“Woman alive, I was afraid to tell anybody, for fear the secret would get out, and put him on his guard, and spoil my fun!” exclaimed the lady from Wild Cats’.
“How spoil your fun?”
“Why, this way—prevent me from doing what I wanted to do.”
“What you wanted to do?”
“Yes!”
“And what was that? Anything more than stopping the wedding?”
“Yes, indeed! It would have stopped the wedding days before it did if I had let on to you, or to any one else, that he had a wife living, and I was she! Why, the very hint of the thing would have stopped the wedding! But I wanted to put him to a public shame, and make an example of him! I wanted to give him rope enough to hang himself. And to let him pile up wrath against the day of wrath! And so I laid low, and said nothing to nobody until I found him at the altar, with the bride by his side, and then I denounced and disgraced him, in the great congregation of the people!”
Just at this moment a servant entered the room, and handed a note to Mrs. Force.
The lady changed color as she recognized the handwriting, and opened the envelope.
These were the contents: