"I'm afraid you've taken rather a bad time, Lawrence."
"You're busy, you mean. This can wait, Henry, if what you're doing is immediate."
"I want some of these men to be back in Michigan to-night. Can't we get together later—this afternoon? You'll be about here this afternoon?" His manner was not casual; Alan could not think of any expression of that man as being casual; but this, he thought, came as near it as Spearman could come.
"I think I can be here this afternoon," Alan said.
"Would two-thirty suit you?"
"As well as any other time."
"Let's say two-thirty, then." Spearman turned and noted the hour almost solicitously among the scrawled appointments on his desk pad; straightening, after this act of dismissal, he walked with them to the door, his hand on Sherrill's shoulder.
"Circumstances have put us—Mr. Sherrill and myself—in a very difficult position, Conrad," he remarked. "We want much to be fair to all concerned—"
He did not finish the sentence, but halted at the door. Sherrill went out, and Alan followed him; exasperation—half outrage yet half admiration—at Spearman's bearing, held Alan speechless. The blood rushed hotly to his skin as the door closed behind them, his hands clenched, and he turned back to the closed door; then he checked himself and followed Sherrill, who, oblivious to Alan's excitement, led the way to the door which bore Corvet's name. He opened it, disclosing an empty room, somewhat larger than Spearman's and similar to it, except that it lacked the marks of constant use. It
