“Well, if you win clear from this present rather doubtful proposition—and we’re backing you in that for all we’re worth, ain’t we, girls?—you’re tied up to a wife whom you don’t know, and I guess the one place in which you’re likely to find her is off the map for you for keeps.”
“I’m not versed in the law,” laughed Maseden, “but it will be a queer thing if I should be compelled to regard myself as married to a lady whom I have seen, certainly, but do not want.”
“How do you know you don’t want her?”
“I know nothing whatsoever about her.”
“That’s just it. That’s where you may be hipped. She may be a peach, the finest ever. Suppose, for the sake of argument, one of these two, Miss Madge or Miss Nina—”
“The lady’s name happened to be Madeleine,” put in Madge instantly. “If the ceremony was meant to be valid she would undoubtedly sign her right name.”
“Just so. You missed my point.”
Maseden thought it advisable to come to the rescue. He had conveyed to the one vitally interested listener that her secret was safe for the time, and this should suffice.
“I am inclined to think that I shall be proof against my nominal wife’s charms, no matter how great they may be,” he said emphatically. “There is a romantic side to the affair, I admit, but I cannot blind myself to the fact that it possesses a prosaic one as well. Association with a skunk like Steinbaum is hardly the best of credentials, in the first place. Secondly, one asks what motive any woman could have in wishing to marry a man condemned to die. I’m not flattering myself that my personal qualifications carried much weight.