“Cora, Cora,” she exclaimed. “Oh, do tell me what is the matter! What is it you are thinking of?”
Their arms were about each other now, their faces pressed together. Then, suddenly, Cora Hartsilver broke down, and began to cry piteously.
“It is something I meant never to tell anybody,” she said when at last Yootha had succeeded in comforting her to some extent. “But what you have told me about your love for Captain Preston has brought it all back afresh. If I tell you, will you promise on your word never to tell a living soul?”
“Of course I will. I promise now, and on my word. What is it, Cora? I have confided in you completely, so surely you can confide in me? You know I can keep a secret, don’t you, dear? Now tell me all about it.”
For some moments Cora remained silent, at intervals mopping her eyes with her pocket-handkerchief. Then at last she said, speaking in a low tone:
“You remember Sir Stephen Lethbridge?”
“Remember him? Why, of course.”
“Yootha, I was dreadfully in love with him! I was in love with him when I married, and after my marriage my love for him increased so that I hardly knew what to do.”
“But why have you never told me this before, dear? I had not the slightest suspicion. Did Henry suspect anything?”
“No. But then Henry was extraordinarily obtuse. When I read in the newspaper the account of the tragedy, he was in the room, but I managed to conceal my feelings and to speak and act as though nothing unusual had occurred. How I did it I don’t know. And next day when we all lunched at the Ritz, the day Captain Preston was introduced to you, I showed nothing, did I? Yet my heart was almost breaking.”