Before he could protest, she shut the door firmly and nodded to the chauffeur. The elevator boy was already at the swinging glass doors, holding them open for her entrance. "Mr. Slade here, Jo?" she said instantly. "Yes, ma’am; upstairs." "How long?" "About half an hour." She entered the elevator and descended at the landing, waiting until it had disappeared. "Now for it!" she said, pressing the bell. And by a last display of her will, she sent through her body a wave of cold resolution that left her outwardly impassive with a little touch of scorn on her lips. *CHAPTER XVIII* It is only in the supreme crisis of a colossal disaster that a nation, which fondly believes it elects its governing bodies, perceives its real masters, and then in the alarm and confusion of its apprehension, it does not recognize what it is shown. The group of ten men who were assembled at Gunther’s, awaiting the arrival of Slade, either in themselves or through the influences they represented, could bring to their support over ten billions of capital. If it were possible to conceive of a master spirit who could unite these ten men, forgetting mutual jealousy and distrust, into one unanimous body with but a single object, in five years these ten men, without the impediment of law, could own every necessary newspaper and magazine in the country, operate every railroad, and, by the simple process of reinvesting their earnings annually, control every important industry, every necessary chain of banks, the entire food supply of the nation, and, at the cost of twenty million dollars every four years and by remaining unknown, control the necessary number of candidates in both political parties in matters essential to their financial interests. That such a coalition will remain a fantasy, is due to two factors: the human nature of such individuals and the human nature of multitudes which, were they successful, would find the corrective in massacre. When such a monetary alliance does take place, it is usually from the necessity, as they see it, of saving the country by the simple process of enriching themselves. When Slade arrived, he entered by the separate entrance to Gunther’s personal apartments, which were situated in a lower wing of the monstrous turreted granite structure which might have served for a miniature Bastile. One of the secretaries was at the door carefully scrutinizing all arrivals. The moment he entered, he was aware that his fate was not the only one that was under discussion. The wing of the house was laid out in the form of a Maltese cross, with a square anteroom in the center, heavily spread with silk Persian rugs, and furnished with easy divans and upholstered chairs. Above was a skylight, now transformed into a vast reflector for the burst of electric lights.