Allan Harrowby went out, along the dusky corridor to the Meyrick door. Not without misgivings, he knocked. A voice boomed "Come!" He pushed open the door.
He saw Spencer Meyrick sitting purple at a table, and beside him Cynthia Meyrick, in the loveliest gown of all the lovely gowns she had ever worn. The beauty of the girl staggered Harrowby a bit; never demonstrative, he had a sudden feeling that he should be at her feet.
"You—you sent for me?" he asked, coming into the room. As he moved closer to the girl he was to marry he saw that her face was whiter than her gown, and her brown eyes strained and miserable.
"We did," said Meyrick, rising. He held out a paper. "Will you please look at that."
His lordship took the sheet in unsteady hands. He glanced down. Slowly the meaning of the story that met his gaze filtered through his dazed brain. "Martin Wall did this," he thought to himself. He tried to speak, but could not. Dumbly he stared at Spencer Meyrick.
"We want no scene, Harrowby," said the old man wearily. "We merely want to know if there is in existence a policy such as the one mentioned here?"
The paper slipped from his lordship's lifeless hands. He turned miserably away. Not daring to face either father or daughter, he answered very faintly:
"There is."
Spencer Meyrick sighed.
"That's all we want to know. There will be no wedding, Harrowby."