we can speak out to the world, and I am sure I shall be glad enough to do it.”

“For my part,” said Mrs. Cliff, “I think we all know who we are now.  I don’t think anybody could tell us.  And I think it would have been a great deal better—­”

“No, it wouldn’t!” exclaimed Edna.  “Whatever you were going to say, I know it wouldn’t have been better.  We could have done nothing but what we have done.  We had no right to speak of Captain Horn’s affairs, and having accepted his conditions, with everything else that he has given us, we are bound to observe them until he removes them.  So we shall not talk any more about that.”

Poor Mrs. Cliff sighed.  “So I must keep myself sealed and locked up, just the same as ever?”

“Yes,” replied Edna, “the same as ever.  But it cannot be for long.  As soon as the captain has made his arrangements, we shall hear from him, and then everything will be told.”

“Made his arrangements!” repeated Mrs. Cliff.  “That’s another thing I don’t like.  It seems to me that if everything were just as it ought to be, there wouldn’t be so many arrangements to make, and he wouldn’t have to be travelling to Berlin, and to London, and nobody knows where else.  I wonder if people are giving him any trouble about it!  We have had all sorts of troubles already, and now that the blessed end seems almost under our fingers, I hope we are not going to have more of it.”

“Our troubles,” said Edna, “are nothing.  It is Captain Horn who should talk in that way.  I don’t think that, since the day we left San Francisco, anybody could have supposed that we were in any sort of trouble.”