on came to me in such a way
that I can't touch it."

"'The information--' It's something damaging to do with the machine?"

Justin drummed with his fingers on the desk without answering.

"You have proof?"

"What's the sense of talking, Leverich? Proof or no, I tell you, I can't
use it. This isn't any funny business; you can see that. Don't you
suppose, if I could use it, that I would? But there are some things a
man can't do. At any rate, _I_ can't. And that settles it."

Heaven knows he had gone over the matter insistently enough in the last
few days, since the combination had been unwillingly given into his
hands, but always with the foregone conclusion. The devil, as a rule,
doesn't actively try to tempt us to evil: he simply confuses us, so that
we are kept from using our reason. But this time he had no field for
action. To use secret information against Cater, that could never have
been had but for Cater's kindness to him in helping him to those bars in
time of need, was first, last, and every time impossible to Justin
Alexander. It was vain for argument to suggest that this very deed of
kindness had worked his disaster--the fact remained the same. He might
do other things; he might do worse things: this thing he could not
do--not though the refusal worked his own ruin, not though Cater's ruin
with Hardanger was insured anyway, but too late for the typometer to
profit by it. Even if the typometer could by some means keep afloat
until that day arrived, it would take a couple of years for such a
timing-machine to regain its prestige in a foreign country.

Justin had no excess of sentiment; no quixotic impulse urged him to go
and tell Cater what he had learned. It was Cater's business to look
after his end of the game. If the price of material or labor was too
cheap, he must know that there was something wrong with it. The stream
of Justin's mind ran clear in spite of that feeling of sharp practice
toward himself--nay, because of it; it was impossible to use the weapon
that a former kindness had placed in his hand. He looked at Leverich now
with an expression which the latter quieted himself to meet. This was a
situation, not for bluster and rage, but to be competently grappled
with.

"How about your obligations? Do you call this fair dealing to us,
Alexander? There's Lewiston's note; once this deal was settled, we would
have paid that, as you know. But it's out of the question as things
stand. We'll have to