"Where did this story come from?" With menacing finger Boyd indicated a front column, headed: NEW ENEMY OF THE SALMON TRUST! FIRST GUN FIRED IN BATTLE FOR FISHERIES! N. A. P. A. PROMISED BITTER FIGHT FOR SUPREMACY OF ALASKAN WATERS! "I don't know." "You don't know?" "No; I never read anything but the 'Past Performances' and the funny page. What does it say?" "It is the whole story of our enterprise, but ridiculously garbled and exaggerated. It says I have headed a new canning company to buck the trust. It tells about George's feud with Marsh, and says we have both been secretly preparing to down him. Good Lord! It's liable to queer us with the bank and upset the whole deal." "I didn't give it out." "It is all done in your particularly picturesque style," declared Emerson, angrily. "Alton swears he knows nothing about it, so you must have done it. It is too nearly correct to have come from a stranger." "Well?" inquired Fraser, quietly. "The harm is done, but I want to know who is to blame." When the other made no answer except to stare at him curiously, he flamed up, "Why don't you confess?" For the first time during their acquaintance, "Fingerless" Fraser seemed at a loss for words; but whether for shame or some other motive, his companion was unable to tell. His nature was so warped that his emotions expressed themselves in ways not always easy to follow, and now he merely remarked, with apparent sullenness: "I'm certainly a hot favorite with you." He clambered stiffly back into bed and turned his defiant face to the wall, nor would he meet his accuser's eyes or open his lips, even when Boyd flung out of the room, convinced that he was the culprit. All that day Emerson waited fearfully for some word from Hilliard, but night came without it; and when several days in succession had passed without a sign from the banker, he breathed more easily. He had already begun to assure himself that, after all, the exposure would have no effect, when one evening the call he dreaded came. A telephone message summoned him to the bank at eleven o'clock the following morning. "That means trouble," he grimly told George. "Maybe not," the big fisherman replied. "If Hilliard took any stock in the story, it seems like he'd have jumped you the next day." "Our machinery is ordered. You realize what it will mean if he backs water now?" "Sure! We'll have to go to some other bank." "Humph! I'll wring Fraser's neck," muttered Emerson. "We have troubles enough without any new ones." It was with no little anxiety that he asked for the banker at the appointed hour, and was shown into an anteroom, with the announcement: "Mr. Hilliard is busy; he wishes you to wait."