e!" Alice cried in sheer
desperation. "Between you, I can't get a moment's peace."

"He would make a lovely Knight." Patricia's face assumed an enraptured
expression. "Oh, I wish I was a damosel, with a vessel of gold between
my hands, and Allen was Sir Launcelot, and I would say, 'Wit ye well,'
and he would kneel and say his prayers to me, and--Alice, what does 'Wit
ye well' mean, anyhow?"

But Alice had fled, leaving Patricia the victrix of her bloodless
battle-field.

XVIII

James Riley's information, while causing Gorham some concern, was not
the matter which gave him the greatest anxiety during the days he passed
away from his office. The fact that Buckner was in town was not
altogether surprising, and his maudlin comments need not necessarily be
seriously considered. In addition to the commission he intrusted to
young Riley, Gorham also set in motion the wheels of his own
secret-service department, feeling confident that he would soon learn
all the facts. The conduct of the current business of the Companies,
complex as it had now become, appeared to be advancing steadily along
the lines which he himself had laid down for it, and he saw no reason to
think that his temporary absence was causing the slightest
disarrangement of the delicately adjusted machine upon which depended
the continued momentum of the business. This interested him
particularly, as he considered that the crowning point of his successful
formation of the Consolidated Companies would not be attained until his
actual contact with the business was not required.

But great enterprises do not expand themselves without the jealous
watchfulness of other competing or interested organizations, and
Gorham's daily reports contained an increasing number of references to
the efforts being made by these to harass the Consolidated Companies
with governmental interference. Senator Kenmore had by this time become
the chief spokesman of the Companies in Washington. Since his first
exhaustive examination into its affairs, his doubts as to the
possibility of conducting so mammoth a consolidation along conscientious
lines had been dissipated by the absolute straightness of the course
which Gorham steered. His influence had been exerted frequently in
behalf of the Companies, and each time the success which thus came to
the corporation carried in its wake advantages to the people, just as
Gorham had promised. The Senator had become one of Gorham's stanche