t to get my hat under them before you and your
friends have an opportunity to roll in your own hogsheads."

It was no time for diplomacy, and I set forth in plain, dog-eat-dog
terms to Mr. Untermyer exactly where he was "at," and that no one but
himself and his associates would be the sufferers by a public explosion.
Reluctantly he agreed with me that under no conditions must the
"Standard Oil" management be changed, but he was bound to have one
victim to show.

"You have the resignations of the present board--why not put in new men,
the strongest 'Standard Oil' men you know?" I suggested.

"I'll do it," he said, "but I'll throw out the present president, blame
him for all that's happened, but--whom shall I put in to replace him?
How about Rogers himself?"

Knowing Mr. Rogers' cross-purposes I was sure he would never become
officially responsible for the company; so I told Untermyer this was
impossible, but I continued: "The next best man and the closest I know
to Rogers is Broughton, his son-in-law. There's your president."

Whereupon Broughton was elected president of the Utah company. The stock
has since dropped from 52 to 22, gone from 22 to 37-1/2, dropped to
18-1/2, with frequent repetitions, and is now 43: and all the drops have
been preceded by tremendous short selling, followed by stories of the
absolute worthlessness of the property; and all the rises, by
tremendous buying and stories of the mine's fabulous richness. Some one
has made millions.

"Standard Oil" is ever ready to forgive and forget those it has injured,
but it has power and place for those who have made it tremble. Its
associates to-day are often yesterday's enemies. As one looks back upon the
Utah episode from over the divide, it helps accentuate its humor to
contrast the present attitudes of the parties engaged with those they then
held to one another. We now see the virtuously indignant Samuel Untermyer
shoulder to shoulder with his wicked betrayer, Henry H. Rogers, whose
counsel he is against the original ally of the same Henry H. Rogers, Thomas
W. Lawson, historian of "Frenzied Finance." And the talented expert, most
trusted of "Standard Oil" mining emissaries--Broughton, whose unfavorable
report on Utah Consolidated was the instrument of the plundering of the
Clark-Ward-Untermyer contingent--elected president by Samuel Untermyer, has
remained ever since at the head of the property he had pronounced
worthless.

CHAPTER XV

DE