The delay he’d asked for was absolutely necessary to Pentecost for the carrying through of the complicated campaign mapped out in his mind. Advance planting of a most unusual character and covering a great extent of territory was required. In addition there was the matter of Haworth himself—the chances—the safeguards—for he was a risk beyond computation. He had insisted on the payment being made to him in cash at the expiration of the fourteen days—if the firm decided to purchase the rights. It looked like a big bunch of money dropped in his lap and no anchor to it—an impossible situation. Of course the fellow would have to be taken care of. The way to do it was the problem. But Pentecost very well knew he’d have a solution—and an adroit one—before morning. He boarded the midnight train for New York fifteen minutes before leaving time, and at once went to work on his intricate scheme. PART VI When Stephen W. Harker of Harker & Pentecost returned from Pittsburgh, where he’d been “planting” for a nice little Gasoline Substitute Swindle (stock selling, of course—that was his department) and had sat in for an hour with Pentecost, getting the details of the extraordinary Haworth device and the elaborate scheme his partner had evolved for its exploitation, he vehemently refused to have anything to do with it. Not for by George and all hell was he going to put his head in a noose like that when he had a nice safe little business that was raking it in as fast as he wanted it. “You got me going once when you had the firm into that damned Folsam affair—you know the one—came out his wife had hit him with something in his tea. You’d got a grip some way so you could hold it back an’ play it. I dipped in with you an’ no complaint at the time. But now I’ll tell you _that_ was too close for me and this time you’re going to jump plumb into the middle of the shake-off! You must be dippy! They’ll get you sure! Anyways, you can count me good an’ out.” Pentecost sat toadlike, silent, regarding Harker with bulging, half-closed eyes. “Now hook to this,” Harker went on; “if the turn is against you and they’re fixing you for the clamps, I back your play to ooze out of anything. But I get loose teeth if I mix in with those little sports that look like raspberry tarts to you. Now this Haworth layout—it looks to me like a frolic with the undertaker; but if you like it for yourself, go to it!” “I’ve gone to it,” Pentecost murmured in a careless sort of way; “and I play it under the firm name.” “But my God—wait! That gets _me_ in!” “Why, so it does!” “What are you doing, dragging me into a play whether I want it or not?” “Can that!” Pentecost flashed sudden fire for an instant. “Do you think I planned this damned firm to keep you under glass?” There was a short pause and Pentecost’s blaze-out subsided. After a while Harker spoke in another tone, now petulant and pleading. “You going to jam me up against that layout an’ nothing to say?”