e eternal. I am
content to live and fight for the right, win or lose, and play my
little part in this mighty drama!"

"I had hoped you were tired of fighting a losing battle."

"Tired of fighting a losing battle? You've forgotten, perhaps, that I'm
a veteran of the civil war. You know we were defeated year after year,
battle after battle, until it looked as if Lee was invincible. And then
a silent dark man with a big black cigar in his thoughtful mouth came
slowly out of the West and we commenced to move forward under his
leadership inch by inch. It was slow, and the dead lay ever in piles
around us--but still we moved--always forward, never backward. And when
at last the men saw it, they began to laugh at Death. Their eyes had
seen the first flash of the coming glory of the Lord!"

The doctor paused a moment and looked at Stuart with a curious
expression of pity shining through his gray eyes.

"What a wonderful old world this is, if we only lift up our heads and
see it. Across its fields and valleys armies have marched and
counter-marched for four thousand years, a world of tears and blood, of
tyranny and oppression, of envy and hate, of passion and sin--and yet
it has always been growing better, brighter and more beautiful. Wooden
shoes have always been ringing on stairs of gold as men from the depths
have climbed higher and higher. I'll fight this battle to a finish and
I'll win. If God lives I'll win--I'm so sure of it, my boy."

The doctor paused and his eyes flashed.

"I'm so sure of it, that I'm not only going to refuse this bribe from
Bivens, but my answer will be a harder blow. I'm going to begin another
bigger and more important suit for the dissolution of the American
Chemical Trust."

"You can't mean this!"

"I do!" was the firm response.

Stuart slipped his arm around the older man with a movement of
instinctive tenderness.

"Look here, Doctor, I've lived in your home for fourteen years and I've
grown to love you as my own father."

"I know, my boy."

"You must listen to me now!" the younger man insisted with deep
emotion. "I can give no time to your suit. I am just entering on a
great struggle for the people. Tremendous issues are at stake."

"And your own career hangs on the outcome, too?" the doctor
interrupted.

"Yes."

"You'll go down a wreck if you fail."

"Perhaps."

"And you're going to risk all without a moment's hesitation?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

"It's my duty."

"Good bo