"Well, I took passage on the _Blue Bird_, bound for Baltimore. There I made the acquaintance of young Roland Bayard, the third mate, who was very good to me. Well, we got to be such good friends that at last, one day, I up and told him all my troubles. And when he heard the name of my rascally husband: "'Anglesea,' says he--'Angus Anglesea!' says he. 'Why, that's the man who is staying with a neighbor of ours down in Maryland. My old aunt wrote to me about him in the very last letter, which met me at 'Frisco.' "And he took the letter out of his pocket and gave it to me to read, and, sure as a gun, it was my fine colonel as the old aunty was writing about! And I said to the young man as I must have been put on a false scent to be running about among Southern ports, when he had gone North. And he said there was no doubt in the world that the man himself had put me on the false scent. "Whether or no that was so, I thought it was very providential I had fell in long o' this young mate, and we got to be fast friends. And we laid a plot that we should say nothing about it, and he would take me to his aunty's, and I should go by the name of my first husband, Wright, and lay low and say nothing, for fear my colonel should find me out and run away again before I could nab him. "Well, we reached Baltimore early in this month, you know, and young Bayard got leave and came home, fetching me along of him. And the fust news as we heard when we got here was as my fine gentleman was gwine to be married to a fine heiress. "But Roland and I, we winked at each other, and never let on to a single soul as I was the colonel's lawful wife. We thought we'd just have lots of fun out of the game, anyways, and wait till the wedding day, when all the people should be in the church, and then--in the midst of his triumph--pull him down and disgrace him before all the world. "Lord, we didn't mean to wait for the last minnit, when the ceremony was over, but to stop it at the very beginning, where the parson asks, 'if any one knows just cause,' you know. But that consarned beast of an old mule of Miss Sibby's wouldn't make time. There, that's all!" At this moment a note was brought in and handed to Mrs. Force. She opened it, and read: "Notwithstanding all seeming proof, I solemnly swear to you that I never was married to the woman Wright; that I was free to contract matrimony when I married your daughter, and that she is my lawful wife. I must see you alone, when I will prove this to your satisfaction. A. A." CHAPTER XXV THE GUEST SHOCKS HER HOST Mrs. Force turned pale as death while she read the note. When she finished it, she stooped forward and dropped it into the red heart of the coal fire. Then, averting her head, that no one might see the blanching of her face, she said, in a tone of enforced calmness, to the waiting servant: "Tell the messenger that there is no answer."