When Matheson reached his office, he was told by a clerk that Mr Lars Larssen was already waiting to see him. He threw off his gloves and fur-lined coat and adjusted the lights before he answered that his visitor could be shown in. He added that the clerk could lock up his own rooms and leave, as he would not be wanted any longer that evening.

There was a quiet simplicity in Matheson's office that one would scarcely associate with the operations of high finance. One might have looked for costly furnishings and an atmosphere redolent of big money. Yet here was a simple rosewood desk with a bowl of mimosa on it, and around the walls were a few simple landscapes from recent salons.

If Lars Larssen were a magic name to Sir Francis Letchmere, it was a magic name also to many other men of affairs. From cabin-boy to millionaire shipowner was his story in brief. But that does not tell one quarter. The son of Scandinavian immigrants to the States, factory-workers, he had run away to sea at the age of fourteen, with the call of the ocean ringing in his ears from the Viking inheritance that was his. But on this was superposed the fierce desire for success that formed the psychical atmosphere of the new American environment. As a boy in the smoke-blackened factory town, he had breathed in the longing to make money—big money—to use men to his own ends, to be a master of masters.

With precocious insight he quickly learnt that money is made not by those who go out upon the waters, but by those who stay on land and send them hither and thither. He soon gave up the seafaring life and entered a shipbroker's office. He starved himself in order to save money to speculate in shipping reinsurance. An uncanny insight had guided him to rush in when shrewdly prudent business men held aloof.

He had emphatically "made good." Each fresh success had given him new confidence in himself and his judgment and his powers. He would allow nothing to stand in his path. Scruples were to him the burden of fools.

A fair-haired giant in build, with inscrutable eyes and mouth set grim and straight—such was Lars Larssen.

Though Matheson was in no way a small man, yet he seemed somehow dwarfed when Larssen entered the room. The financier was a self-made master, but the shipowner was a born master of men—perhaps one's instinctive contrast lay there. The one had the strength of finished steel, but the other was rugged granite.

Lars Larssen said quietly: "Your letter brought me over to Paris. I don't usually waste time in railway trains myself when I have men I can pay to do it for me. So you can judge that I consider your letter mighty important."

"I'm sorry if you have given yourself an unnecessary journey," returned Matheson. "I had intended my letter to make my attitude clear to you."

"Then you missed fire."

"My attitude is simply this: I want to call the deal off."

"Not enough in it for you?" cut in Larssen.

"Not enough in it for the public."

The shipowner surveyed the other man through half-closed lids, weighing up how far this declaration might be a genuine expression of opinion and how far a mere excuse to cover some hidden motive.

"Talk it longer," he said.

For reply Matheson drew out a large-scale map of Canada from a drawer and unfolded it with a decisive deliberation. He laid a finger on the south-western corner of Hudson Bay. "Here is Fanning trading station, the terminus of your five-hundred-mile railway. The land you run it over is mostly lakes, rivers, and frozen swamps for three-quarters of the year. The line is useless except for your own purpose—to carry wheat for the Hudson Bay steamship route to England. You agree?"

"Agreed." Larssen was not the man to waste argument over minor points when a vital matter was under discussion.

"Then the scheme centres on the practicability of making the arctic Hudson Bay passage a commercial highway. It means the creating of a modern port at Fanning. It means the lighting of a whole coast-line"—his finger travelled to the north of Hudson Bay and the northern coast of Labrador—"before a cargo of wheat leaves Port Fanning."

"I'll build lighthouses myself by the dozen if the Canadian Government won't. I'll equip every one with long-range wireless."

"The cost will be tremendous."

"There will be a differential of sixpence a bushel on wheat over my route. That talks down fifty lighthouses."

"But it makes no allowance for rate-cutting by the big men on the present routes. Further, if the Canadian Government are not with you on this scheme, they'll be against you. There are a dozen ways in which you might be frozen out. In that case the Hudson Bay Route will be the biggest fiasco that ever happened."

"Nothing I've yet touched has been a fiasco," answered Lars Larssen with a grim tightening of jaw. "Leave that end to me.... Now your end is to get the money."

"From the English and Canadian public."

"Naturally."

"You came to me because the English and Canadian public are prejudiced against 'Yankee propositions.' You yourself couldn't float it in England. On the other hand, I'm Canadian-born, and my name carries weight both in England and in Canada."

"With the public," added Larssen, and there was a subtle emphasis on the word "public," which carried a world of hidden meaning. Matheson had been associated with other schemes which had a bad odour in the nostrils of City men.

"With the public who provide the capital," answered the financier, and his emphasis was on the word "capital." He continued. "With myself and Sir Francis Letchmere and a few titled dummies on the Board—which is what you want from me—the public will tumble over one another to take up stock."

"Agreed."

