"Don’t! ... There are things a woman doesn’t forgive, and I want to be good friends!" Beecher nodded. Gunther came out, and she gave them her fingers, remaining tall and stately, her head inclined a little pensively, until they had left. "Most remarkable woman here!" said Gunther briefly. "In a year or so more she’ll be the undisputed leader." "What about John G.?" "The coming man. You know we’re in close relations with him. The Governor has a great admiration for him, and you know it isn’t often the Governor is taken that way!" "What’s he doing?" "Railroad unification, territorial development ... only man in this country who can appreciate what the Canadian Pacific is doing!" "I thought he was considered rather a freebooter?" "So he was. Big men change when they get what they want. He had an interview with the old man, and laid his cards on the table. Governor said it was the frankest confidence he’d ever heard. When he went into the railroad field, it was at the mercy of a lot of clever little stock-jobbers, who were playing it like a game of roulette. Slade’s driven ’em out, broken their backs, bankrupted them ... Oh! he strikes hard! ... Now there’s a real railroad policy, with a national object." "You seem quite enthusiastic over him yourself," said Beecher, glancing at the plates on the boxes. "I am. He’s a constructive ... that’s what we want!" "When did all this happen?" "A couple of months after that affair of the Atlantic Trust." Beecher stopped, and with a gesture showed his companion a plate on which was inscribed: ENOS BLOODGOOD. "I never can forget Majendie that night," he said, sobered by the recollection of the events in which he had been such an agitated spectator. "By Jove, he was true blue!" "If he’d had the nerve to face the music he’d be a rich man to-day," said Gunther, meditatively. "The Atlantic Trust is stronger than ever. Of course, technically, Majendie did things he had no right to do, but do you know, every investment he made has turned out enormously profitable! Queer how one man drops out and another pops up." "I wonder how much of it was business, and how much was..." Beecher broke off and a second time gestured in the direction of the box. "Who knows?" said Gunther, with a shrug of his shoulders. Beecher glanced down the corridor to assure himself there was yet time, and opened the door.