ughter.

"She was here yesterday morning," Anita explained. And I now wondered
how much Alva there was in Anita's firm stand against her parents.

"I'm glad you like her," said I. "Why don't you take her down to our
place on Long Island? Everything's ready for you there, and I'm going
to be busy the next few days--busy day and night."

She reflected. "Very well," she assented, presently. And she gave me a
puzzled glance she thought I did not see--as if she were wondering
whether the enemy was not hiding a new and deeper plot under an
apparently harmless suggestion.

"Then I'll not see you again for several days," said I, most
business-like. "If you want anything, there will be Monson out at the
stables, where he can't annoy you. Or you can get me on the 'long
distance.' Good-by. Good luck."

And I nodded carelessly and friendlily to her, and went away, enjoying
the pleasure of having startled her into visible astonishment.
"There's a better game than icy hostility, you very young lady," said
I to myself, "and that game is friendly indifference."

Alva would be with her. So she was secure for the present, and my mind
was free for "finance."

* * * * *

At that time the two most powerful men in finance were Galloway and
Roebuck. In Spain I once saw a fight between a bull and a tiger--or,
rather, the beginning of a fight. They were released into a huge iron
cage. After circling it several times in the same direction, searching
for a way out, they came face to face. The bull tossed the tiger; the
tiger clawed the bull. The bull roared; the tiger screamed. Each
retreated to his own side of the cage. The bull pawed and snorted as
if he could hardly wait to get at the tiger; the tiger crouched and
quivered and glared murderously, as if he were going instantly to
spring upon the bull. But the bull did not rush, neither did the tiger
spring. That was the Roebuck-Galloway situation.

How to bait tiger Galloway to attack bull Roebuck--that was the
problem I must solve, and solve straightway. If I could bring about
war between the giants, spreading confusion over the whole field of
finance and filling all men with dread and fear, there was a chance, a
bare chance, that in the confusion I might bear off part of my
fortune. Certainly, conditions would result in which I could more
easily get myself intrenched again; then, too, there would be a by no
means small satisfaction in seeing Roebuck c