He was beside himself, almost incoherent, for the moment quite irresponsible. It is very likely that, but for Claire, he would have mounted a horse and pursued Haig to his ranch, with such consequences as anybody except himself could easily have foreseen. But he was not so far gone in frenzy as to hurt Claire, as he must have done in tearing himself loose from her. He stood a moment in tragic helplessness, grinding his teeth, and hurling muttered imprecations out into the night that covered Philip Haig. Then he looked down at the golden head pressed against his breast, and felt the frail body quivering; and some sense of what he was doing, or was about to do, reached his brain through the fumes of rage. There was yet a long struggle; for he was too ponderous for quick decisions, and at the same time too outright for successful equivocation. Defeat was always a staggering blow to him, since he had no art to mask it. And now, lacking the sagacity to swallow his mortification and to bide his time, he could only suffer, rending himself in lieu of another on whom to pour his fury. In the midst of this futile passion his roving eyes fell on Marion. She lay where she had fallen, in a dead faint, limp on the red-and-yellow rug. Seth stared at her a full minute, while an indefinable suspicion grew in the back of his brain. She had said, "I've brought him here to make peace with you." And Haig himself had given the lie to that speech! What did it all mean? By God, he would find out! "Come, Claire!" he said. "Attend to Marion!" And he began to loosen her fingers from his coat. But she only clutched it the tighter. "You'll go!" she cried. "No! Not to-night!" "You promise?" "Yes! Yes!" he growled. She looked steadily up at him, questioning, fearful, until he bent down and kissed her. "There!" he said, roughly and yet not ungently. "Now go to Marion!" They picked her up, and laid her on the couch at one side of the big room; and Claire unbuttoned her dress at the throat, and bathed her face and neck with cold water, while Seth rubbed and slapped her hands. Her first impulse, on opening her eyes and seeing Claire and Seth leaning over her, was to raise her head, and look toward the door. She saw only a patch of darkness, empty and still. Then she remembered how she had heard his mocking voice fade away in the night; and her eyes returned to Seth and Claire. Their faces told her what to expect: and she knew that they were right in demanding, as they would demand, the fullest explanation. "Water, please!" she murmured, moistening her dry lips with her tongue. She sat up, slowly emptied the glass that Claire placed in her trembling hand, then buttoned her collar over her bare throat, and began to pin up the locks of hair that had fallen about her face and neck. Her hands, she thought, were very thin and white. She had never fainted before, and was still a little frightened and surprised. "What does it all mean, Marion?" demanded Huntington.