rths of the remainder," repeated
Cowperwood, grimly. "I do not want to control. If they want to raise
the money and buy me out on that basis I am willing to sell. I want a
decent return for investments I have made, and I am going to have it.
I cannot speak for the others behind me, but as long as they deal
through me that is what they will expect."

Mr. Schryhart went angrily away. He was exceedingly wroth. This
proposition as Cowperwood now outlined it was bucaneering at its best.
He proposed for himself to withdraw from the old companies if
necessary, to close out his holdings and let the old companies deal
with Cowperwood as best they could. So long as he had anything to do
with it, Cowperwood should never gain control of the gas situation.
Better to take him at his suggestion, raise the money and buy him out,
even at an exorbitant figure. Then the old gas companies could go
along and do business in their old-fashioned way without being
disturbed. This bucaneer! This upstart! What a shrewd, quick, forceful
move he had made! It irritated Mr. Schryhart greatly.

The end of all this was a compromise in which Cowperwood accepted
one-half of the surplus stock of the new general issue, and two for one
of every share of stock for which his new companies had been organized,
at the same time selling out to the old companies--clearing out
completely. It was a most profitable deal, and he was enabled to
provide handsomely not only for Mr. McKenty and Addison, but for all
the others connected with him. It was a splendid coup, as McKenty and
Addison assured him. Having now done so much, he began to turn his
eyes elsewhere for other fields to conquer.

But this victory in one direction brought with it corresponding
reverses in another: the social future of Cowperwood and Aileen was now
in great jeopardy. Schryhart, who was a force socially, having met
with defeat at the hands of Cowperwood, was now bitterly opposed to
him. Norrie Simms naturally sided with his old associates. But the
worst blow came through Mrs. Anson Merrill. Shortly after the
housewarming, and when the gas argument and the conspiracy charges were
rising to their heights, she had been to New York and had there chanced
to encounter an old acquaintance of hers, Mrs. Martyn Walker, of
Philadelphia, one of the circle which Cowperwood once upon a time had
been vainly ambitious to enter. Mrs. Merrill, aware of the interest
the Cowperwoods had aroused