wer could I give him?
Could I tell him that International Patents had driven his father into
exile, that I had been partly the cause, the indirect cause, it is true,
but still the cause of his mother's death? I never found the courage to
do that and so I sent him to a preparatory school and later to college.
Years wiped out his childhood recollections and when he came here he
came as a stranger employed in the company's laboratory. I make no
defense, but I assure you all that my own sufferings have atoned for all
the wrongs I have done."

Brent broke down and was almost weeping, when Quentin and Eva moved over
to his side and reassured him.

As soon as Brent had recovered from his weakness he wanted to know all
that had happened since he had been unconscious under the drug, and as
he listened he was aghast at the Automaton and Balcom's villainy.

"I've something here that will stop him, though," added Quentin, as he
showed the new gas-gun he had invented and explained its deadly
properties. "Bring him on again--I'm ready."

"Quentin--please don't joke about that terrible monster," shivered Eva.
"It has injured us so often--I don't even want to talk about it--or
about the government that asked you to come here and set things right.
Let us forget--now that all is right."

Quentin smiled at her and his quick mind saw that the time had come to
guide the conversation into pleasanter channels. He moved close to
Brent.

"It looks, Mr. Brent," he said, quietly, "as though we all were at about
the end of our troubles. But there are two of us here who are not quite
happy--yet. Mr. Brent, I am going to claim a reward."

"Anything, my dear Locke, anything I have is yours."

"Then I may as well tell you that Eva and I love each other and I want
your consent to our marriage."

Brent beamed.

"That, Quentin, is the dearest wish my heart can have."

Quentin turned to Eva to take her in his arms when there was a terrific
crash of glass in the conservatory, the splintering of wood, and the
Automaton, arms swinging like flails, charged like a mad thing into the
room.

Its terrorizing eyes were agleam, its one desire destruction. A large
table stood in its way and it demolished it as though it were matchwood.

The interruption came so abruptly that Brent, who in his right mind had
never seen the fiend and was now seeing it for the first time, was
paralyzed with horror. He tried to rise from his chair, but in his weak
condi