"The matter," he remarked, "becomes clearer to me. You are either the most ingenuous person I ever met, or the most subtle. Tell me, is it a personal bribe you have brought?" "It is not," Mr. Beldeman replied. "It did not occur to those in whose employment I am, or to me, to offer you a single sixpence. I am here to offer you, if you send your people out on strike within the next week--the coal strike, the railway strike, the ironfounders, the smelters, from the Clyde southwards--one million pounds as a subscription to your strike funds." "You have it with you?" Maraton enquired, after a moment. "I have four drafts for two hundred and fifty thousand pounds each, in my pocket-book at the present moment," Mr. Beldeman declared. "They are payable to your order. You can accept my offer and pay them into your private banking account or the banking account of any one of your Trades' Unions. There is not the slightest doubt but that they will be met." "Are there any terms at all connected with this little subscription?" "None," Beldeman replied. "And your object," Maraton added, "is to benefit through our loss of trade?" "Entirely," Mr. Beldeman assented, without a quiver upon his face. Maraton was silent for a moment. "I do not see my way absolutely clear," he announced, "to recommending a railway strike at the present moment. If I acceded to all the others, what would your position be? The railway strike is of little consequence to a foreign nation. The coal strike, and the iron and steel works of Sheffield and Leeds closed--that's where English trade would suffer most, especially if the cotton people came out." Mr. Beldeman shook his head slowly. "My conditions," he said, "embrace the railways." "Somehow, I fancied that they would," Maraton remarked. "Tell me why?" Beldeman rose slowly to his feet. "Are you an Englishman?" he asked. "I can't deny it," Maraton replied. "I was born abroad. Why are you so interested in my nationality?" Beldeman shrugged his shoulders. "I cannot tell you. Just an idea. I do not wish to say too much. I wish you only to consider what a million pounds will do to help your work people. You, they say, are one of those who love the people as your own children. A million pounds may enable them to hold out until they can secure practically what terms they like. Those million pounds are yours to-day, yours for the people, if you pledge your word to a universal strike." "Including the railways?" "Including the railways," Mr. Beldeman assented. Maraton smiled quietly. "I do not ask you," he said, "what country you represent. I think that it is not necessary. You have come to me rather as though I were a dictator. There are others besides myself with whom influence rests." "It is you only who count," Mr. Beldeman declared. "I am thankful that at any rate you have met my offer in a reasonable spirit. Accept it, Mr. Maraton. What concern have you for other things save only for the welfare of the people?"