"No, I saw no lady—a servant came to tell me that a gentleman was waiting to see me," responded the doctor.
"Then she must have gone immediately out and made off with all possible speed," said Ray, musingly.
"But," Doctor Wesselhoff continued, as if he had not heard his remark, "the woman I spoke of—a Mrs. Walton—called upon me the previous day and arranged with me to take you as a patient. She was upward of fifty years of age, her hair was white, and she had the look of one who had known much care and sorrow."
He then proceeded to relate all that had occurred during the interview, and Ray was astonished at the daring scheme which had been so successfully planned and carried out.
When the physician concluded his account, Ray gravely and positively declared:
"I do not know any person by the name of Walton. If this woman told you that she was my mother, she uttered a falsehood, for I have no mother—she died more than ten years ago, and her place has been filled, as well as another could fill it, by a housekeeper. My home is No. 119 —— street; but, Doctor Wesselhoff, if you still doubt my statements, and imagine that I am laboring under a peculiar mania, you can easily ascertain the truth by bringing my father here to prove my assertions. I beg that you will do so without delay, for he must be suffering the most harrowing suspense on my account."
Doctor Wesselhoff looked very much disturbed, for the more he talked with Ray, the more fully convinced he was that he had been unconsciously lending his aid to further an atrocious crime.
But as he saw how pale and weary his patient was, he was recalled to a sense of his duty as a physician.
He arose and kindly took the young man's hand.
"I am very much afraid," he said, "that we are both the victims of a complicated plot; but let me assure you that so far as I am concerned, the wrong to you shall be made right without a moment's delay. Now I want you to go to sleep, and while you are resting I will seek an interview with the man whom you claim as your father."