A long silence followed.
"My poor child," said Obed Chute at last, "I have been all the day making inquiries every where, and have already engaged the police to search out this mystery. There is one thing yet, however, which I wish to know, and you only can tell it. I am sorry to have to talk in this way, and give you any new troubles, but it is for your sake only, and for your sake there is nothing which I would not do. Will you answer me one question?"
Zillah looked up. Her face had now grown calm. The agitation had passed. The first shock was over, but this calm which followed was the calm of fixed grief--a grief too deep for tears.
"My question is this, and it is a very important one: Do you know, or can you conceive of any motive which could have actuated this person to plot against you in this way?"
"I do not."
"Think."
Zillah thought earnestly. She recalled the past, in which Hilda had always been so devoted; she thought of the dying Earl by whose bedside she had stood so faithfully; she thought of her deep sympathy with her when the writings were found in her father's desk; she thought of that deeper sympathy which she had manifested when Guy's letter was opened; she thought of her noble devotion in giving up all for her and following her into seclusion; she thought of their happy life in that quiet little sea-side cottage. As all these memories rose before her the idea of Hilda being a traitor seemed more impossible than ever. But she no longer uttered any indignant remonstrance.
"I am bewildered," she said. "I can think of nothing but love and fidelity in connection with her. All our lives she has lived with me and loved me. I can not think of any imaginable motive. I can imagine that she, like myself, is the victim of some one else, but not that she can do any thing else than love me."
"Yet she wrote that letter which is the cause of all your grief. Tell me," said he, after a pause, "has she money of her own?"
"Yes--enough for her support."