consent to the marriage but denied him admission into the house.
Mathilde Stangerson, however, had fallen in love. To her Jean
Roussel was everything that her love painted him. She was indignant
at her father's attitude, and did not conceal her feelings. Her
father sent her to stay with an aunt in Cincinnati. There she was
joined by Jean Roussel and, in spite of the reverence she felt for
her father, ran away with him to get married.

They went to Louisville and lived there for some time. One morning,
however, a knock came at the door of the house in which they were
and the police entered to arrest Jean Roussel. It was then that
Mathilde Stangerson, or Roussel, learned that her husband was no
other than the notorious Ballmeyer!

The young woman in her despair tried to commit suicide. She failed
in this, and was forced to rejoin her aunt in Cincinnati, The old
lady was overjoyed to see her again. She had been anxiously
searching for her and had not dared to tell Monsieur Stangerson of
her disappearance. Mathilde swore her to secrecy, so that her father
should not know she had been away. A month later, Mademoiselle
Stangerson returned to her father, repentant, her heart dead within
her, hoping only one thing: that she would never again see her
husband, the horrible Ballmeyer. A report was spread, a few weeks
later, that he was dead, and she now determined to atone for her
disobedience by a life of labour and devotion for her father. And
she kept her word.

All this she had confessed to Robert Darzac, and, believing Ballmeyer
dead, had given herself to the joy of a union with him. But fate had
resuscitated Jean Roussel--the Ballmeyer of her youth. He had taken