Anna the Adventuress

"Alive! In London!" Annabel moaned.

"Yes. Pull yourself together, Annabel! I must have the truth."

The girl on the lounge drew a long sobbing breath.

"You shall," she said. "Listen! There was a Meysey Hill in Paris, an

American railway millionaire. This man and he were alike, and about

the same age. Montague Hill was taken for the millionaire once or

twice, and I suppose it flattered his vanity. At any rate, he began to

deliberately personate him. He sent me flowers. Celeste introduced him

to me--oh, how Celeste hated me! She must have known. He--wanted to

marry me. Just then--I was nervous. I had gone further than I meant

to--with some Englishmen. I was afraid of being talked about. You

don't know, Anna, but when one is in danger one realizes that the--the

other side of the line is Hell. The man was mad to marry me. I heard

everywhere of his enormous riches and his generosity. I consented. We

went to the Embassy. There was--a service. Then he took me out to

Monteaux, on a motor. We were to have breakfast there and return in

the evening. On the way he confessed. He was a London man of business,

spending a small legacy in Paris. He had heard me sing--the fool

thought himself in love with me. Celeste he knew. She was chaffing him

about being taken for Meysey Hill, and suggested that he should be

presented to me as the millionaire. He told me with a coarse nervous

laugh. I was his wife. We were to live in some wretched London suburb.

His salary was a few paltry hundreds a year. Anna, I listened to all

that he had to say, and I called to him to let me get out. He laughed.

I tried to jump, but he increased the speed. We were going at a mad

pace. I struck him across the mouth, and across the eyes. He lost

control of the machine. I jumped then--I was not even shaken. I saw

the motor dashed to pieces against the wall, and I saw him pitched on

his head into the road. I leaned over and looked at him--he was quite

still. I could not hear his heart beat. I thought that he was dead. I

stole away and walked to the railway station. That night in Paris I

saw on the bills 'Fatal Motor Accidents.' _Le Petit Journal_ said that

the man was dead. I was afraid that I might be called upon as a

witness. That is why I was so anxious to leave Paris. The man who came

to our rooms, you know, that night was his friend."

"The good God!" Anna murmured, herself shaken with fear. "You were

married to him!"

"It could not be legal," Annabel moaned. "It couldn't be. I thought

that I was marrying Meysey Hill, not that creature. We stepped from

the Embassy into the motor--and oh! I thought that he was dead. Why

didn't he die?"