The only thing would have been if Charlotte herself couldn't have faced it.

Then, if SHE had not had confidence, we might have talked.

But she had it to any amount." "Did you ask her how much ?" Bob Assingham patiently inquired.
He had put the question with no more than his usual modest hope of reward, but he had pressed, this time, the sharpest spring of response.
"Never, never--it wasn't a time to 'ask.' Asking is suggesting--and it wasn't a time to suggest.

One had to make up one's mind, as quietly as possible, by what one could judge.

And I judge, as I say, that Charlotte felt she could face it.