"They stopped here yesterday for some water," sobbed the mistress of the house hysterically. "Oh dear, dear! Pitching apples across the yard at the little dark one, he was, and both of them making fun."
The rattling explosions of a motor cycle sounded from without; the first of the emergency surgeons to arrive ran up the steps and into the room, stripping off his coat while appraising with keen eyes the unconscious patient.
"Get out, everyone," he directed concisely. "Here, I want a helper—you, Rose?"
Corrie, on his knee beside the couch, looked up and dragged himself erect. Gerard's face was no more drawn and colorless than his, but he answered to the call, as half an hour before he had answered the demand of the situation for a guide.
"I'll help," he consented, his voice hoarse. "I deserve it."
Before the surgeon's imperious gesture, the rest of the men were retreating to leave the room, when those nearest the door were suddenly thrust back. Staggering, furious passion blazing in his scratched and pain-twisted face, Rupert burst across the threshold.
"Alive?" he hurled the fierce question. "Alive? What?"
"Yes," snapped the surgeon. "Cut this sleeve, Rose—gently! Clear out, you; the ambulance men will take care of you when they get here."
Rupert's haggard black eyes embraced the scene, and encountered Corrie.
"You——" he snarled, choking, and whirled to face the witnesses, extending one slim shaking hand toward the workers beside the couch. "Here, I ain't supposing but that most of you are chasing headlines for paper rags—print down that Allan Gerard was killed by that man. I'm saying it; Gerard cut him off from getting past, and he pitched a wrench that knocked him out. Go down to the course and you'll get the wrench to Missouri you, on the road. Rose knocked out Gerard and our car ran wild."