"Why didn't you take the S. R.& N. when I cabled you last month?"

"I couldn't. But what has that to do with the matter?"

"Don't you see? It's so plain to me that I can't understand how you failed to realize the value--the necessity of buying my road."

"Explain, please."

"Gladly. The North Pa.s.s & Yukon is paying a fabulous blackmail to the river-lines to escape a ruinous rate war."

"Right! It's blackmail, as you say."

"Under the present agreement you handle the Dawson freight and keep out of the lower river; they take the whole Tanana valley and lower Yukon."

"Correct."

"Didn't it occur to you that the S.R.& N., which starts four hundred miles west of the North Pa.s.s and taps the Tanana valley, can be used to put the river steamers of that section out of business?"

"Let's have a look at the map." Mr. Illis hurried into an adjoining room and returned with a huge chart which he unrolled upon the table.

"To tell you the truth, I never looked at the proposition from that angle. Our people were afraid of those glaciers and the compet.i.tion of the Copper Trust. They're disgusted, too, with our treatment."

"The Trust is eliminated. Kyak harbor is wiped off the map, and I'm alone in the field."

"How about this fellow Gordon?"

"He'll be broke in a year. Incidentally, that's my trouble."

"But I'm told you can't pa.s.s the glaciers."

"I can. Parker says he'll have the bridge done by spring."

"Then I'd bank on it. I'd believe Parker if I knew he was lying. If you both agree, I haven't the slightest doubt."

"This is a bigger proposition than the North Pa.s.s, Mr. Illis. You made money out of that road, but this one will make more." He swiftly outlined the condition of affairs, even to the att.i.tude a.s.sumed by the Heidlemanns; and Illis, knowing the speaker as he did, had no doubt that he was hearing the exact truth. "But that's not all," continued O'Neil. "The S. R. & N. is the club which will hammer your enemies into line. That's what I came to see you about. With a voice in it you can control the traffic of all central Alaska and force the San Francisco crowd to treat the N. P. & Y. fairly, thereby saving half a million a year."

"It's a big undertaking. I'm not sure our crowd could swing it."

"They don't have to. There's a quick profit of two million to be had by selling to the Trust next spring. You can dictate your own terms to those blackmailers to-morrow, and then make a turn-over in nine months.

It doesn't matter who owns the S. R. & N. after it's completed. The steamboat men will see their profits cut. As it is now, they can make enough out of their own territory to haul freight into yours for nothing."

"I dare say you'll go to them if we don't take you up, eh?"

"My road has its strategic value. I must have help. If you don't come to my rescue it will mean war with your line, I dare say."

Mr. Illis sat back, staring at the ceiling for a long time. From the street below came the whir and clatter of taxicabs as the midnight crowd came and went. The city's nocturnal life was at its height; men had put aside the worries of the day and were devoting themselves to the more serious and exhausting pastimes of relaxation. Still the white-haired Briton weighed in his mind the matter of millions, while the fortunes of Murray O'Neil hung in the balance.

"My people won't buy the S. R. & N.," Illis finally announced. "But I'll put it up to them."

"I can't delay action if there's a chance of a refusal. I'll have to see Blum and Cap.r.o.n," said O'Neil.

"I'll cable full details within the hour. We'll have an answer by to-morrow night."

"And if they refuse?" O'Neil lit a cigar with steady fingers.

"Oh, if they refuse I'll join you. We'll go over the matter carefully in the mean time. Two million you said, didn't you?"

"Yes. There's two million profit for you in nine months." His voice was husky and a bit uneven, for he had been under a great strain.

"Good! You don't know how resentful I feel toward Blum and his crowd.

I--I'm downright angry: I am that."

Illis took the hand which his caller extended, with an expressionless face.

"I'm glad I found you," confessed O'Neil. "I was on my last legs.

Herman Heidlemann will pay our price when the last bridge-bolt is driven home, and he'll pay with a smile on his face--that's the sort of man he is."

"He won't pay if he knows I'm interested. We're not exactly friendly since I sold out my smelter interests. But he needn't know--n.o.body need know."

Illis called his valet and instructed him to rouse his secretary and ring for some cable blanks.

"I think I'll cable, too," Murray told him. "I have some 'boys' up there who are working in the dark with their teeth shut. They're waiting for the crash, and they'd like to hear the good news."

His fingers shook as he scrawled the name of Doctor Gray, but his eyes were bright and youth was singing in his heart once more.

"Now let's get down to business," said Mr. Illis. "We'll have to talk fast."

It was growing light in the east when O'Neil returned to the Holland House; but he felt no fatigue, and he laughed from the pure joy of living, for his dream seemed coming true.

XIX

MISS APPLETON MAKES A SACRIFICE

Tom Slater came puffing up the hill to the Appleton bungalow, plumped himself into a chair, and sighed deeply.

"What's the matter? Are you played out?" asked Eliza.

"No. I'm feeling like a colt."

"Any news from Omar Khayyam?"

"Not a word."

Eliza's brows drew together in a worried frown, for none of Murray's "boys" had awaited tidings from him with greater anxiety than she.

It had been a trying month for them all. Dr. Gray, upon whom the heaviest responsibility rested, had aged visibly under the strain; Parker and Mellen and McKay had likewise become worn and grave as the days pa.s.sed and they saw disaster approaching. Even Dan was blue; and Sheldon, the light-hearted, had begun to lose interest in his commissary duties.