Lorton had so studiously preserved. Part of it she
had revealed, but only part, and that, too, in such general outlines
that any discovery of the rest was impossible. Had Obed questioned
Gualtier he might have discovered the truth; that is, if Gualtier
would have answered his questions, which, of course, he would not
have done. But Obed did not even try him. He asked nothing and said
nothing during all that long drive. He saw that there was a secret,
and he thought that if Miss Lorton chose to keep it he would not seek
to find it out. He would rather leave it to her to reveal; and if she
did not choose to reveal it, then he would not care to know it. She
was the only one who could explain this away, and he thought that it
would be, in some sort, an act of disloyalty to make any
investigations on his own account with reference to her private
affairs. Perhaps in this he might have been wrong; perhaps he might
have strained too much his scruples, and yielded to a sense of honor
which was too high wrought; yet, at the same time, such was his
feeling, and he could not help it; and, after all, it was a noble
feeling, which took its rise out of one of the purest and most
chivalrous feelings of the heart.

While Obed was thus silent, thoughtful, and preoccupied, Gualtier was
equally so, and at the same time there was a deep anxiety in his
heart, to which the other was a stranger. To him, at that moment,
situated as he was--a prisoner, under such circumstances, and in
company with his watchful, grim, and relentless captor--there were
many thoughts, all of which were bitter enough, and full of the
darkest forebodings for the future. He, too, had made discoveries on
that eventful day far darker, far more fearful, far more weighty, and
far more terrible than any which Obed could have made--discoveries
which filled him with horror and alarm for himself, and for another
who was dearer than himself. The first of these was the great, the
inexplicable fact that Zillah was really and truly alive. This at
once accounted for the phantom which had appeared and stricken terror
to him and to Hilda. Alive, but how? Had he not himself made
assurance doubly sure? had he not with his own hands scuttled that
schooner in which she was? had he not found her asleep in her cabin
as he prepared to leave? had he not felt the water close up to the
deck before he left the sinking yacht? had he not been in that boat
on the dark midnight sea for a long tim