"I have learned with horror and dismay of the great bereavement which has fallen upon you and your family, but in view of this misfortune, I have thought it wisest to take my departure at once. "You will understand, of course, that under these conditions it is advisable to discontinue our present relations at once, and as my presence might prove embarrassing I leave with feelings of great unhappiness. You are doubtless aware of the customs of my country in the matter of settlements, the absence of which would preclude the possibility of marriage on my part. "Mrs. Crabb has kindly consented to make my apologies and excuses to you for my abrupt departure which I take with deep regret, the deeper because of my profound esteem for your many delightful qualities, of which you may be assured I shall never cease to think with tender and regretful sentiments----" Patricia broke off abruptly. "I think that is all, Monsieur. Will you finish it--as you please?" The baron nodded and added: "I am, Mademoiselle, with profound assurances of my friendship and consideration, "Yours, "Louis Charles Bertram de Chartres, "Baron DeLaunay." Patricia meanwhile had ordered the Baron's suitcase packed and had 'phoned for a station wagon and a while later stood in the hallway speeding the parting guest. "Must you go, Monsieur? I am so very sorry. I understand, of course. I am the loser." And with all the generosity of a victorious general whose enemy is no longer dangerous. "If you are nice you may kiss my hand." As DeLaunay bent over her fingers he murmured: "If it had only been _you_, Madame." And in a moment he had gone. CHAPTER XIX Patricia stood in the hallway a moment looking at the note to Aurora, which she held in her fingers. Then she went to the desk so recently vacated by her guest and wrote steadily for an hour. Her thesis was the international marriage, and she called it Crabb vs. DeLaunay, enclosing two papers, DeLaunay's note and the newspaper clippings from her adorable printers. Slips of paper were pinned to them, upon one of which she had written "Exhibit A," and on the other "Exhibit B." She sealed them all in a long envelope addressed to Miss North and handed it to Aurora's maid with instructions that it should be given to her mistress when she had gone up to her room. From her own bed Patricia heard the motor arrive and her husband fuming in the hallway below, the sound of Aurora's door closing and of Mortimer's heavy footsteps in his own quarters; then after awhile, silence. She lay on her bed in the dark thinking, listening intently. It was long before she was rewarded. Then her door opened quietly, and in the aperture the night-lamp showed a pale, tear-stained face and a slender, girlish figure swathed in a pale blue dressing gown.