a wedding, and I was fool
enough to play the bridegroom."

"And you did not love her?"

Faith asked the question slowly.

"Not a bit, Miss Marvin; I liked her, of course. But she was in love
with me; I discovered that later."

"Why did you not own her as your wife?"

Faith hardly knew her own voice as she asked this. It hardly seemed
possible that she could speak so calmly.

Mr. Denton looked at her sharply before he replied.

"You can guess that surely," he said very softly. "Rascal that I was, I
was ashamed to own her."

After a minute he went on with almost desperate calmness, as though he
was determined to tell the whole of the distressing secret.

"I told her that dad would disown me if he knew that I had married her,
but that if she would wait until I was twenty-one, that there would be
no more danger of my losing my money. Mag likes money, you know, and she
consented readily, but when she saw me flirting with the other girls,
as I had to, you see, to make every one think that I was still single,
her jealousy got the best of her, and you know what happened."

"Well, you will have to own her now," said Faith in almost a whisper.

She had been praying silently for strength to say it calmly.

"Never!" cried young Denton with a flash of anger in his eyes.

"Own a murderess for my wife--never! never! Miss Marvin!"

"Then I shall despise you," said Faith, with a flush of color in her
cheeks. "For it is the only thing you can do to right the wrong that you
have done her."

"But I can't. Indeed, I can't!" cried the young man, wildly. "Don't you
see, Miss Marvin, that I have nothing to give her, no love, no respect,
not even friendship?"

"But you must own her, just the same," said Faith, decidedly. "Maggie
was a good girl once; it is love for you that has ruined her."

James Denton was even paler than when he entered as he answered her, and
there was a tone in his voice that made Faith shudder.

"Two wrongs cannot make one right, Miss Marvin," he said, firmly, "and
to live with Maggie would be as great a wrong as the first, for I cannot
do so honorably while I love another."

Faith looked up at him quickly and found his gaze riveted on her face.
For a moment she seemed drawn to him as if by a magnet, then the
revulsion came again and she raised both hands imploringly.

"Go, go, Mr. Denton!" she cried in a sharp whisper. "Please go before
you say what is in your heart, for your words can only add c