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Rh seriousness. "It was only incidental—quite irrelevant—that this young woman happened to be very wealthy. I fell desperately in love. I am still in that—er—pleasing state. The young lady's name, gentlemen, is Cynthia Meyrick. She is the daughter of Spencer Meyrick, whose fortune has, I believe, been accumulated in oil."

Mr. Thacker's eyebrows rose respectfully.

"A week from next Tuesday," said Lord Harrowby solemnly, "at San Marco, on the east coast of Florida, this young woman and I are to be married."

"And what," asked Owen Jephson, "is your proposition?"

Lord Harrowby shifted nervously in his chair.

"I say we are to be married," he continued. "But are we? That is the nightmare that haunts me. A slip. My—er—creditors coming down on me. And far more important, the dreadful agony of losing the dearest woman in the world."

"What could happen?" Mr. Jephson wanted to know.

"Did I say the young woman was vivacious?" inquired Lord Harrowby. "She is. A thousand