His Unknown Wife

“You are mistaken, Nina. I know enough about the law to say definitely that it is the ceremony which counts, not the name. You will see at once that this must be so. If you married another man to-morrow, and signed yourself ‘Mary Smith,’ you would still be committing bigamy.”

At that she laughed.

“I must really be careful,” she said.

“I only want to fix in your mind the absolute finality of that early morning wedding in the Castle of San Juan. It makes matters easier.”

“To my thinking it makes them most complex.”

“Not at all. You and I have only reversed the usual procedure. Common-place folk meet, fall in love, go through a more or less frenzied period of being engaged, and, finally, get married. We began by getting married. Circumstances beyond our control stopped the natural progression of the affair, but I suggest that the frenzied part of the business might well start now.”

He caught her left hand and held it. She did not endeavor to withdraw it, but he was startled by her seeming indifference. Still, being a determined person, even in such a delicate matter as love-making, he pursued his theme.

“You well know that I mean to marry you, Nina, though I have regarded myself as bound to your sister until freed by process of law,” he went on. “But I ought to have guessed sooner that Madge would never have allowed Sturgess to become so openly her slave if she had contracted to love, honor and obey me. She might, indeed, have shared my view that the marriage was a make-believe affair as between her and me, but she would have held it as binding until the law declared her free. Then, that day in Hell Gate, when the hazard of a few minutes would decide whether we lived or died, you meant to tell me the truth before the end came. Is that so?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“You have no right to ask.” Her voice was very low.

“I can answer my own question. You wanted to die in my arms, Nina, with our first and last kiss on our lips. Fool that I was, I was so concerned about the height of a tide-mark on a rock that I gave no heed to the faltering speech of the woman I loved. The next time I heard those same accents from you was when I came to my senses on board this ship. For a few seconds you bared your heart again, Nina, and again I was deaf.

“You must forgive me, sweetheart, though such grievous lack of perception was really the highest compliment I could pay you. The notion that I was married to Madge was firmly established in my mind, and I literally dared not tell you that you were the one woman in the world for me till the other obstacle was removed. Seldom, if ever, I suppose, has any man been in such a position. Of course, there would have been no difficulty at all if I had happened to guess the truth – ”

“That is just where you are mistaken, Alec,” and the words came with a sorrowful earnestness that Maseden found vastly disconcerting. “What woman with a shred of self-respect would agree to regard such a union as ours binding? Now, you have had your say; let me have mine,” and she snatched her hand away vehemently. “I married you as part of an infamous compact between that trader, Steinbaum, and Mr. Gray.

“My family is not wealthy, Alec. When my mother married a second time she did so largely on account of Madge and myself. She lacked money to educate us, or give us the social position every good mother desires for her daughters. But Mr. Gray, though a man of means, frittered away a good income in foolish speculations. He was worth half a million dollars, and believed himself such a financial genius that he could soon be a multi-millionaire. Instead of making money, he lost it, and the latest of his follies was to finance Enrico Suarez in a scheme to seize the presidency. The attempt was to have been made two years ago, but was postponed, or defeated, I don’t know which – ”

“Defeated,” put in Maseden. “I know, because I helped to put a stopper on it.”

“Well, the collapse of that undertaking and its golden promise frightened my stepfather. After a lot of correspondence between Steinbaum and himself he came to South America, bringing with him practically the remnants of his fortune. My mother was too ill to accompany him, and he refused to travel alone, so we two girls were given the trip. Naturally, we were quite ignorant of the facts, and believed he was merely visiting a little republic in which he had financial interests.

“By chance we arrived in Cartagena on the very day Suarez had planned for the president’s murder – and yours, too, for that matter. Your arrest and condemnation gave the conspirators a chance of repaying Mr. Gray the money he had advanced. They were afraid he would lodge an official complaint, and get the State Department to interfere. But they had not the means in hard cash, and it occurred to one of them – Suarez, I believe – that if one of Mr. Gray’s daughters married you, and inherited your estate, the property could be sold for a sum sufficient to clear his claim and leave a balance for the other thieves.

“That is the precious project in which I, the elder of the two, became a pawn. Mr. Gray terrified me into compliance by telling me that we would be paupers on our return home. For myself I cared little, but when I thought of my mother I yielded. I am not excusing myself, Alec, though I little guessed the true nature of the bargain. I see now that Suarez and Steinbaum wished to avoid the actual semblance of having committed daylight murder and robbery. They might justify your death as a rebel against the state, but they could not explain away the seizure of your property, whereas its sale by your widow would be a most reasonable proceeding.

“Please understand that I believed I was only carrying out a formal undertaking meant to enable my stepfather to recover money honestly lent. Even so, my resolution faltered at the last moment, and I signed the register in my mother’s name. And now I have bared my heart to you, and you see how – utterly – impossible – it is – Oh, Alec, don’t be cruel! Don’t torture me! I can never, never be your wife, because I can never forgive myself!”

Alec, the wise, as Sturgess had often styled him, showed exceeding wisdom now by letting her cry her fill. Never a word did he say until the tempest subsided. Then he took her hand again and drew her to him.

“Tell me one thing, Nina,” he said gently. “What became of the ring – our ring?”

“It is tied around my neck – on a bit of ribbon,” she sobbed.

“Then it shall remain there until we reach New York,” he said.

“But – I want – to keep it – as a souvenir – of all that has passed,” she said brokenly.

“So you shall, dear one. You would never feel satisfied, anyhow, with a Spanish marriage, so we’ll try an American one.”

“Alec, I cuc – cuc – can’t marry you. I’m too ashamed.”

He laughed happily, and drew her to him.

“You can’t wriggle out of the knot now, girlie,” he said. “But, just to behave like other folk, we’ll begin again at the beginning, and not at the end. Nina, do you think you can learn to love me quick enough to permit of a real wedding when we arrive in New York? You and I have gone through so many experiences since we met that we can dispense with some of the preliminaries to courtship. Shall we fix a date now? Say three weeks after we land, or sooner, if matters can be arranged.”

She lifted her tear-stained face, and her soul went out to his in their first kiss.

Sturgess, when he heard of the latest development, “got busy,” as he put it, on his own account. He, of course, had been told the exact facts by Nina on that night passed on the island in Nelson Straits. The upshot of the general agreement speedily arrived at was a noteworthy double wedding, at which, as a topic of conversation, the beauty of the brides rivaled, if it did not eclipse, their extraordinary adventures.

It should be said, as a fitting rounding off of a record of singular events, that Maseden not only obtained the money held in trust for him by the consul at Cartagena, but the proceeds of the sale of the ranch as well. Enrico Suarez was stabbed to the heart by a maniac with a grievance. Señor Porilla, an honest man, according to South American standards, became president, and saw to it that Maseden’s rights were safeguarded. Even the wily Steinbaum was compelled to disgorge to Gray’s executors.

The Aztec treasure was sold for a mint of money to a millionaire collector, and this sum was settled on Mrs. Gray for life, with reversion to her daughters in equal shares.

If any one is really curious to ascertain the identity and whereabouts of Mr. and Mrs. Philip Alexander Maseden or Mr. and Mrs. C. K. Sturgess, all that is necessary is to visit a town on the coast of Maine any August, and keep an eye peeled for a ship’s life-boat converted into a yawl and named “The Ark.” Therein will be found some very pleasant people, and, with the help of the foregoing history, the rest of the task should be simplicity itself.

THE END