Mr. Fordyce actually let his cigar go out.  This incredible story was beginning to have an effect upon him.

“But where did she come from?” he asked blandly, as one speaks to a harmless imbecile.  “I leave you here in an abject state of despair, ready almost to decide upon marrying old Bessie, and I return in an hour and you inform me everything is settled, and you are the fiance of another lady!  You know, you surprise me, Michael—­’Pon my word, you do!”

Michael laughed, it was really a huge joke.

“Yes, it is quite true.  Well, just as I was going to ring and send James for Bessie to talk it over with her, there was no end of a smash—­as you see—­and a girl—­a tourist—­fell through the secret door.  I haven’t opened it for five years.  She was running away from a horrid fellow she was engaged to, it seems, and fled into the passage, and the door shut after her and she could not get out, so she pushed on in here.”

“It adds dramatic color to the story, the girl being engaged to someone else—­pray go on.”

Mr. Fordyce had now picked up his cigar again.  This preposterous tale no longer interested him.  He thought it even rather bad taste on the part of his friend.

“All right!” Michael explained.  “You need not believe me if you don’t like.  I don’t care, since I have done what I wanted to.  Bar chaff, Henry, I am telling you the truth.  The girl appears to be a young woman of decision.  She explained at once her circumstances, and it struck us both that to go through the ceremony of marriage would smooth all our difficulties.  We can easily get the bond annulled later on.”

Henry Fordyce put down his cigar again.

“I am off to town to-night.  You won’t mind, will you?” Michael went on.  “Just to see if everything is all right, and to get her guardian’s consent and a special license, and I shall be back by the six o’clock train on Thursday in time to get the ceremony over that night; and then, by the early morning express, if you’ll wait till then, we’ll go South together, and so for Paris and freedom!”

Henry actually rose from his chair.

“And the bride?” he asked.

Michael laughed.  “Oh, she may go to the moon, for all I care; she leaves directly after the ceremony with her certificate of marriage, which she means to brandish in the face of her relations, who are staying at the Inn, and so exit out of my life!  It is only an affair of expediency.”

“It is the affair of a madman.”

Michael frowned, and his firm chin looked aggressive.

“It is nothing of the kind.  You told me yourself that you would rather marry old Bessie—­a woman of eighty-four—­than Violet Hatfield; and now, when I have found a much more suitable person—­a pretty little lady—­you begin to talk.  My mind is made up, and there is an end of it.”

Mr. Fordyce interrupted.

“Bessie would have been much more suitable—­a plain pretext; but you have no idea what complications you may be storing up for yourself by marrying a young girl—­What is the sense in it?” he continued, a little excited now.  “The younger and prettier she is makes her all the more unsuitable to be used merely as a tool in your game.  Confound it, Michael!”