"A very quiet election; no opposition to our ticket. Directors' meeting pro forma. Vice-President Selden cast majority vote for new officers. Reports endorsed. Selden, president; yourself, vice-president; Hugh Worthington, managing director. New officers published to-morrow. Too late for afternoon press. Will go and report to Mr. Wade." The first official act of Vice-President Arthur Ferris had been to order Accountant Somers to send a cheque for one month's extra salary to each of the office force, and then to add, "I shall be in Philadelphia for some days, remember; Lafayette House. Use telegraph business cipher only. I will be too busy to come to the telephone. Shall be at Cramp's yards taking a look with a view to further investments there." No flush of triumph colored Arthur Ferris' pale face as he pondered over his dispatch to Hugh Worthington. He suddenly paused, with his pencil in the air. "By God! I have it! We will soft-soap this fellow. Violence in quarrel is always a clumsy mistake. I need to keep in touch with Clayton; at least, until old Hugh gets his claws upon him. What if the fool resigns and throws all up in a huff? There is no way to lure him out West then. It would not do to have anything happen to him here. And I'll ring in the Auld Lang Syne a bit, also." He smiled artfully as he read over his two telegrams before handing them to the waiting operator. The anaemic girl was sadly disappointed in their tenor. She had scented an intrigue in the presence of the dapper young lawyer with his distinctly clubman air. "Pshaw! only business," she murmured, as she dashed her hand into the cash till for the change of a five-dollar bill. But Arthur Ferris' resolute eyes recalled her to duty, as he impatiently said, "Repeat them both back to me, at Lafayette House, Philadelphia. Take out the extra charge, and please give me a press copy of each." "I'll run over to Philadelphia, drop in at the clubs, have a good time, and then disappear via Pittsburgh 'for New York,'" he said. "It will give time for Randall Clayton to cool off. And, after all, the smooth way is the best way. I can hold him over till Hugh works him 'on the easy pulley.'" He was proud of these two telegrams, as he sat at his carefully-chosen early dinner. He read them over with a secret glee. "He is ours. No one can snatch him from our clutches. The old man can cajole him with Alice's wish that he should join the family party. That'll fetch him. Fool! that he did not make the running while she was at his side. The 'Sister' business is always a rank failure. But he has made me a millionaire for life." Arthur Ferris had no pity for the man whose life secrets he had sapped in those four long years of treason to friendship. He recalled with a secret complacence the steps which had led him, bit by bit, into Hugh Worthington's confidence, through the frank disclosures of Clayton.