Lorimer remained dumb, and looked at Dora in the strangest manner, as if seeking to know whether he had heard aright. He threw his cigarette on the tray and drew nearer to her. He hardly knew whether to pity her or to reproach her bitterly. "What!" said he, "you do not know what happened to Philip at the moment that he was about to leave the Paris hotel to return to London in time to dine with Sabaroff? He never explained all that to you? Why, he told me that he had written you a long explanation of it all." "It is quite true that he has written to me several times since that dreadful day, but I have torn up unread every letter he has sent me since I left that hated house." "Well," said Lorimer, with an air of mixed pity and amazement, "upon my word, you can do clever things, when you set about it! If you had read his letters, you would have learnt the whole truth." "Tell me yourself, tell me everything," said Dora breathlessly. "Listen, then, while I show you how unfounded was your crowning suspicion of him. Philip's business in Paris being finished, he had breakfasted early, and was descending the staircase on his way to his cab, when, as he reached the first floor landing, a door opened, and a gentleman came out. Judge of his feelings at finding himself face to face with his father! One glance served to show Philip that a great change had come over him. From a hale, haughty, self-reliant man of sixty, he had turned into a pitiable invalid, and looked prematurely old and feeble. A broken cry, 'My son!' arrested Philip's steps. Struck with pity at the sight of the change in his father, he allowed himself to be led through the still-open door, and there ensued a moving scene in which the elder man humbled himself before the younger and implored his forgiveness. The minutes fled by meanwhile, and when Philip, unnerved and shaken, reached the station, it was only to find that the train had left two minutes before. The rest you know." "Oh, my poor brain is on fire," murmured Dora. "Dora, you have misjudged Philip. He made you rich, thinking to add to your happiness--that is the only harm he ever did you. Ah, say that you forgive him, and will go back to him--he is waiting for you." "No, no, never in that house." "No," said Lorimer softly; "not in that house, but the old studio in Elm Avenue." "Where? what did you say?" exclaimed Dora. "Philip has left the house you hate so, because of its cruel souvenirs. He has gone back to St. John's Wood, where you spent the first six years of your married life, and, in order never to be turned out of that house, he has bought it." "But the house is inhabited," said Dora. "I know it." "Why, then--it must be Philip" ... "Who occupies it," said Lorimer; "he is only waiting for your presence, dear Dora, before beginning to work again. He will devote the rest of his life to painting in the old studio. It is his irrevocable resolution."