ll as I can tell
you," he replied evasively.

"I take it that you want me to unload our stock on to the pool and the
other members of the syndicate?" I asked with a brutal frankness that I
realized, after I heard the words, was almost indecent.

"What is the use of putting it that way, Lawson?" he replied angrily.
"You know I mean nothing of the sort. You know I want you to keep every
one you can from selling, and simply supply the legitimate demand that
can be worked up among the subscribers all over the country. If worked
as you can work it, this ought to clean up our stock without any one's
being hurt."

I understood perfectly. If Mr. Rogers and I had been on terms of
flippancy instead of dignity, at this stage we should have given each
other the wink. Just what he wanted done I knew. He knew I knew what he
wanted, and I knew he knew I knew, and yet we were pretending not only
that we knew nothing but that there was really nothing to know.

Fortunately, at this stage of the duel Mr. Rogers' secretary arrived
with my checks and stock, and while we were verifying these, I had time
to study my mental chess-board for the next move. The papers were all
passed at last and then I entered into some explanation of my own
intentions. I told Mr. Rogers that for the time being I would hold all
my stock, but that I intended to borrow a stack of money on it from
Stillman through my brokers, for I fully intended to support the
market, as my belief in the stock was absolute.

I could have sworn Mr. Rogers inwardly chuckled at my fatuity, but I
went right on:

"If Mr. Rockefeller has decided that your share and his of the allotment
must, in whole or in part, be turned into money before the second
section is tackled, there's nothing for it but to go ahead, and I will
put in great work for you (I didn't add, "my work, if I can make it,
will keep you in as long as the public have a share"), because," said I,
"my one ambition now is to complete the second section and get things in
such shape that those people I have had locked-in so long can get out,
if they care to."

It was an intricate problem that was thus settled, for Mr. Rogers well
knew that it would be useless to attempt to sell big quantities of
Amalgamated without my detecting it, and he dared not ask me to have a
hand in his plot without including my own stock. When he saw I intended
to stand by my baby, and yet was so anxious to get to the second section
that I would