"This guaranty," I cried, "and this atonement for what I have done. I shall leave to-night for London. If I possibly can I shall have the marriage with Miss Grey dissolved. In any case, I shall live in future on my own earnings, and not on her money. I shall start by the first ship for Australia. I shall take one hundred pounds to commence my new life with, and I shall never rest until I have repaid every farthing of the money I now loathe myself for having received in such a manner--innocent as my intentions were at first." "And it was for love, not for money, that you married Miss Grey," she said, the tears dropping from her eyes as she spoke. "It was the dream of a boy," I answered; "and when I have gone you will have this guaranty of the purity of my feelings for you--however much I have erred--that having dared to tell you of my love, I have exchanged wealth for poverty and exile, rather than live on the income I have derived from the woman who has made it impossible for me to ask you to be my wife." "Sit down for a moment," she said, standing with her elbows on the mantel-piece, and her face buried in her hands. I had risen from my seat, but I did as she asked. We neither of us spoke for a minute or two. Then she said, without raising her face from her hands: "You would have asked me to be your wife if you were not married?" "Good God! of course I would--you know I would," I cried in wonder. "And if I could find out a means by which I could legally be your wife, would you take me?" I sprung from my seat and was standing by her side imploring her to tell me what she meant, and telling her that life was worthless to me without her, when suddenly she threw her arms round my neck, crying as she did so: "My darling cousin, I am your wife. It was me whom you married in York Place. I loved you as you loved me from the first. I have been following your career all these years, wondering whether you could love me when you were a man, and in your rightful position, as I knew that you loved me when we were married." Of what followed I cannot trust myself to speak. It was about an hour afterward, as we were sitting by the Mediterranean, that I heard from her own lips the explanation of the enigma of our marriage. I wish that I had space to tell the whole story in her own words, but I must summarize a considerable portion of the tale. I shall, therefore, only repeat as much as is necessary to enable the reader to understand our respective positions on the day we met in Chandos Street.