“Now I have recited my entire stage career to you. After this experience my nerves seemed to fail me and I was unfit for anything. I had the misfortune one day to meet one of my old friends, who happened to be in the audience when I broke down. We had a long talk over our lunch which lasted from two till five o’clock. He was so sorry for me, and said the thing I needed was travel. I felt myself as if something was needed. He proposed to assist me financially, and insisted on my going to Mt. Clemmens to take a course of sulphur baths. I really felt that it would benefit me, and hoped it would refit me for some sort of service by which I might earn a living. I accepted the proffered aid and left Chicago to seek health and strength. I spent seven weeks at the baths, and was so much improved that I felt that life was again worth living. At the end of that time my benefactor came to me. He told me two things and one was that he had seen Leslie in Chicago; that since the forfeiture of his bond he had decided to return here and had married his former employer’s daughter, Emily. The other thing he told me was that he was just starting for a year’s sojourn in Europe and wished me to join him. I did not know what it meant, but he plainly told me that I would be expected to travel as his wife. His request had a crushing effect on me. I could see why he had entertained so much sympathy for me in my days of trouble. “I wanted to kill him. I asked him why he had not let me starve or die from the effects of the malady from which I was suffering. He listened quietly and then talked soothingly to me, until he convinced me that in reality he was my only friend. I then became suspicious. I did not believe he had seen Leslie, and I did not believe Leslie was married. I still loved him with the devotion that had eaten into my childish heart. I made my tormentor this proposition: That I would return to Chicago and see Leslie. If he really was married and could not marry me, I would return to him and accompany him to Europe. I had two reasons for making this request. First, I really wished to see Leslie, and second, I considered it a good plan to get away from the man who had befriended me, and to whom I found it quite a task to say no after all his kindness. He consented to the return to Chicago, and suggested that if I wished to go with him that I meet him in New York in two weeks. He filled my purse and I came here. I easily found Leslie. I told him I still loved him and begged him to marry me or kill me and end my suffering. He denounced me bitterly, accusing me of every sin a mortal can commit, and wound up by telling me he was married and showed me a picture of his wife. Here, this is the very picture,” said the girl as she drew a photograph from the envelope. “And you, of course, snatched it out of his hand.” “No, I will tell you how I got it when I get to that part.”