The house was a large one. It covered a great deal of ground although it was only one story high. A wide hall ran through the center of the main building, and there were doors to the right and the left. Through the first doorway to the right, Patricia made her escape; and, through it, Roderick Duncan followed her. But he brought up suddenly, the instant he had crossed the threshold, and stood there, staring. Patricia had passed swiftly ahead of him, and Roderick saw her drop upon her knees beside a couch-bed, whereon a man was lying--and that man was Richard Morton.
Duncan was too greatly amazed for connected thought, but he was conscious of the fact that Morton's eyes sought him over the shoulder of Patricia, who knelt beside the couch. He had never thought that Morton's eyes were quite so expressive. They seemed almost to speak to him, to wonder at his presence there; but, stranger than all else, to express unquestionable pleasure because of his presence. He thought it remarkable that Morton did not move; that the man made no effort to rise, or to speak; that there was neither smile nor frown upon his white, still face. Then, Patricia's voice broke the spell that was upon him. She turned, and beckoned to him.
"Come here, Roderick," she said, softly. "Come and speak to Richard. Tell him that you have come all the way out here, by a special train, to marry me, and that you have brought a minister along with you to perform the ceremony. Come, Roderick, come. He will be made very happy by the news." She turned toward the stricken man, again, and added: "Won't you, Richard?"
Slowly the lids dropped for an instant over those strangely brilliant eyes, and, when they were raised again, the eyes seemed to smile at Roderick; but there was no other emotion visible about the prostrate man.
"I have not told you about him, Roderick," Patricia said, rising to her feet, "but I will do so now, in his presence. He wishes it so; do you not, Richard?"
Again, those eyes closed for an instant, and Roderick understood that the gesture, if gesture it could be called, meant an affirmative.
"Richard wishes you to know all the truth about him," she continued. "I have promised him, many times, that some day I would tell you. He meant to kill himself that night, when he drove his roadster away from Cedarcrest. He guided his car, purposely, into the mass of rocks at the roadside. I found him there. Patrick O'Toole, who is devoted to me, was with me, you know. We saw the wreck, and stopped. Then, we found Richard. Oh, it was awful. I thought he was dead, and I believed that I was his murderer. I still think that I was the unconscious cause of it all, although he will not have it so. I was moaning over him, when Mr. Radnor--you remember him?--found us. He took us to a sanatorium that he knew about, where he said there was a good doctor; and so it proved. I forgot all about Jack Gardner's car, but later I sent Patrick back after it."