Dr. Winthrop listened with a stern, white face, as all the treachery of those two women was revealed to him, and realized how they had plotted not only to ruin her life, but to make a dupe of him also. “About this petition for a divorce—when was it sent, Salome?” he gravely asked, when she had concluded this portion of her story. She gave him the exact date. “And to whom?—what was the lawyer’s name?” She told him. “Ah! he was abroad last year—I know him. Miss Rochester must have met him then. Why, Salome, he is one of the most unprincipled scamps in his profession!—he will do anything for money, and is most successful in this particular branch of his business. He makes a specialty of procuring divorces secretly, and is very cunning in bringing about just what his clients desire. But,” he added, “we will see if we cannot put a stop to these proceedings at once.” “Oh, can you—can you?” Salome eagerly cried. “I am going to try,” he answered gravely. “I shall send a cable message commanding—if the decree has not already been granted—that all further attempts to obtain a separation be dropped—that such is the wish of both you and myself.” “Oh, do, do! I wish, oh, I wish you would go this moment to send it,” Salome cried, clinging to him nervously, and raising an appealing look to him. “It will do just as well an hour hence, love,” he returned soothingly, “and there is much about you that I still wish to learn. How did it happen that I found you in the hospital in this disguise? how did you happen to be in Paris at all? how did you escape from that terrible fire? Oh, my darling, go back to the hour of our separation and tell me everything—spare no one, for I must know the whole truth, no matter whom it involves.” Salome leaned back in his arms, and, laying her head upon his shoulder, where she could look up and watch every varying expression of his dear face, began her story, and told him, as he requested, all that had occurred since their parting in New York. She tried to be as lenient as possible in speaking of his mother and sister, but she was truthful, and he could not fail to understand how much they had been to blame for the suffering which they had both been called upon to endure. “What a tale!” he exclaimed, when she concluded; “it is full of romance—full of suffering, too. What danger, love, you have been in; what a narrow escape you had from that burning building. But nothing shall ever separate us again—not a thousand treacherous women; not a hundred marriage contracts made by arbitrary match-makers.” Salome’s lovely face brightened at his words like a flower after a refreshing shower. “Then you do not regret the fortune which your uncle left you upon such strange conditions?” she said inquiringly. “Regret it, love! A world in the balance with you would be as nothing,” he cried, and caught her to him with a passion, which told her how heartfelt were his words.