But I insisted on going, and we three went on our terrible errand.
Ruth received us in the library. She saw at once that her secret was known, and she took it calmly.
"You know," she said, quietly, to Stone. "I am sorry. I hoped to hide my secret and let Victoria Van Allen forever remain a mystery. But it cannot be. I admit all—"
"Wait, Ruth," I cried out. "Admit nothing until you are accused."
"I am accused," she responded, with a sad smile. "I heard you talking in the passage between the rooms. In my bathroom I could hear you distinctly. There is there a mirror door also. It looks like an ordinary mirror and has a wide, flat nickel frame, matching the other fittings. Yes, I had the sliding doors built for the purposes which you have surmised. Shall I tell you my story?"
"Yes, and let us hear it, too," came from the doorway, and the two sisters appeared, agog with excitement and curiosity.
"Come in," said Ruth, quietly. "Sit down, please, I want you to hear it. Most of it you know, Sarah and Rhoda, but I will tell it briefly to Mr. Stone, for I want not leniency, but justice."
I seated myself at Ruth's side, and though I said no word I knew that she understood that my heart and life were at her disposal and that whatever she might be about to tell would not shake my love and devotion. It is not necessary to use words when a life crisis occurs.
"I was an orphan," Ruth said, "brought up by a stern and Puritanical old aunt in New England. I had no joy or pleasures in my childhood or girlhood days. I ran away from home to become an actress. Tibbetts, my old nurse, who lived in the same village, followed me to keep an eye on me and protect me in need. I was a chorus girl for just one week when Randolph Schuyler discovered me and offered to marry me if I would renounce the stage and also gay life of any sort and become a dignified old-fashioned matron. I willingly accepted. I was only seventeen and knew nothing of the world or its ways. As soon as we were married he forbade me any sort of amusement or pleasure other than those practised by his elderly sisters. I submitted and lived a life of slavery to his whims and his cruelty for five years. He had agreed to let me have Tibbetts for my maid, as he deemed her a staid old woman who would not encourage me in wayward desires. Nor did she. But she realized my thraldom, my lonely, unhappy life, and knew that I was pining away for want of the simple innocent pleasures that my youth and light-hearted nature craved. I used to beg and plead for permission to have a few young friends or to be allowed to go to a few parties or plays. But Mr. Schuyler kept me as secluded as any woman in a harem. He gave me no liberty, no freedom in the slightest degree.
"I had been married about four years when I rebelled and began to think up a scheme of a dual existence. I had ample time in the long lonely hours to perfect my plans, and I had them arranged to the minutest detail long before I put them in operation. Why, I practised writing with my left hand and acquired a different speaking voice for a year before I needed such subterfuges. Had I been able to persuade my husband to give me even a little pleasure or happiness I would willingly have given up my wild scheme. But he wouldn't; so once when he was away on a long trip, I had the passage between the two houses made.