O’Brien handed him the New Testament.
He bowed again with hypocritical devotion and took the formal oath to speak “the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.”
“Col. Anglesea, will you now state the grounds upon which you claim this lady here present, Odalite Force, or Anglesea, as your wife, and charge Abel Force, her father, with forcibly abducting and illegally detaining her?” said the judge.
“I will,” replied the colonel. And he began his statement:
“Three years and four months ago, on the twentieth of December, 18—, in the Church of All Faith, in the Parish of All Faith, in the State of Maryland, I married Odalite Force, here present, daughter of Abel Force, also here present. The Rev. Dr. Peters, rector of All Faith, performed the marriage. Mr. Abel Force gave away the bride. At the end of the ceremony a madwoman burst into the church, forced her way to the altar and created a disgraceful disturbance, into the details of which I need not go. Mr. Force, with the help of some of his neighbors, seized his daughter, tore her from my arms and conveyed her to his home, where he has forcibly and illegally detained her ever since. I see one man and several young women who were witnesses of the whole transaction, and may be put upon the stand to corroborate my testimony,” concluded the colonel.
“Oh, Lord!” muttered one and all of the girls, aghast at the proposition.
“Col. Anglesea,” questioned the judge, “you say that this happened more than three years ago. Why has not this complaint been made sooner?”
“Imperative business summoned me immediately to England and detained me there. I wrote many letters to my wife, imploring her to come over to me—letters which perhaps never reached her, for she never replied to them. I then sent a messenger, the Rev. Dr. Pratt, to see her in person, and try to induce her to come over to England under his escort and join me at Anglewood, where I impatiently awaited her. But my reverend courier failed to find her where I had left her, at her father’s country seat, Mondreer, and heard that she was with her family in Washington. He came here in search of my wife, but again failed to meet her. He was told that she was traveling with her family in Canada. In short, my agent failed to find her, and returned to England from his fruitless errand.”
“Lord! how that man can lie!—I mean, what reckless assertions he can make!” said Wynnette, in a low tone, to Roland.
“I like your first way of putting it best,” muttered young Bayard.