“My darling! my _wife_!” said the exultant young husband, as he stretched forth his arms to gather his beautiful bride to his breast. Gladys looked up with a startled, searching glance. Something in his tone had struck strangely on her ears, although he had spoken scarcely above a whisper. She saw that he was still somewhat pale, but his whole face was lighted with triumph. “Geoff——” she began, then the word suddenly froze on her lips, a bewildered look shot in her eyes, when all at once she started away from him, flinging out her arms with a wild gesture of horror and loathing, her face as white as her dress, her eyes almost starting from her head. “EVERET MAPLESON! Oh! Heaven! how came _you here_?” she shrieked. He strode up to her, the look of triumph still on his pale face. “Because I have a right to be here—beside my _wife_!” “Never! _never!_” she panted, wildly. “You have no right—I am _not_ your wife!” “But, my darling, you are. I have never left your side for an instant since we were pronounced, before God and man, to be husband and wife. You are mine, Gladys! by the laws of the land, as well as by the laws of God! You plighted your vows to me in the presence of hundreds of witnesses, and I shall claim you before all the world!” She never moved while he was saying this. She stood looking at him with that wild, incredulous light still in her eyes, that deadly whiteness on her face, her arms still outstretched in that attitude of horror and loathing. She was like a beautiful piece of sculpture that had suddenly been transformed from a happy, living being into pulseless marble by the blighting influence of some congealing wand. “Can you not believe it, and be sensible?” Everet Mapleson—for it was really he—went on rapidly, for the sound of wheels from without came to him, and he knew that the room would be full in a few moments. “Do not make a scene. You are mine, and no earthly power can sever the bonds that unite us! I love you madly! I worship you! There is nothing I will not do to prove my devotion to you! I have given you a proud name; I have wealth, position, influence, and I am your slave if you will give me but a crumb of love upon which to feast my hungry heart. Gladys, again I implore you not to make a scene! Receive your friends as if nothing unforeseen had happened, and they will never suspect; and to-morrow we will go away over the ocean, and leave the world to get over its astonishment as best it can.” He paused, for the horror, the despair on her face, which grew every instant more terrible, filled him with fear and dismay. She did not stir; she was as if frozen in that attitude. She simply stood staring into his face, her own as rigid as a stone, but with such suffering, such anguish, in that fixed gaze as he had never seen depicted in human eyes before. Steps and voices sounded in the hall. He caught a glimpse of Mr. and Mrs. Huntress hurrying in, to be the first to congratulate their darling.