days before my
wedding-day he came to me and urged me to fly with him. He loved me, he
said; he would make me his wife; he would come for my answer the next
night. I must meet him; I must go with him. At night, when they all
slept, I stole from the house to meet him; not to fly with him, the good
God knows--to refuse him, to forget him, to keep to my duty if my heart
broke in the keeping. He had a horse and carriage waiting, and--to this
day I hardly know how--he made me enter it, and drove me off. I cried
out for help; it was too late; no one heard me. He soothed me with his
specious promises, and perhaps I was not difficult to soothe. It was too
late to go back; I thought he loved me and went on. He took me to
Boston. There, next morning in the hotel, without witnesses, we were
married. A man, a clergyman, he told me, came, a ceremony of some sort
was gone through, we were pronounced man and wife.

"He took me with him to a cottage he had engaged by the sea shore. For
three weeks he remained with me there, tired to death of me, I know now.
Then he was summoned to New York to his home, and I was left. Mr. Darcy,
he never came back.

"I waited for him weeks and weeks--ah, dear Heaven! what weeks those
were. Then the truth was told me. His uncle's servant was in his
confidence. I was deserted. I had never been his wife, not for one hour.
The man who had come to the hotel was no clergyman; he was going to be
married in December; I was to go back to my friends and trouble him no
more. That was my fate. I had been betrayed from first to last, and he
had done with me forever.

"Well, that is more than six months ago. I don't know whether hearts
ever break except in books. I know I am living still, and likely to
live. But not here. I have deceived you, Mr. Darcy; but I tell you the
truth to-night. And to-night, if you like, I will go."

He rose slowly to his feet; swift, dark passion in his eyes--swift,
heavy anger knitting his shaggy brows. He held to the arms of his chair
and looked down upon her, his face set hard as iron.

"Sit there!" he ordered. "Tell me the scoundrel's name."

The dark eyes looked up at him; the gravely quiet voice spoke.

"His name is Laurence Thorndyke."

CHAPTER XVII.

A LETTER FROM PARIS.

It is a sunny summer afternoon. The New York pavements are blistering in
the heat, and even Broadway looks half deserted. Up-town, brown stone
mansions are hermetically sealed for the season,