If it were possible for such a man as Mr. Philip Slotman to be shocked,
then Slotman was deeply shocked at this moment. He had come to regard
Joan as something infinitely superior to himself. Self-indulgent, a
libertine, he had pursued her with his attentions, pestered her with his
admiration and his offensive compliments. Then it had slowly dawned on
the brain of Mr. Philip Slotman that this girl was something better,
higher, purer than most women he had known. He had come to realise it
little by little. His feelings towards her had undergone a change. The
idea of marriage had come to him, a thing he had never considered
seriously before. Little by little it grew on him that he would prefer
to have Joan Meredyth for a wife rather than in any other capacity. He
could have been so proud of her beauty, her birth and her breeding.

And now everything had undergone a change. The bottom had fallen out of
his little world of romance. He stood there, gasping and clutching at
the edge of the table, while he listened to the man in the adjoining
room offering marriage to Joan Meredyth "as the only possible atonement"
he could make her!

Naturally, Mr. Philip Slotman could not understand in the least why or
wherefore; it was beyond his comprehension.

And now he stood listening eagerly, holding his breath waiting for her
answer.

Would she take him, this evidently rich man? If so, then good-bye to all
his hopes, all his chances.

Within the room the two faced one another in momentary silence. A flush