Patricia sighed.

“Has it ever struck you, my lamb,” she said, “that our dear Syl is a selfish pig?”

Joan started in surprise.

“Oh, I know,” Patricia went on, “her respectability and genius protect her, but she is selfish.  How long did she stop to consider us when her own plans loomed high?  She dumped everything on us and went!  It was business, pleasure, art, and John.  For the rest—­’poof!’” Patricia spoke the last sound like a knife cutting through something crisp and hard.

Joan continued to stare.  Unformed impressions were taking shape—­she felt disloyal, but she was not deceived.

“Syl brought you here,” Patricia was going on, “because she was lonely and you fitted in; she never changed her own course.  She has engaged herself to her John because he fits in and will never interfere.  I’ve seen him—­and I grieve over him.  He’ll think, bye and bye, that he’s gone into partnership with God in giving Syl and her art to the world!  But he’ll never have any nice little fire to warm the empty corners of his life by.  I hope he’ll never discover them—­poor chap!  He’s as good as gold and Syl has pulled it all over him without knowing it.  She’s made him believe that he was specially designed to further a good cause—­she is the good cause.

“And the best, or the worst, of it is that Syl will make good.  That kind does.  It is such fools as you and I who fail because we have imagination and find ourselves at the crucial moment in the other fellow’s shoes.”

“Oh, Pat!” It was all that Joan could think of saying.

Patricia was rushing on.

“Very well, then!  Now, listen, lamb, you and I are going to skip and skip at once.  I’m done up.  A change is all that will save me—­and you’ve got to go with me!”

“Yes, yes, Pat!”

“Why, child, a step on the stairs is giving us electric shocks.  This lease is up in October.  I’ll telegraph Syl to-day.  She can make her own arrangements after that—­we’ll leave things safe here and get out to-morrow!”

Suddenly Joan got up and threw her hands over her head.

“Thank heaven!” was what she cried aloud.

There was much rush and flurry after that, and in the excitement the nervous tension relaxed.

A note, a most bewildering one, was posted to Elspeth Gordon.  It came at a moment when Miss Gordon greatly needed Joan and was most annoyed at her non-appearance.  It simply stated: 

    Something has happened—­I’m going at once to Chicago with Pat.

Now as Patricia had been an unknown quantity to Miss Gordon—­her relations with Joan being purely those of business—­she raised her brows with all the inherited conservatism of her churchly ancestors and steeled her heart—­as they often had.

“Temperamental!” sniffed Miss Gordon, “utterly lacking in honour.  Just as I might have expected.  A poor prospect for—­Pat!  I do not envy the gentleman.”