she could extend her stay, but her mother wrote 'Come home,' and there
was no appeal from that. Then I did a desperate thing. Without Molly's
knowledge I wrote to her mother telling her that I loved her daughter
and begging, as a man begs for his life, to be allowed to ask her to
wait for me. The letter was a lie in that it concealed the fact that my
love was already confessed but I felt it necessary to shield Molly. I
received no answer to the letter, but Molly received a telegram, 'Come
home at once.'

"I can leave you to imagine the scene--my despair, Molly's tears! Never
for an instant did she dream of disobeying and I--I felt that if she
went I should lose her forever.

"Willits, there is something in me, devil or angel, which will not give
up. Nothing has ever conquered it yet and Molly was like wax in my
hands--so long as 'Mother' need not know. I do not attempt to excuse
myself; what I did was dastardly, but it did not seem so then. The night
before she left, she stole away from home. I had a license and we were
married by a Methodist minister. He knew neither of us and probably
forgot the whole incident immediately. It was a marriage only in name
for we said good-bye at Molly's door. She left next morning. I never saw
her again."

Into the silence which followed, the professor's words dropped dryly.

"What was your idea in forcing a meaningless marriage?"

"I loved her. I knew that it was the only way. Madly as I loved her, I
knew that Molly was weak as water. I could not, would not, run the risk
of letting her leave me without the legal tie. But I justified it to