One bright day, in 1875, some friends who had known pretty Annie Ralston from the days of her childhood, met her at the Union Depot, Kansas City, with many valises and travelling bags in charge. "Would she go up in town? Could they render her any service?" were questions which were asked. No, at another time she would go up town, there was nothing they could do for her. Soon she was joined by her outlawed lover. Together they took a train and proceeded to Leavenworth, Kansas, where the vows which they had made to each other were renewed and sealed by legal authority, and fair Annie Ralston became the outlaw's bride, and with him she journeyed toward the yellow Southern sea, where the sunlight is warm and the breezes balmy. It was a sacrifice to thus banish herself from that society in which she was so well fitted to shine as one of its brightest ornaments; it was a trial to surrender up the friends and associates of her girlhood; to bid adieu to those who were near and dear to her; it was heroic to cast herself upon the care of the man she loved. On the altar of her affection, therefore, she placed all the idols of her youth; and in her devotion she proceeded to dig a wide, deep grave in which to bury forever the images which she had cherished. And so Annie Ralston became an outlaw's wife. CHAPTER XXXVI. A SEVENTEEN THOUSAND DOLLAR HAUL. It had been some weeks since the people of the West had enjoyed a sensation growing out of the robbery of a train, or the plundering of a bank. Frank and Jesse James, and Cole, and Jim, and Bob Younger, with their merry companions, had been unusually quiet for quite a long season for these restless rovers and adroit plunderers. The gang was increasing in numbers, and was now really formidable. Others as daring had joined themselves to the noted outlaws--the Jameses and the Youngers. Cal Carter from Texas, and Clell Miller, and Bill Chadwell, Charles Pitts, and Sam Bass, and Bill Longley, and the Hardins and the Moores of the Indian Territory and Texas divisions of the clan were frequently with Frank and Jesse James and the Younger Brothers. In the gang, but apparently merely as a subaltern, whose principal employment was to hold the horses of the chief robbers when business required them to dismount, was a young fellow who went by the name of Hobbs Kerry. Before Otterville, the protestations and denials of the Jameses and the Youngers were accepted by many good citizens, and there were numbers of very honorable persons who believed sincerely that these men were sadly slandered. The express robbery at Rocky Cut, near Otterville, served to remove the scales from the eyes of numbers of these good people, and Frank and Jesse James, and the three Youngers were revealed before the public as most dangerous highwaymen.