“Not knowingly. Not guiltily. Neither state, church nor society will hold her guilty of a deep wrong that she has suffered, not committed. Hers was not an elopement. Not a clandestine marriage. Her courtship was open. Her engagements approved by all her friends. Her wedding was public, and the reception that followed was the social event of the season.”
“Yet the man is not her husband?”
“No.”
“How so?”
“Because he was and had been a married man for two years previous to his meeting with your daughter. Because he was and is a bigamist. More than that, he is a forger, a perjurer, a swindler, a highway robber and a midnight assassin!”
“Great Heaven! Great Heaven!” groaned the wretched father, covering his face with his hands.
“In a word, this man may be called the champion criminal of his age,” continued Ran, unmercifully “piling up the agonies.”
“And how is it that he is at large?”
“Because his crimes have only recently been brought to light.”
“And this man has betrayed my poor girl!”