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THE WOOING OF CYNTHIA.
Cynthia's swoon was after all but brief.

Upon recovering consciousness her first act was to dismiss her woman.

She had need to be alone--the need of the animal that is wounded to creep into its lair and hide itself.

And so alone with her sorrow she sat through that long day.
That her father's condition was grievous she knew to be untrue, so that concerning him there was not even that pity that she might have felt had she believed--as he would have had her believe that he was dying.
As she pondered the monstrous disclosure he had made, her heart hardened against him, and even as she had asked him whether indeed she was his daughter, so now she vowed to herself that she would be his daughter no longer.