n now, girlie, and go to bed. I want to talk
to Jim."

She paused a moment, smiling into Stuart's face and softly said:

"Good-night, Jim--pleasant dreams!"

Through all the riot of emotions with which that night ended and
through the years of bitter struggle which followed, that picture was
the one ray of sunlight which never faded.

"Well, my boy, I've just done a thing which I know was inevitable, but
now that it's done I'm afraid I may have made a tragic mistake. Tell me
if it's so. There may be time to retract."

"Bivens has threatened to ruin your business?"

"On the other hand, he has just offered to buy it at my own price."

"And you refused?"

"To sell at any price--but it's not too late to change my mind. I can
call him back now and apologize for my rudeness. Tell me, should I do
it?"

"Do you doubt that you're right in the position you've taken?"

"Not for a moment. But the old question of expediency always bobs up.
I'm getting older. I'm not as old as this white hair would make me, but
I feel it. Perhaps I am out-of-date. Your eyes are young, boy; your
soul fresh from God's heart. I'm just a little lonely and afraid
to-night. See things for me--sit down a moment."

The doctor drew Stuart into a seat and rushed on impatiently.

"Listen, and then tell me if I should follow that little weasel and
apologize. I'll do it if you say so--at least I think I would, for I'm
afraid of myself." He paused, and a look of pain clouded his fine face
as his eye rested on a portrait of Harriet on the table before him.

"There are several reasons why you couldn't have a more sympathetic
listener to-night, Doctor--go on."

"Grant all their claims," he began impatiently, "for the Trust--its
economy, its efficiency, its power, its success--this is a free
country, isn't it?"

"Theoretically."

"Well, I wish to do business in my own way--not so big and successful a
way perhaps as theirs, but my own. I express myself thus. When I hint
at such a thing to your modern organizing friend, that these enormous
profits for the few must be paid out of the poverty of the
many--against whom the strong and cunning are thus combining--a simple
answer is always ready, 'Business is business,' which translated is the
old cry that the first murderer shrieked into the face of his
questioner: 'Am I my brother's keeper?'

"That's why I'm afraid of these fellows. The unrestrained lust for
money is always the essence of murder, and t