Yet, he made no move. If you had been watching him from beyond the screen of vines, no indication of what was passing in his thoughts would have been noticeable. The fierce hatred he so suddenly experienced was not made manifest by any act or expression, although it was none the less pronounced, for all that. And, strangely enough, it did not lead him to any greater consideration of Morton, or of his acts; rather the contrary.
Once, while he was preoccupied in this manner, he was again conscious of the distant whirr of an automobile engine, but he gave it no thought, till afterward. He did notice that Jack Gardner also heard it, and took his cigar from his mouth while he listened to it; but at once resumed his conversation with the lawyer. Soon afterward, Roderick left his chair under the vine, and passed inside the house.
"Hello, Rod," Jack called after him. "I didn't know you were there. Won't you join Melvin and me, in our cozy corner?" to which Duncan called back some casual reply, and passed on.
He had made up his mind that he would seek out Patricia, at once, and tell her of the discovery he had just made; that he had been a fool not to realize before, that Morton was the man of her choice, and that she could have the fellow if she wanted him; that he would not only release her from the tentative engagement, but that he would repudiate the contract entirely, and that, as soon as he could secure his own copy of it from the strong-box where he had put it, he would tear it into ten thousand pieces; that he would have no more of her, on any conditions, and that—oh, well, he thought of many bitter and biting things that he would say to her the moment he should find her—possibly in tears because of Morton's enforced departure from Cedarcrest, or in the act of weeping out the truth on Sally Gardner's shoulder. He thought he understood the situation now, as he had not seen it before.
Duncan searched in the drawing-room, the music-room, the dining-room; he explored the snuggery, the library, and even Jack's own particular den; he sought the side piazzas; he went outside among the trees to certain hidden nooks he knew. But Patricia was nowhere to be discovered. Neither had he been able to see Sally anywhere about, and the conviction became stronger upon him that the two were somewhere together, and that Patricia, her pride forgotten, was keeping the young hostess with her while she told of the terrible predicament in which she now found herself to be enmeshed; for it would be a most stupendous predicament for Patricia to face—the realization that she was in love with Morton, in spite of the contract in writing she had forced Roderick Duncan to sign with her.
Returning to the house, he found the butler, and was about to send him in search of his mistress, when he discovered Sally, descending the stairway.
"Where is Patricia?" Each asked the question simultaneously, so that the words were pronounced exactly together; and yet neither one smiled. Each question was a reply to its mate.
"I have been searching everywhere for her," said Duncan.
"So have I," replied Sally. "Where can she be?"
"I haven't an idea. Isn't she up-stairs?"