What she meant he did not know. What he should have done he did not know. That he had done the wrong thing he was not sure. But he had. _Wrong_? Indeed, his act had been the deadliest wrong possible to the woman. He was stunned, he did not understand; but there was one thing of which in his sane moments he was already convinced: Ruth loved him. Nothing should have superseded that in his mind. Whatever the riddle was, whatever the skein of mystery in which they two were entangled, he should have remembered that. Instead he had allowed jealousy to step in and becloud the issue. John Ryder had turned his back upon a woman who had shown she loved him deeply. He had deserted her at a time when she needed him as she never had before and probably never would again. All the pain and passion which followed this event John Ryder could lay to his own act. He brought all that followed upon himself by his own unwisdom. He was thinking only of himself. He was like a hurt animal, desiring to seek some lair wherein to lick its wounds. He walked on and on. The in-running tide lapped along the strand at his feet, the burden of its murmur being: "_I never heard of you before!_" What had Ruth meant by that statement? Was it possible that she was insane? What had that fellow, White, said to her that had thrown her mind into such confusion? White! At the remembrance of the man of mystery Ryder suddenly spat out an oath. He could explain this thing; and Ryder suddenly registered a vow that White should explain, or he would have his life! He was a man now enraged to the point of desperation. He started for the hotel with this single idea milling in his brain. More than an hour had elapsed since he had left the Pinewood Inn, but he had taken little note of the lapse of time. He betrayed his disturbed state of mind when he reached the desk where George presided. "For mercy's sake, Mr. Ryder! what's happened to you?" demanded the clerk. "I--I am looking for a man," stammered Ryder. "You know--the fellow who threw a fit here last night. White--John B. White." "What about him?" "I want to see him." "But he's gone, sir." "Gone? Left the hotel?" "Yes, sir. He had no heavy baggage, and he got somebody to row him across the inlet. There are several fellows down there taking folks back and forth because of the broken bridge. I guess he intended catching the two o'clock train on the main line. Had your lunch, sir?" Ryder was not thinking of eating. He walked away from the desk without replying. White was gone. Then who would explain to him----? Ruth! He started up the stairway. Instinctively he sought Suite Three. Yet when he arrived there he hesitated. Should he go in? Could he face Ruth? What was he to say to her? At last he turned the knob. The door was unlocked. He stepped into the room. Its condition instantly shocked his mind into activity.