Vanulm half recoiled, then made as if to rise, but again Gordon shook his head. "No, no," he said, "it isn't fever; I'm as sane as you are; I wanted money; I tried to blackmail him; drugged him, and made him believe he'd ruined a girl; bled him for a hundred thousand; and then, by the devil's own luck, the thing leaked out. Then it was my life against his, and he was fool enough not to see it. I got my chance out on the island, and I shot him, and threw his body into the quicksand over by the point. That same night I killed the woman who told him, and that's how I got my start. Then came the time about the Konahassett--the Ethel, they called it then--and I couldn't come to terms with Mason; he was honest--and stubborn--and that left only one way. I killed him, and to make things sure, I killed the only woman that ever really cared for me, and married Mason's daughter--" he smiled sneeringly--"the young woman you thought so charming, and who tired of me when she thought my money was gone. To make the thing safe, I had to get the murders saddled on a poor old drunk out there; that never troubled me much, though; he was only a pawn in the game. So I got the mine. And since then, as you probably know, I've been fooling the people right and left--the people that have trusted me; all my stock market letters were fakes; all my battle with the moneyed interests was a sham--I've been hand in glove with them, from the start. My politics have been rotten, right through; I've bought, bribed, corrupted, betrayed, and yet they've followed me like sheep; if I'd have lived, I'd have been president of this country; deals; combinations; God, how, I had things lined up; and now I'm through; I've had my turn at the game; I'm through; and we're counting up the score." As he spoke, a curious light had come into his eyes; slowly the color had crept back into his sunken cheeks; even his voice had taken on something of its old, commanding ring. Fascinated, Vanulm gazed at him without speaking, and the dying man, almost as if in a state of exaltation, went on: "I've played square with myself, Herman; square all the way through; and I'm not afraid, now. It's been a fair game. I've seen what I wanted, and I've taken it. Money? I've made my fortune. Twenty million dollars, Herman; no more, no less; and I could have doubled it, trebled it, in ten years more. And everything it could buy; I've gratified every wish of man; God, Herman, I've lived a dozen lives in one. Power? I've made history in the market; I've changed a state in politics; five years more, and I'd have changed the destiny of the country. Success? There isn't a man alive that's accomplished more. Every one's envied me, looked up to me, tried to copy me, even. And the preachers say a man is nothing; it's a lie, Herman; a man's a god; man is God; I've played the game through, and I know. Herman, get that doctor; I won't die; I can't die; I tell you I'll be president yet. Great God, Herman--"