"Liked it? Yes: and I will, too," said Mollie, recklessly, "some day, when I'm more than usually aggravated. It strikes me, however, I should like to find out my husband first." "Finish your story. You married this masked man?" "Yes; that very night, about midnight, we were married. Sarah came to me early in the evening, and told me to be ready, that the clergyman would be there, and that I was to be wedded under my Christian name, Mary, alone. I still wore the wedding-robes in which I was to have been made Lady Trajenna. To these a white silk mask, completely hiding my face, was added, and I was led forth by my masked bridegroom into another apartment, and stood face to face with a portly, reverend gentleman of most clerical aspect and most alarmed face. I thought he had a familiar look, but in the confusion of such a moment I could not place him. I know him now, though--it was the Reverend Raymond Rashleigh, of St. Pancras'. I've heard him preach dozens of times." "How came he to lend himself to such an irregular proceeding?" "By force, as I did. He was carried off in much the same fashion, and scared pretty nearly out of his wits--married us to get free--like me again. At the conclusion of the ceremony, I returned with Sarah to the inner room, and the Reverend Mr. Rashleigh was safely taken home." There was a pause. Mollie sat looking with knitted brows into the fire. "Well?" questioned Miriam, sharply. "I stayed there a week," went on Mollie, hurriedly. "It was part of the compact, and if he was to keep his, and liberate me, I was to remain quietly as long as I had promised. But it was not so long in passing. I had the range of two or three rooms--all with carefully closed blinds, however--and I had a piano and plenty of books, and as much of Miss Sarah Grant's society as I chose. There was nothing to be got out of her, however, and I tried hard enough, goodness knows. You might as well wring a dry sponge." "And the man you married?" "Oh, he was there, too--off and on everyday; but he kept me as much in the dark as Sarah. He always persisted in speaking French to me--that I might fail to recognize his voice, I dare say; and he spoke it as fluently as a Frenchman. But he was really an agreeable companion, could talk about everything I liked to talk about, could play the piano to a charm, and I should have liked him immensely if he had not been my husband, and if he had not worn that odious mask. Do you know, Miriam," flashing a sudden look up, "if he had taken off that mask, and showed me the handsome face of one of my rejected suitors I did not absolutely abhor, I think I should have consented to stay with him always. He was so nice to talk to, and I liked his bold stroke for a wife--so much in the 'Dare-Devil Dick' style. But I would have been torn to pieces before I'd have dropped a hint to that effect." "If it had been Doctor Oleander, would you have consented to stay with him as his wife?"