But the girl was now deeply in love with Ashton, and apparently he with her.  He begged her to marry him.  They knew that to this, partly from prejudice and partly owing to his position in the bank, her father would object.  Accordingly they agreed that in August, when the racing moved to Saratoga, they would run away and get married at that place.  Their plan was that Ashton would leave for Saratoga with the other racing men, and that she would join him the next day.

They had arranged to be married by a magistrate, and Ashton had shown her a letter from one at Saratoga who consented to perform the ceremony.  He had given her an engagement ring and two thousand dollars, which he asked her to keep for him, lest tempted at the track he should lose it.

But she assured Ford it was not such material things as a letter, a ring, or gift of money that had led her to trust Ashton.  His fear of losing her, his complete subjection to her wishes, his happiness in her presence, all seemed to prove that to make her happy was his one wish, and that he could do anything to make her unhappy appeared impossible.

They were married the morning she arrived at Saratoga; and the same day departed for Niagara Falls and Quebec.  The honeymoon lasted ten days.  They were ten days of complete happiness.  No one, so the girl declared, could have been more kind, more unselfishly considerate than her husband.  They returned to Saratoga and engaged a suite of rooms at one of the big hotels.  Ashton was not satisfied with the rooms shown him, and leaving her upstairs returned to the office floor to ask for others.

Since that moment his wife had never seen him nor heard from him.

On the day of her marriage young Mrs. Ashton had written to her father, asking him to give her his good wishes and pardon.  He refused both.  As she had feared, he did not consider that for a bank clerk a gambler made a desirable son-in-law; and the letters he wrote his daughter were so bitter that in reply she informed him he had forced her to choose between her family and her husband, and that she chose her husband.  In consequence, when she found herself deserted she felt she could not return to her people.  She remained in Saratoga.  There she moved into cheap lodgings, and in order that the two thousand dollars Ashton had left with her might be saved for his child, she had learned to type-write, and after four months had been able to support herself.  Within the last month a girl friend, who had known both Ashton and herself before they were married, had written her that her husband was living in London.  For the sake of her son she had at once determined to make an effort to seek him out.

“The son, nonsense!” exclaimed the doctor, when Ford retold the story.  “She is not crossing the ocean because she is worried about the future of her son.  She seeks her own happiness.  The woman is in love with her husband.”

Ford shook his head.