know nothing. I do not see what can be done until we
do know. Perhaps some of you can tell us what they are."

But no one could, and after due calculation advice was borrowed of
caution. The loans of Frank Algernon Cowperwood were not called.

Chapter L

A New York Mansion

The failure of American Match the next morning was one of those events
that stirred the city and the nation and lingered in the minds of men
for years. At the last moment it was decided that in lieu of calling
Cowperwood's loans Hull & Stackpole had best be sacrificed, the
stock-exchange closed, and all trading ended. This protected stocks
from at least a quotable decline and left the banks free for several
days (ten all told) in which to repair their disrupted finances and
buttress themselves against the eventual facts. Naturally, the minor
speculators throughout the city--those who had expected to make a
fortune out of this crash--raged and complained, but, being faced by an
adamantine exchange directorate, a subservient press, and the alliance
between the big bankers and the heavy quadrumvirate, there was nothing
to be done. The respective bank presidents talked solemnly of "a mere
temporary flurry," Hand, Schryhart, Merrill, and Arneel went still
further into their pockets to protect their interests, and Cowperwood,
triumphant, was roundly denounced by the smaller fry as a "bucaneer," a
"pirate," a "wolf"--indeed, any opprobrious term that came into their
minds. The larger men faced squarely the fact that here was an enemy
worthy of their steel. Would he master them? Was he already the
dominant money power in Chicago? Could he thus flaunt their
helplessness and his superiority in their eyes and before their
underlings and go unwhipped?

"I must give in!" Hosmer Hand had declared to Arneel and Schryhart, at
the close of the Arneel house conference and as they stood in
consultation after the others had departed. "We seem to be beaten
to-night, but I, for one, am not through yet. He has won to-night, but
he won't win always. This is a fight to a finish between me and him.
The rest of you can stay in or drop out, just as you wish."

"Hear, hear!" exclaimed Schryhart, laying a fervently sympathetic hand
on his shoulder. "Every dollar that I have is at your service, Hosmer.
This fellow can't win eventually. I'm with you to the end."

Arneel, walking with Merrill and the others to the door, was silent and
dour. He had been c