The guardian at the Holden gate would have testified that he had not passed out that way, and the way through the offices had been closed at five, subsequent to which hour several witnesses could have sworn to seeing him still on the lot.
In the ensuing search even the tank at the lower end of the lot might have been dragged--without result.
Being little known to the public, however, and in the Patterson home it being supposed that you could never tell about motion-picture actors, his disappearance for the night caused absolutely no slightest ripple.
Public attention as regarded the young man remained at a mirror-like calm, unflawed by even the mildest curiosity.

He had been seen, perhaps, though certainly not noted with any interest, to be one of the group watching a night scene in front of one of the Fifth Avenue mansions.
Lights shone from the draped windows of this mansion and from its portals issued none other than Muriel Mercer, who, as Vera Vanderpool, freed at last from the blight of Broadway, was leaving her palatial home to cast her lot finally with the ardent young tenement worker with the high forehead.

She descended the brown-stone steps, paused once to look back upon the old home where she had been taught to love pleasure above the worth-while things of life, then came on to the waiting limousine, being greeted here by the young man with the earnest forehead who had won her to the better way.
The missing youth might later have been observed, but probably was not, walking briskly in the chill night toward the gate that led to the outer world.

But he wheeled abruptly before reaching this gate, and walked again briskly, this time debouching from the main thoroughfare into the black silence of the Western village.

Here his pace slackened, and halfway down the street he paused irresolutely.