“That we should have left so suddenly; that I could not even tell dear ma where we were going; that you were in such a hurry to reach your new place in Paris, though we have stopped a whole month in London. What is the reason I have no letters from home?”
“Because none have come, I suppose. I have not received any,” I answered, struggling to be funny.
“Paley, you told me, if you left for Paris, that you should write to the bank officers, and resign your situation. You did not do so. This paper says you have been missing for a week, and there is a suspicion that your accounts are not all right. Tell me the worst, Paley. I will try to bear it,” she continued, wiping away the tears which filled her eyes.
I was tempted to do so. She had been worrying for weeks about her letters, and she would continue to do so as long as we remained in Europe. No letters would come; none could come. Her parents and her sisters were as anxious about her as she was about them. I could never make peace on the plan which I had laid out at home. My wife would become more and more unhappy, and after the facts of my defalcation had been fully published, I should be still more in dread of meeting some American who would recognize me. As a teller in the bank I was well known to many of the wealthiest men of Boston. Under existing treaties, I could be arrested in most of the European nations, and sent back to the scene of my crime. There was no place of safety for me. I could not flee from the wrath to come.
“What do you suspect, Lilian?” I inquired.
“I should not suspect anything, if this paper did not say that your accounts were supposed to be wrong. I don’t know any thing about such things, but this paragraph set me to thinking how strange your movements were when you left Boston. I wish I could believe it is all right. Why don’t you go to your place in Paris? We had to leave home at twenty-four hours’ notice, because there must be no delay.”
“We are going next week.”
“But you have laid your plans to travel in Europe for the next year, at least.”