Without a word in explanation the changed Richardia led him to the stair and signed to him to precede her. Tregarvon hesitated only long enough to see that the professor was hobbling away toward the lighted library. Then he stood aside and slipped an arm under Richardia’s. “They hadn’t told me you had been ill,” he said reproachfully; and as they went up together the nearness of her set his blood afire and for the moment he forgot the scene in the deep wood timing itself in the Sunday afternoon of revealment. At the stairhead a door stood ajar, with the flickering light of an open fire in the room beyond shining through the narrow opening. With a quick premonition that a tragedy was about to be revealed, Tregarvon followed his guide into the room. It was a huge chamber, spacious enough to belittle the few pieces of old-fashioned furnishings, and in the great four-poster bed lay a young man with an arm in a sling and his bandaged head propped high among the pillows. Though the face of the sick man was haggard and emaciated, Tregarvon recognized it instantly. It was the face of the handsome young fellow who had kept the Sunday afternoon tryst with Richardia. It was only natural that he should be checked by a sudden feeling of antagonism, but before it could find expression it was swallowed up in an astoundment too great to be measured. Richardia had led him to the bedside and she was saying quietly: “Mr. Tregarvon has come, brother. Shall I leave him alone with you?” The sick man roused himself with an effort that was plainly distressful. “Yes,” he said shortly. And after Richardia had gone: “I’m the man you’re looking for.” Tregarvon dragged a chair to the bedside and sat down. In the rush of conflicting emotions one exultant fact was hammering itself into his brain and dominating all others: Richardia’s secret had not been her lover’s secret; it was her _brother’s_. In the turmoil of readjustment, it was inevitable that the generous impulses of former days--the days before the _débâcle_--should come swiftly to the surface. “I’m glad to be here, Mr. Birrell; and that is entirely apart from anything you may be going to tell me,” he said quickly. “Are you quite sure you are able to talk?” “I’ve got to talk; it’s up to me now. Sister told me a little while ago that you had caught Morgan McNabb; that you’re going to have him brought back here so that you can give him the third degree. I’m the man you want. Morgan did only what I made him do.” Tregarvon was beginning to understand a little. “Perhaps you’d better tell it all, if you feel equal to it,” he suggested soberly. Then he added: “I’m not going to be your judge, Mr. Birrell.” The sick man rocked his head on the pillows. “You won’t understand; I couldn’t make anybody understand. But it’s got to be told. Do you know what that crook Parker did to my father?” “Yes.” “All of it?” “Yes; all of it.”