But, then, she knew how to flatter this egotism.  She was beautiful and attractive in person, meek and submissive in manner, complimentary and caressing in words and tones.

Cora asked herself whether it would be right, proper, or expedient for her to give information of that secret interview between Mr. Fabian and Mrs. Stillwater, to which she herself had been an accidental and most unwilling witness, on that warm night in September, in the hotel parlor at Baltimore.

She could not refer to it in her intended letter to her Uncle Fabian.  To do so would be useless and humiliating, if not very offensive.  Her Uncle Fabian knew much more about that interview than she could tell him, and would be very much mortified and very indignant to learn that she knew anything of it.  He might accuse her of being a spy and an eavesdropper, or he might deny and discredit her story altogether.

No.  No good could come of referring to that interview in her letter to her Uncle Fabian.  She would merely mention to him the fact that Mrs. Stillwater had written to Mr. Rockharrt an appealing letter declaring herself to be widowed and destitute, and asking for advice and assistance in procuring employment; and that he had replied by inviting her to Rockhold for an indefinite period, and sent her a check to pay her traveling expenses.  She would tell Mr. Fabian this as a mere item of news, expressing no opinion and taking no responsibility, but leaving her uncle to act as he might think proper.

She could not tell her brother Sylvan of that secret interview, for she was sure that he would act with haste and indiscretion.  Nor could she tell her Uncle Clarence, who would only find himself distressed and incapable under the emergency.  Least of all could she tell her grandfather, and make an everlasting breach between himself and his son Fabian.

No.  She could tell no one of that secret interview to which she had been a chance witness—­a shocked witness—­but which she only half understood, and which, perhaps, did not mean all that she had feared and suspected.  On that subject she must hold her peace, and only let the absent members of the family know of Mrs. Stillwater’s intended visit as an item of domestic news, and leave any or all of them to act upon their own responsibility unbiased by any word from her.

Cora’s position was a very delicate and embarrassing one.  She did not believe that this former nursery governess of hers was or ever had been a proper companion for her.  She herself—­Cora Rothsay—­was now a widow with an independent income, and was at liberty to choose her own companions and make her home wherever she might choose.

But how could she leave her aged and widowed grandfather, who had no other daughter or granddaughter, or any other woman relative to keep house for him?  And yet how could she associate daily with a woman whose presence she felt to be a degradation?