diabolical. It would have entailed the loss of the savings of thousands
of small depositors.

"With this knowledge in my possession, I did not know just what my duty
was. To shut my eyes to the affair and let it culminate in disaster to
innocent thousands, would have been a simple matter. For several days I
was in a quandary, but my conscience at length conquered. I mustered up
courage enough to speak to my employer. I chose for my time the hour
after his return from church on Sunday. He had passed the plate with the
unction of a saint. Men and women had looked at him and inwardly said:
'What a fine man Mr. Steel is; if there were only more like him.'

"At the first intimation I gave him that I looked upon his plans as
illegal and immoral, if not absolutely criminal, he attempted to prove
to me in a plausible argument that bankers have a right to look out for
themselves, no matter who it hits.

"'This plan of mine,' he said, 'is just a stroke of financiering; it is
what any man would do if put in my place.'

"This did not satisfy me, and the expression of scorn that came over my
face did not escape him.

"From attempting to prove the righteousness of the case, he then took to
berating me for interfering with his business. Had I not enough to do to
attend to my affairs in his office, without prying into his outside
dealing? Was it a matter that he must lay before his manager? These were
the questions he put to me in sharp tones.

"I saw that it would be useless to argue with him so I arose and said:

"'As you will not listen to reason, as you are a hypocrite and a
villain, I shall be compelled to quit your employ. But I wish to inform
you that I shall expose this diabolical plan. It shall not be carried
out if I can prevent it, and you know that I am in possession of the
facts.'

"At this statement his anger knew no bounds. He railed at me as a
trickster. He charged me with wishing to blackmail him. Then seeing that
this was not the way to gain his point, he adroitly shifted his lines.

"Would I not take a share in the profits that were to be made? Did I not
see that banking was a business in which every advantage was to be
seized and worked for all that was in it? At length he offered to let me
in his firm as a partner. This last offer was one that a man would have
been more than human to set aside without weighing.

"He saw me hesitate. It was not the hesitation that comes as a
forerunner of surrender; it wa