"There was more truth than romance in the story that I deserted my
associates in that panic, Jim. I had to do it. I was given my choice. I
could do it or walk the plank. Not one of the men I deserted in that
pool would have hesitated a moment to do exactly what I did under the
same conditions; but, Jim, it hurt. Somewhere down deep there's
something that makes me hold fast to a man who stands with me. And the
one ambition of my life now is to crush the man who forced me to lick
his feet that day, and I'll do it yet!"

Again his voice sank to a whisper and Stuart watched his convulsed
features with increasing fascination.

"The world is waiting," he continued, "for its real master--not a
multi-millionaire, but the coming billionaire. The rulers of the old
world fawn on our financiers and envy their power. But the king of
kings is yet to come. If I had been ready in this panic with the
capital I have to-day I could have made a billion. With the power and
experience I now have and one such man as you on whom I can depend I'd
double my fortune every year. That means that in five years I will be a
billionaire, and only forty-two.

"Think for a minute what that means if you can! A billion dollars will
double itself in seven years. At forty-two I'd be worth a billion. At
forty-nine I'd have two billions. At fifty-eight I'd be worth four
billions--and just old enough to really begin to do things. That is on
the supposition that my money only increases by its banking power,
which is the smallest way to look at it. In seven years I'd start with
a billion preparing for the grand coup of the next panic. It always
comes within a decade. The man who enters a panic with one billion
dollars in cash if he had the nerve, the daring, and the brains can
emerge with fifty!

"Give me one billion answerable to my will alone and I can rule this
nation. Give me four billions and no king or emperor, president or
parliament on this globe will dare to make peace or war without
consulting me. The power which Caesar or Napoleon wielded will be
child's play to the power within my grasp. When such a man lives the
world will know for the first time in history the might of a real
master.

"How long could this republic stand if such a man should see fit to
change its form? Even now our petty millionaires buy courts and
legislatures, and the control of great cities. But the new king would
know no limitations to this power. He would make the laws, s