a great career, yours. You've made your big business out of nothing."

"I had something to start with. Your grandfather had a business worth
not much, but it was a business, and the fundamental thing is to have
machinery to work with when you start life. I had that. My father was
narrow, contracted and a blunderer, but he made good in a small way."

"And you in a big way," said Carnac, with admiration and criticism in his
eyes.

He realized that John Grier had summed him up fairly when he said he was
playing with life's vital things. Somehow, he saw the other had a grip
upon essentials lacking in himself; he had his tooth in the orange, as it
were, and was sucking the juice of good profit from his labours. Yet he
knew how much trickery and vital evasion and harsh aggression there were
in his father's business life.

As yet he had never seen Tarboe--he had been away in the country the
whole year nearly--but he imagined a man of strength, abilities,
penetration and deep power. He knew that only a man with savage
instincts could work successfully with John Grier; he knew that Grier
was without mercy in his business, and that his best year's work had been
marked by a mandatory power which only a malevolent policy could produce.
Yet, somehow, he had a feeling that Tarboe had a steadying influence on
John Grier. The old man was not so uncontrolled as in bygone days.

"I'd like to see Tarboe," Carnac said suddenly. "He ain't the same as
you," snapped John Grier. "He's bigger, broader, and buskier." A
malicious smile crossed over his face. "He's a bandit--that's what he
is. He's got a chest like a horse and lungs like the ocean. When he's