“It is a small, elegant villa, situated in the midst of beautiful grounds in a small, sequestered dell, inclosed with wooded hills rising backward into forest-crowned mountains, and watered by many little springs rising among the rocks and running down to empty into a miniature lake that lies shining before the house.  It seems to be in the heart of the Cumberlands, in the depth of solitude, yet it is not fifteen minutes’ walk by a forest footpath to the railway station at North End.”

“What shall we name this little Eden?”

“Rose Bower, and the locality Rose Valley.”

“And when may I take possession?”

“Whenever you please.  All is prepared and waiting the arrival of Mrs. Stillwater, who has taken the house and engaged the servants through her agent, and who is expected to reside there during the absence of her husband, Captain Stillwater, on long voyages.”

“How long are these false appearances to be kept up, and when are our true relations to be announced?”

“Before very long, my sweet!”

“I hate this concealment!  I know that I am a favorite with your father and mother, so I cannot see why you have not told them and will not tell them.”

“Now, Rosamunda, don’t be a little idiot!  Be a little angel, as you always have been!  Am I not doing everything I can for your comfort and happiness, only asking you in turn to be faithful and patient until I can make you my wife before the whole world?  My father does not like the idea of my marrying—­anybody!  If he knew we were engaged to each other, he would never forgive me, and that means he would cut me off from all share in the patrimony.  And we could not afford to lose that!  Let me tell you a secret, Rose.  Though our firm does business under the name ‘Rockharrt & Sons,’ yet ‘Sons’ have a merely nominal interest in the works while Rockharrt lives.  So you see, I have very little of my own, and if the autocrat should learn, even by our own confession, that we had been—­been—­been—­concealing our engagement from him, he would never forgive either of us.”

At this moment a step was heard passing along the corridor outside.

It caused the two unseen inmates of the parlor to shrink into silence, and even when it had passed out of hearing it caused them, in renewing their conversation, to speak only in the lowest tones, so that Cora could no longer catch a word of their speech.

She would before this have risen and retired to her own room; but she was afraid of making a noise, and consequently causing a scene.

Were those two, her Uncle Fabian and Mrs. Stillwater, only secretly engaged?  Secretly engaged?  But whoever heard of a betrothed lover providing a home for his betrothed bride to live in before marriage!  And then, again, was her Uncle Fabian really so dependent on his father as he had represented to Rose?  Cora had always understood that he had a quarter share in the great business, and that Clarence had an eighth.  And, worse than all, had they been so deceived as to the condition of Rose that, if she was Mrs. Stillwater at all, she was the widow and not the wife of Captain Stillwater, since she was engaged to be married, if not already married, to Mr. Fabian Rockharrt?