“But I knew it would never do for me to take my wife to the Morena Mines, where I was known by men who were also from the South, and through whom the knowledge of my marriage would soon travel back to Virginia. Only a short time previous I had bought out a man in another district, getting his claim for a mere song, and not a soul in the place knew me. I resolved to take Annie there, make just as pretty and comfortable a home as I could for her, call myself William Dale, going back and forth from one mine to the other, as my business demanded it, until I was satisfied to sell out altogether and return to Virginia, proclaim my marriage, and give Miss Everet the other half of her fortune. But when I confessed this to Annie, as of course I had to do in order to assume her name, she was very unhappy. She was not lacking in spirit either, and made me almost despise myself for the part I had played. “‘I would never have come to you if I had known this,’ she said. ‘I hate deception and double-dealing of whatever nature. You might have told me frankly how you were situated, and I would have waited and been faithful to you until you could have openly made me your wife.’ “‘But you would not have allowed me to take care of you,’ I replied. “‘No,’ she answered, flushing; ‘my pride would not have yielded to that, but I could have done very well for myself for a while, and waited patiently until it was right that we should be married.’ “I had a hard task to pacify her. She was determined at first that the whole truth should be confessed, saying she would not occupy a false position. But when I told her that it would ruin me to force a sale of my stock; that I should lose all the hard labor of the three years that I had spent there, and not even then be able to replace the money from Uncle Jabez’s fortune which I had invested, she became more reasonable. I promised that if she would try and be patient and happy for a year, I would replace every dollar that was not my own, and have something handsome besides, as a capital for myself. “I honestly meant to do all this, for I knew that I should never thoroughly regain the respect of my wife until I had redeemed my position and hers before the world.” CHAPTER XLIV. THE COLONEL’S STORY CONCLUDED. “Annie and I were very happy,” Colonel Mapleson went on, after a momentary pause, “during the year that followed—happy in spite of a little cloud that had arisen so soon after our marriage, for our prospects were very encouraging. I was doing finely. Every month my profits were increasing, and thus the time of our emancipation was growing nearer. If I could only replace what now no longer properly belonged to me, Annie said she would be content to remain in that mining country as long as I desired. She was willing to live simply, even frugally, if I would only do right, acknowledge our marriage before the world, and not have to hide like a couple of criminals.