“Consolidated is the watchword of the age; it means elimination of ruinous competition, and consequent harmony and reduced expense in management. Mr. Ridgway, may I count you with us? Together we should go far. Do you say peace or war?” The younger man rose, leaning forward with his strong, sinewy hands gripping the table. His face was pale with the repression of a rage that had been growing intense. “I say war, and without quarter. I don’t believe you can beat me. I defy you to the test. And if you should—even then I had rather go down fighting you than win at your side.” Simon Harley had counted acceptance a foregone conclusion, but he never winked a lash at the ringing challenge of his opponent. He met his defiance with an eye cold and steady as jade. “As you please, Mr. Ridgway. I wash my hands of your ruin, and when you are nothing but a broken gambler, you will remember that I offered you the greatest chance that ever came to a man of your age. You are one of those men, I see, that would rather be first in hell than second in heaven. So be it.” He rose and buttoned his overcoat. “Say, rather, that I choose to go to hell my own master and not as the slave of Simon Harley,” retorted the Westerner bitterly. Ridgway’s eyes blazed, but those of the New Yorker were cool and fishy. “There is no occasion for dramatics,” he said, the cruel, passionless smile at his thin lips. “I make you a business proposition and you decline it. That is all. I wish you good day.” The other strode past him and flung the door open. He had never before known such a passion of hatred as raged within him. Throughout his life Simon Harley had left in his wake wreckage and despair. He was the best-hated man of his time, execrated by the working classes, despised by the country at large, and distrusted by his fellow exploiters. Yet, as a business opponent, Ridgway had always taken him impersonally, had counted him for a condition rather than an individual. But with the new influence that had come into his life, reason could not reckon, and when it was dominant with him, Harley stood embodied as the wolf ready to devour his ewe lamb. For he couldn’t get away from her. Wherever he went he carried with him the picture of her sweet, shy smile, her sudden winsome moments, the deep light in her violet eyes; and in the background the sinister bared fangs of the wild beast dogging her patiently, and yet lovingly. CHAPTER XI. VIRGINIA INTERVENES James K. Mott, local chief attorney for the Consolidated, was struggling with a white tie before the glass and crumpling it atrociously. “This dress-suit habit is the most pernicious I know. It’s sapping the liberties of the American people,” he grunted at last in humorous despair. “Let me, dear.” His wife tied it with neatness and dispatch, and returned to the inspection of how her skirt hung.