"It was November 14, 1888."
"Exactly," says Colonel Tom. "I got to Chicago at six o'clock of that very day. And I went at once to the address in Lucy's letter. I got there between seven and eight o'clock. She was gone. My thought was that you must have got wind of my coming and persuaded her to leave with you in order to avoid me—although I didn't see how you could know when I would get there, either, when I thought it over."
"And you have never seen her since," says Armstrong, pondering.
"I HAVE seen her since," says Colonel Tom, "and that is one thing that makes me say your story needs further explanation."
"But where—when—did you see her?" asts the doctor, mighty excited.
"I am coming to that. I went back home again. And in July of the next year I heard from her."
"Heard from her?"
"By letter. She was in Galesburg, Illinois, if you know where that is. She was living there alone. And she was almost destitute. I wrote her to come home. She would not. But she had to live. I got rid of some of our property in Tennessee, and took enough cash up there with me to fix her, in a decent sort of way, for the rest of her life, and put it in the bank. I was with her there for ten days; then I went back home to get Aunt Lucy Davis to help me in another effort to persuade her to return. But when I got back North with Aunt Lucy she had gone."
"Gone?"
"Yes, and when we returned without her to Tennessee there was a letter telling us not to try to find her. We thought—I thought—that she might have taken up with you once again."