In the end, they deputed the volunteering Adela to sit with him in the library, and put the question of Besworth decisively, in the name of all.

They, meantime, who had a contempt for sleep, waited aloft to hold debate over the result of the interview.
An hour after midnight, Adela came to them, looking pale and uncertain: her curls seeming to drip, and her blue eyes wandering about the room, as if she had seen a thing that kept her in a quiver between belief and doubt.
The two ladies drew near to her, expressing no verbal impatience, from which the habit of government and great views naturally saved them, but singularly curious.
Adela's first exclamation: "I wish I had not gone," alarmed them.
"Has any change come to papa ?" breathed Arabella.
Cornelia smiled.

"Do you not know him too well ?" An acute glance from Adela made her ask whether Besworth was to be surrendered.
"Oh, no! my dear.

We may have Besworth." "Then, surely!" "But, there are conditions ?" said Arabella.
"Yes.

Wilfrid's enigma is explained.