“I think you’ll find,” said Markworth, taking out the marriage certificate which he had brought with him, the advertisement, and a photographic likeness which he had had taken at Havre, “when you look at these, that I’ve found the girl, and am entitled to the reward you have offered.”
“This is Susan, sure enough; but,” he observed, “where’s it taken? Havre? Havre? How the devil did she get there?”
“I took her there,” answered Markworth, in the most cool and collected manner, according to his wont; “and if you’ll look at this certificate here you’ll see that I had a perfect right to do so. She is my wife!”
“Whew!” whistled Mr Trump, through his closed teeth. “Your wife! Why, the girl’s insane!”
“That’s where you make the mistake, my dear sir! She’s no more insane than you are. Her people ought to have told you that, for although she had been previously a little ‘foolish,’ perhaps, they saw her improvement of late; and she had the sense, at all events, to run away with me and get married, and that’s no proof of her insanity.”
“I don’t know about that,” said Mr Trump, “I don’t know about that. I remember now, the old doctor said that she had been more intelligent before she disappeared, but he did not tell me that Susan Hartshorne was quite right in her mind, and I won’t believe it. Do you know Mr —, I beg your pardon, I did not catch your name.”
“Markworth, Allynne Markworth,” said that gentleman.
“Thank you! Well then, Mr Allynne Markworth, do you know that that girl has a large fortune, and it is a very serious offence in the eyes of the law to abduct, and enter into a false contract of marriage with a girl of feeble intellect like that?”
“I am perfectly aware of the facts as you state them, my dear sir. Allow me to congratulate you on your legal presence of mind and abilities,” said Markworth, as calmly as ever. “I knew she had a fortune, but you will have to prove she was non compos mentis, I believe that’s your term for it, when I married her. The girl was of age, my dear sir. Look at that marriage certificate, and see for yourself. She was of legal age on the very day before we were married. There! you see the date of the certificate, 28th August, 1867.”
“Well, well, whether she was of age or not you can be prosecuted under an indictment for a conspiracy to obtain the money of a person of unsound mind, under the pretence of going through a marriage ceremony with a person who, in the eye of the law, could not make a binding contract!”