Lying awake and trembling in the small room off of Olive Treadwell's, Marcia Lowe's words returned with sharp insistence and kept Cynthia wakeful for many an hour.
The next morning she was alone when the maid came to her and said a lady wanted to see her on very important business and had asked that they might be undisturbed for a half hour. Cynthia, puzzled and half afraid, bade the girl bring the caller to the sitting-room in which she then was.
What followed was so vital and impressive that all her life Cynthia was to recall the setting of the scene. The whiteness of the sunlight streaming into the east windows, the deep red of the wall paper, the tick of the marble clock on the shelf, and the crackle of the cannel coal fire on the hearth. While she waited for the visitor she was unconsciously preparing for the part and the lines of what was to follow. By the time the slow, light steps were at the room door, Cynthia seemed to know who the stranger was. The maid closed the door after the guest and then Cynthia said quietly to the tall, black-robed girl:
"No. Mrs. Treadwell--told me! Please sit down."
They faced each other with only a few feet between them. Cynthia was obsessed with but one conscious thought--she must go on as she was led; say what she would be told to say. She could not think for herself. But the stranger--distracted and ill at ease, leaped at conclusions; hurried to her goal and took no heed of the obstacles in her path.
"I did not know until last night that he--that Lans had a sister," she said. "Our own affairs were so engrossing and--and exclusive--at that time!"
Marian Spaulding had an odd habit of spacing her words as if the sharp breaths in between were dashes to emphasize her thought. "I knew Mrs. Treadwell was aware of--of our arrangement--I knew, from Lans, that she was broad minded and generous but when I saw you two together last night--I--I wanted to come to you instead of to her!"
An overpowering excitement in the speaker began to affect Cynthia. She drew her chair closer and whispered:
The significant words rushed Marian Spaulding breathlessly onward.
"I--I could not go to him--to Lans--until I made sure--as sure as possible--that I would not be injuring him by--by my demands. I wanted to tell some one who loved him and would think of him, first. He was always so heavenly good to me--I would not harm him even--now!"