“I went up to the cot and kneeled beside it, putting my cool hand on his burning forehead, and whispered ‘Jack’ very softly. “He ceased his ravings and seemed to be listening. I repeated his name and he murmured ‘Carrie.’ “That was the turning point in his disease. The fever abated and I continued to visit him almost daily, sometimes in company with mamma, sometimes alone. Mamma liked him very much indeed, and soon lost sight of the way I met him. “When he had recovered sufficiently to go out, he came over to our house. He won papa over directly, a feat I had feared far more than that of winning mamma, for he was so set in his ways. He improved the first opportunity to ask papa for my hand, and he consented on condition that we wait one year at least, for he thought I was too young to assume the responsibilities of married life. So it was arranged. I continued with my shorthand, and after I finished found a nice position in a lawyer’s office. “Jack would give me no peace until I would consent to marry him secretly. He said he was afraid he would lose me. So one day we stole away and were married. He was very tender with me, and taught me the beauty of married relations, so slowly and gently, that I was not shocked, as I might have been had he been different. To outward appearances he was only the devoted lover and I, being his fiancee, he was allowed to call as often as he chose and stay as late as he liked, for my parents had implicit confidence in him. “One day, six months after we were married, a strange man called at the office to see me. I met him with a great deal of trepidation, fearing, I don’t know what. “‘Is your name Carrie Barnes?’ said he. “I said, ‘Yes, what do you want?’ “‘Do you know one Jack Bates?’ “‘I do,’ said I, now thoroughly aroused to anger. ‘Is it any of your business if I do?’ “He looked at me kindly, yet gravely, and replied in even tones, ‘I am sorry to say it is some of my business, and a very unpleasant business at that.’ “Then he asked me if there was not a private office where he could talk his business over with me. So I took him into Mr. Walton’s private office. “He said, ‘Will you tell me what you know of Mr. Bates?’ “I told him I didn’t know anything against him, if that was what he was waiting to hear me say. “‘Will you tell me what your relations are with him?’ “I could feel the blood leaving my face, and I must have repeated his question, for he said, ‘Yes, tell me whether you have ever had any relations with him which you should not hold.’ “‘I will not tell you a thing,’ said I. ‘Who are you and what do you mean by asking me such questions?’ “He was exasperated, I suppose, by my impudence, for he said, ‘I’ll tell you my business. I am an attorney representing my client, and in his behalf I am tracing the career of Jack Bates. It is known that he has been to your home frequently, and that you have been out together a great deal. It will be to your advantage to tell all you know.’