“‘O Robert, don’t tempt me so. I do love Richard, or I did before you came, and he is so good, so noble. God will never forgive me if I deceive him so dreadfully. Please, Robert, don’t tempt me any more.’ “You can imagine how I answered her. There were kisses and caresses, and assurances that you would rather give her up than take her when her heart was not your own, and so the victory was won, and I acted a most cowardly part. I made Anna promise not to speak of me when talking with you, Richard, or hint in any way that I was the cause of her changed feelings toward you. I then returned to New York, while she asked to be released from her engagement. She wrote to me once, bitterly condemning herself for her deception, as she termed it, and earnestly begging permission to tell you all, but I refused, and held her to her promise; and so matters stood when you decided upon sending her to Boston. You know she came first to New York to Uncle Jason’s, whose wife is both deaf and half blind, so she was not in my way at all. After you returned home, Dick, I was there every night, and as Uncle Jason nodded over his paper in his study, while Aunt Eliza nodded over her knitting in the parlor, I had every opportunity for pressing my suit, rejoicing when I saw how I could sway Anna at my will. She was easily influenced by those she loved and trusted—” Here Robert’s voice trembled, and he paused a moment ere he resumed: “She believed that I was good, and this belief, more than anything I could say, led her to listen to me. She was to leave on Monday for Boston, and on Saturday I took her for a drive through the city, and when she returned at night she was my wife. How I accomplished it I can hardly tell, for at first Anna refused outright, but she was finally persuaded, and at the house of a clergyman whom I knew by reputation the ceremony was performed. It was the original plan that when her visit was over I should accompany her home and announce our marriage, after which she should return with me to New York, but subsequent events made this impossible. My uncle had commissioned me to telegraph to the friends in Boston that I would be there on Monday with Anna, and he kindly gave me permission to remain a few days, or even longer if I liked. This I professed to have done, but it was a lie I told my uncle, who, believing Anna to be Dick’s betrothed, had no suspicion that I cared for her in the least except as my sister. After leaving her at his door on Saturday night, I purposely did not see her again until Monday, when, according to arrangement, I went ostensibly to accompany her to Boston. Anna knew nothing of my real intentions, and it was some time before she understood that we were going to Albany instead of New Haven. In much surprise she questioned me, turning very white and bursting into tears when the truth dawned upon her, and she saw how she was becoming more entangled in the deception. We stayed in Albany at the City Hotel until