Wyndham saw that her eyes were brimming with tears. The next instant she was in his arms, and as he caught the passionate light in her eyes his heart swelled with thanksgiving, the irresistible force of love had conquered the constraint growing between them. But his moment of rejoicing was short lived as, regaining some semblance of composure, she quietly unclasped his hands and rose. “We are both mad, Hugh,” she said, with a pitiful attempt at a smile. “Under existing circumstances we cannot be married.” “Why not?” hotly, with honest worship in his eyes. “I see no barrier, except of your imagining.” She recoiled. “Hush, Hugh! I cannot discuss it--it’s too near, too dreadful--” She covered her eyes and so missed the look he shot at her. Without a word he turned and paced agitatedly up and down the room, coming at last to a full stop beside her. “Very well, if you wish it I will not allude to past events.” His voice was so changed that she looked at him in quick alarm. “But you must understand, Dorothy, that your love is to me more than all the world; that I have never ceased to love you.” She moved impulsively toward him, then checked herself, her eyes downcast; she dared not look at him or her resolution would have given way. “Finish your breakfast,” she said in a voice which quivered in spite of her endeavor to keep it calm; she was very near to tears. “Are you going to Washington this morning?” “No.” He accepted her effort to make the conversation impersonal with marked displeasure, then, thinking better of his ungracious monosyllable, he added hastily, “Is there anything I can do for you in town?” “There is nothing, thanks,” she said drearily, and looked past him through one of the windows in time to see Dr. Alan Noyes walking swiftly along the path which circled the house. Dorothy watched Noyes out of sight, then turned back to Wyndham, her eyes dark with wonder. “Hugh,” she almost whispered her words, and he bent eagerly nearer, “why has Alan Noyes discontinued wearing his false arm?” He did not reply at once, and she remarked his silence, but before she could repeat her question he addressed her. “I cannot imagine,” he admitted. “It is a move likely to turn suspicion toward him, and it will not lessen the conviction that he is perhaps responsible for Brainard’s murder.” “Why?” “Because without the arm he could not have committed the crime; therefore, if he is guilty the first thing he would do would be to get rid of the arm--if innocent he would have continued to use it.” “But his motive?” Dorothy frowned in perplexity. “The only person he might protect by such a subterfuge never murdered Bruce Brainard.” Wyndham studied her intently as he drew a degree closer. “Are you so very positive you know who really is guilty?” he questioned, with peculiar intonation; the look she flashed at him was her only answer, for Mrs. Porter’s entrance put an effectual end to the tête-à-tête.