Robert Wade, with indignation against Ferris' brutal treatment, announced the policy of a united resistance, a joint appeal to Hugh Worthington, and the demand of an Investigation Committee of Directors. "We will wait for Mr. Worthington's vindication," said Wade, in an unanswerable tone. "Then you will wait until eternity," sadly said Walter Edson. "Here is the ten o'clock edition of the Evening Telegram. Mr. Hugh Worthington, the well-known capitalist, died at Pasco, Washington, this morning, from injuries received in a railroad accident." When the hubbub had subsided, the voice of Wade was heard. "Gentlemen, we must act in a passive defence until the Worthington Estate sends in a man to control the situation. I shall move that three of us retain lawyers to defend us all and advise us as to our joint course, for I apprehend Mr. Arthur Ferris will be a King Shark if he rules over us." While the endangered officials burned the midnight oil, the hollow-eyed Arthur Ferris was hidden at the Waldorf-Astoria with that sage statesman Senator Dunham. It was long after midnight when Dunham dismissed his nephew. He had half pooh-poohed away the fears of the young schemer. "Of course, the girl is rattled. You see, no one but you and I know of the marriage. It gives you an iron hold upon her. She will undoubtedly be advised to let our Western friends escort Mr. Worthington's body on to Detroit. There, of course, she will be met by the family lawyers. "After the necessary preliminaries there, one of them will escort her on here--and--I will be within reach. She evidently wishes to have the affair of the marriage made public, some time later. If you made Worthington do the right thing about the will, and all that, you will come out all right. "But do not cross her wishes. You cannot spring this marriage on the public without endangering all our interests. My lawyers here will look out for the big deal. You can bring the estate's lawyer to me, and, when you have reduced your wife to a passive mood, we three can clue up all the private affairs. I will be near you. I think you are borrowing trouble. As for young Witherspoon, let him be a little huffy. I can soon whip in those railroad chiefs of his. Have little to do with him, but be civil--that's all. "Don't antagonize him. He might prove an ugly customer." While the tide of intrigue ebbed and flowed around the great company's headquarters, far away beyond the Rockies, on past the dreary plains and the uplifted minarets of the Columbia, seated by the coffin of her dead father, Alice Ferris gazed down in silence upon the face of the stern old man. Among the silent watchers, gazing in the fair face of the orphaned girl, there was no one who knew her other than as Alice Worthington. The calm majesty of Death had swept away from the dead capitalist's face all the anxious look of money cares. The pale lips were silent now, behind his broad brow the busy brain was settled forever.