"Ask him. I have no doubt that he will answer you."
"Patricia, are you going to persist in this attitude toward me, even after we are married?" Duncan inquired, anxiously. But, instead of replying, she raised her head in a listening attitude, and announced to all who were present:
"I hear the horn of an approaching automobile. Perhaps, Mr. Morton has caught a ride."
"Answer me, Patricia," Duncan insisted.
"My conduct will be the answer to your question," she said, with her face averted.
Jack Gardner hurriedly left the room, accompanied by Sally. A moment later, when the automobile horn sounded nearer, Duncan left his place beside Patricia, and followed. Melvin, the lawyer, also went out, and then one by one the others, until Patricia was the only guest who remained at the table. She continued to occupy herself with the food that had been placed before her, while the flush on her cheeks deepened, her eyes shone with added brightness, and she smiled as if she were rather pleased than otherwise by the predicament in which Morton would find himself, when he should be closely questioned by Jack and Sally Gardner and the guests as well, whose curiosity, she knew, would now far exceed their discretion.
It never once occurred to her that Dick Morton, having had time to think over the occurrences of the afternoon and evening, and to realize the enormity of the offense he had committed, would tell the truth about it. Men within her knowledge, who belonged to the society with which she was familiar, would temporize, under such circumstances, would seek, by diplomatic speech to shield the woman in the case from the comment that must follow a revelation, would make use of well-chosen words to escape responsibility for what had occurred; would practise a studied reserve until certain knowledge could be obtained of what the woman might have said, upon her arrival.
The doors had been left open, and Patricia was conscious of loud tones proceeding from the veranda at the front of the house; of masculine voices raised in anger; and then she heard the sound of a blow, followed instantly by a heavy fall. Almost at the same instant, the sharp crack of a pistol smote upon the air, for an instant stiffening her with horror. She started to her feet in terror, her face gone white, her eyes dilated with apprehension. Then, she somehow stumbled to her feet, and stood there, trembling in every nerve, until she could gather strength to run forward.
A horrified and silent group of persons surrounded the principals in the scene that had just occurred, for there had not yet been time for any of them to recover from the paralyzing effect of what had happened.
Richard Morton was on the floor of the veranda where he had raised himself upon one elbow, and he still held in his right hand the small revolver from which the shot that Patricia had overheard, had come. Roderick Duncan was standing a few feet away, and he was holding in his arms the limp form of Beatrice Brunswick, whose head had fallen backward, as if she were unconscious, or dead. Just at the instant when Patricia caught a view of this strange tableau, the other spectators threw off the momentary lethargy that had overpowered them, and rushed forward toward the principal actors in the scene that had passed, each shouting a different exclamation, but all alike in their expressions of horror and loathing for the man who was down—Richard Morton.