Under other conditions the railroad company’s “social secretary,” as the society editors of the capital were still calling him, might have had a joyous half-holiday.  The autumn afternoon was picture-fine, the little car ran well, and Patricia’s mood was tempered with the gayety which strives to extract the final thrill of enjoyment out of the closing days of a delightful vacation.  Blount was grateful for the light-hearted mood.  He felt that it would be next to impossible to tell Patricia how wretchedly he had failed in the single-handed crusade, and, as to the desperate alternative, there could be no confidences with one whose every reference to his father was shot through with loving and loyal admiration.

At the military reservation there were fewer opportunities for the confidences, or rather fewer temptations to indulge in them.  It was a gala day at the post, and there were a number of auto parties out from the city.  Blount knew most of the officers and their wives, and Patricia was welcomed not less for her own sake than for the reason that she had figured in former visits as the protegee of an ex-senator’s wife.  After the parade there was an impromptu game of baseball, with the broad verandas of the officers’ quarters serving for the grandstand.  Beyond the game there was tea, and the sunset gun had been fired before the young lieutenant, who had attached himself to Miss Anners at the earliest possible moment in the afternoon, reluctantly surrendered his prize and handed Patricia into the waiting runabout for the return to the capital.

“We shall be late for dinner, if we don’t hurry,” was the young woman’s comment when Blount steered the little car clear of the post settlement and took the road well in the wake of the Weatherford touring machine.  Then she added:  “We mustn’t be; we are dining out this evening—­at the Gordons.”

Blount was entirely willing to hurry.  Half of one of the precious days of challenge had been wasted in the futile search for Gryson, and here was the other half worse than wasted, since the handsome young lieutenant had so brazenly monopolized Patricia.

“I’ll get you home in time for dinner, never fear,” he returned, but apparently the little car was no party to the promise.  A short mile from the reservation the motor began to miss, and a few minutes farther along it stopped altogether.  Blount got out and began to investigate.  There was plenty of gasolene, but the spark appeared to be dead.

“I ought to have a leather medal!” he confided to Patricia, in great disgust.  “Mrs. Blount told me that the batteries needed to be changed, and I had them changed, but neglected to have them tested.  Sit still and let me spin it on the magneto a while.”

She let him do it until the perspiration was standing in fine little beads on his forehead and he was hot and desperate.  Then she said sweetly:  “I don’t believe I’d wear myself out that way, if I were you, Evan.  Something happened to the magneto two or three weeks ago, and it has never been fixed.”