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Updated: May 18, 2025
The lawyer's shrewd guess about the chauffeur being put out of commission had certainly furnished a suggestion for Morton to follow. Patricia hesitated to accompany him, in that manner, but finally consented, though not without reluctance; and so, shortly before five o'clock, they started. They should easily have arrived at Cedarcrest between six and seven.
"Richard Morton!" she exclaimed sharply, touching his arm, tentatively. "Why don't you answer me? What are you trying to do? Where are you taking me?" For just an instant, he flashed his eyes into hers; then he replied, grimly: "I am taking you for a good ride. We'll steer around to Cedarcrest by another road, presently." "But I wish to go there at once." "You can't."
You have not proven yourself quite the friend I hoped you would be. Friends don't plot against each other." "Shall I turn the car about and take you home?" he asked shortly, with tightening lips, angered unreasonably by the attitude she had assumed. "No; you may take me to our destination, Cedarcrest."
"Chiefly, because I do not approve of plots and schemes, in any form. Had you asked me, frankly and openly, to drive to Cedarcrest with you, I should have felt no hesitation in accepting; as it is, you have given offense, Mr. Morton." "So much so that you won't even call me Dick?" he said, with a light laugh that was more forced than real. "Yes.
Five minutes later, while Patricia yet remained at the top of the steps where Morton had left her, the steam-roadster that had been so closely related to her experiences of the night rushed past the house and disappeared along the winding roadway toward the Cedarcrest gate. And she remained there, in a listening attitude, as long as she could hear the droning murmur of its mechanism.
And toward this quarry Duncan was now hastening at the full speed of his big Packard-sixty, with the trusted Thompson at the wheel; and toward it, as the chief actor, Richard Morton had started away from Cedarcrest with a broken heart, and with a brain crazed by the calamities that had rushed so swiftly upon him.
Patricia was, of course, unaware of the scene that had taken place at Duncan's rooms just before the informal invitations to Cedarcrest were issued, but Duncan recalled that circumstance now, with a deeper understanding of all that had happened as a sequel to it; and he believed that the time was ripe for a better understanding between himself and Patricia.
Talk about me getting things into a mess! Great Scott! if you don't get into one, out at Cedarcrest, with that sort of a mix-up to take care of, I'm a sheep-herder. Maybe you haven't got on to the fact, my girl, but, as sure as you're the best little woman in all New York, Dick Morton is so dead stuck on Patricia Langdon that he can't forget it for a minute.
Sally nodded toward the butler, and waved him away, knowing that he had overheard Patricia's words, and that she would speedily be served; the others of the party resumed their former seats around the table, and the practical Sally turned and faced Patricia, again, her eyes flashing some of the indignation she felt because of her guest's evident reluctance to explain the strange circumstance of her arrival at Cedarcrest alone.
"You're not very deep, Morton," he said, presently. "I can see through you as plainly as if you were a plate-glass window. You have come here to induce me to relieve you of the necessity of taking Agnes and Frances Houston to Cedarcrest, in order that you may have Patricia Langdon alone with you in your roadster. And I'll wager that your chauffeur is out of commission, too."
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