llion on this little fish deal!'"

Gregson sat up with a jerk.

"A million! Great Scott--"

"Yes, a million, Greggy," said Philip, softly, with his old fighting
smile. "There was a hundred thousand dollars to my credit in a First
National Bank. Pleasant surprise, eh?"

Gregson had dropped his cigarette. His slim hands gripped the edges of
the table. He made no reply as he waited for Whittemore to continue.

III

For a full minute Philip paced back and forth without speaking. Then he
stopped, and faced Gregson, who was staring at him.

"A million, Greggy," he repeated, in the same soft voice. "A hundred
thousand dollars to my credit--in a First National Bank! While I was up
here hustling to get affairs on a working basis, eager to show the
government and the people what we could do and would do, triumphing in
our victory over the trust, and figuring each day on my scheme of
making this big, rich north deal a staggering blow to those accursed
combinations down there, they were at work, too. While I was dreaming
and doing these things, Brokaw and the others had formed the Great
Northern Fish and Development Company, had incorporated it under the
laws of New Jersey, and had already sold over a million dollars' worth
of stock! The thing was in full swing when I reached headquarters. I
had authorized Brokaw to act for me, and I found that I was
vice-president of one of the biggest legalized robbery combinations of
recent years. More money had been spent in advertising than in
development work. Hundreds of thousands of copies of my letters from
the north, filled to the brim with the enthusiasm I had felt for my
work and projects, had been sent out broadcast, luring buyers of stock.
In one of these letters I had said that if a half of the lakes I had
mapped out were fished the north could be made to produce a million
tons of fish a year. Two hundred thousand copies of this letter were
sent out, but Brokaw and his associates had omitted the words, 'If a
half of the lakes mapped out were fished.' It would take fifteen
thousand men, a thousand refrigerator cars, and a capital of five
million to bring this about. I was stunned by the enormity of their
fraud, and yet when I threatened to bring the whole thing to smash
Brokaw only laughed and pointed out that not a single caution had been
omitted. In all of the advertising it was frankly stated that our
license was provisional, subject to withdrawal if the company did