--to be frank--I instantly thought of it
myself. I intended to do it when you came, but"--a sickly smile--"you
anticipated me."

"I understand," said I good-humoredly. "I don't blame him." And I didn't
then.

After I had completed my business at the National Industrial, I went back
to my office and gathered together the threads of my web of defense. Then
I wrote and sent out to all my newspapers and all my agents a broadside
against the management of the Textile Trust--it would be published in
the morning, in good time for the opening of the Stock Exchange. Before
the first quotation of Textile could be made, thousands on thousands of
investors and speculators throughout the country would have read my letter,
would be believing that Matthew Blacklock had detected the Textile Trust
in a stock-jobbing swindle, and had promptly turned against it, preferring
to keep faith with his customers and with the public. As I read over my
pronunciamiento aloud before sending it out, I found in it a note of
confidence that cheered me mightily. "I'm even stronger than I thought,"
said I. And I felt stronger still as I went on to picture the thousands on
thousands throughout the land rallying at my call to give battle.

XVIII. ANITA BEGINS TO BE HERSELF

I had asked Sam Ellersly to dine with me; so preoccupied was I that not
until ten minutes before the hour set did he come into my mind--he or any
of his family, even his sister. My first impulse was to send word that I
couldn't keep the engagement. "But I must dine somewhere," I reflected,
"and there's no reason why I shouldn't dine with him, since I've done
everything that can be done." In my office suite I had a bath and
dressing-room, with a complete wardrobe. Thus, by hurrying a little over
my toilet, and by making my chauffeur crowd the speed limit, I was at
Delmonico's only twenty minutes late.

Sam, who had been late also, as usual, was having a cocktail and was
ordering the dinner. I smoked a cigarette and watched him. At business or
at anything serious his mind was all but useless; but at ordering dinner
and things of that sort, he shone. Those small accomplishments of his had
often moved me to a sort of pitying contempt, as if one saw a man of talent
devoting himself to engraving the Lord's Prayer on gold dollars. That
evening, however, as I saw how comfortable and contented he looked, with
not a care in the world, since he was to have a good dinner and a good
cig