times
before he was able to say:

"You and your wife don't care to make it up with the Ellerslys? I fancied
so, and told Sam you'd simply think me meddlesome. The other matter is the
Travelers Club. I've smoothed things out there. I'm going to put you up and
rush you through."

"No, thanks," said I. It seemed incredible to me that I had ever cared
about that club and the things it represented, as I could remember I
undoubtedly did care. It was like looking at an outgrown toy and trying
to feel again the emotions it once excited.

"I assure you, Matt, there won't be the slightest difficulty." His manner
was that of a man playing the trump card in a desperate game--he feels it
can not lose, yet the stake is so big that he can not but be a little
nervous.

"I do not care to join the Travelers Club," said I, rising. "I must ask you
to excuse me. I am exceedingly busy."

A flush appeared in his cheeks and deepened and spread until his whole body
must have been afire. He seated himself. "You know what I've come for," he
said sullenly, and humbly, too.

All his life he had been enthroned upon his wealth. Without realizing it,
he had claimed and had received deference solely because he was rich. He
had thought himself, in his own person, most superior; now, he found that
like a silly child he had been standing on a chair and crying: "See how
tall I am." And the airs, the cynicism, the graceful condescension, which
had been so becoming to him, were now as out of place as crown and robes on
a king taking a swimming lesson.

"What are your terms, Blacklock? Don't be too hard on an old friend," said
he, trying to carry off his frank plea for mercy with a smile.

I should have thought he would cut his throat and jump off the Battery wall
before he would get on his knees to any man for any reason. And he was
doing it for mere money--to try to save, not his fortune, but only an
imperiled part of it. "If Anita could see him now!" I thought.

To him I said, the more coldly because I did not wish to add to his
humiliation by showing him that I pitied him: "I can only repeat, Mr.
Langdon, you will have to excuse me. I have given you all the time I can
spare."

His eyes were shifting and his hands trembling as he said: "I will transfer
control of the Coal combine to you."

His tones, shameful as the offer they carried, made me ashamed for him.
For money--just for money! And I had thought him a man. If he had been a
self-dece