"The capitalization you propose is £5,000,000 in Ordinary £1 Shares, which the public will mostly take up. Also £200,000 in Deferred Shares of the nominal value of one shilling each, which are to be allotted to yourself as vendor. That gives you four million votes out of a total of nine million, and for practical purposes means control."

"The Deferred Shares are not to get a cent of dividend until a fifteen per cent. dividend is paid on the Ordinary Shares. That's the squarest deal for the public that ever was," retorted Larssen.

"But you hold control."

Both men knew the tremendous import of that word. The fortunes of the world's financial giants have all been built up on "control." Dwarfing "capital" and "credit" it stands—that word "control." If the wild gamble of the Hudson Bay scheme were to rush through to commercial success—if the limitless wheat-lands of Canada were to pour their mighty torrent of life into Europe through the channel of Hudson Bay—it would be Lars Larssen who would hold the key of the sluice-gate. Directly, he would be master of the wheat of Canada. Indirectly, he could turn his master-position to financial gain in scores of ways. The £200,000 to be allotted him as vendor was a bagatelle; but to hold four million votes out of nine million was to control an empire.

He replied evenly: "I keep control on any proposition I touch. That's creed with me. Creed."

"We split on that," answered Matheson.

"You want control for yourself?"

"No."

"Then what is it you do want?"

"I want half the Deferred Shares in the hands of Lord ——." He named a Canadian statesman and empire-builder whose integrity was beyond all suspicion. "I want him to hold them as trustee for the ordinary shareholders. He will consent if I ask him."

"No doubt he will!" commented Larssen ironically. He drew up his chair closer to the other man. There was a dangerous gleam in his eye as he said: "Now see here. All the points you've put up were known to you months ago. What's happened to make you switch at the last moment?"

He had put his finger on the very core of the matter, but Matheson met his searching gaze without flinching. "What's happened is an entirely private matter. I've reasons for not wishing to be associated with your scheme unless you agree to half the Deferred Shares being held by Lord —— as trustee. These reasons of mine have only arisen during the last few weeks. Circumstances are different with me from what they were when you first broached the plan. If you don't care to agree to my suggestion, I call the deal off. As regards the expenses you've incurred, I'll go halves."

For comment, the shipowner flicked thumb and forefinger together.

"No, I'll do more," pursued Matheson. "I'll make you a more than fair offer—shoulder the whole expenses myself."

Larssen ignored the offer. "I went into the preliminaries of the scheme on the understanding that we were to pull together."

"I know."

"It means big money for you—enough to retire on."

"I know."

"Then what the hell's the reason for this sudden attack of scruples?"

For a moment Matheson's eyes blazed black anger, but the anger died out of them and the tired look of the platform of the Gare de Lyon took its place. "You wouldn't understand," he answered. "The whirlpool."

"What's that?"

"It would be useless to explain. I have private reasons.... I've made you a thoroughly fair offer, and I don't think there's anything more to be said." Matheson rose and walked to the window, pulling up the blind and gazing out on the sombre splendour of the big banking houses of the Rue Laffitte and the Rue Pillet-Will.

Larssen looked at the silhouette of his antagonist with a tense set of his jaws. Many plans were revolving in his mind. Moralists might have labelled them "blackmail," but Lars Larssen was utterly free from scruples where his own interests were concerned. Honesty with him was a mere matter of policy. To a man with the average sense of honour, such an attitude of mind is scarcely realisable, but Lars Larssen was no normal man. In him the Napoleonic madness—or genius—burned fiercely. He had ambitions colossal in scale—he regarded his present wealth and power as a mere stepping-stone to the realisation of his Great Idea.

That great ultimate purpose of his life he had never revealed to man or woman—save only to his dead wife. He aimed to be controlling owner of the world's carrying trade; to hold decision on peace and war between nation and nation because of that control of the vital food supply. To be Emperor of the Seven Seas.

He had one child only—his boy Olaf, now aged twelve, at school in the States. Olaf was to hold the seat of power after him and perpetuate his dynasty.

That was Larssen's life-dream.

Any man or woman who stood between him and his great goal was to be thrust aside or used as a stepping-stone. Matheson, for instance—he was to be used. There must be something underlying Matheson's sudden access of scruples—what was it? A case of cherchez la femme? Or political ambitions, perhaps? If he could arrive at the motive, it might open up a new avenue for persuasion.

He searched the silhouette of the man at the window for an answer to the riddle. But Matheson's face was set, and the answer to the riddle was such as Lars Larssen could never have guessed. It lay outside the shipowner's pale of thought—beyond the limitations of his mind.

For Matheson also had his big life-scheme, and it now filled his mind with a blaze of light as he stood by the window, silent.

Larssen resolved to play for time while he set to work to ferret out his antagonist's motive for the sudden change of plan. He did not dream for a moment of relinquishing control on the Hudson Bay scheme. As he had stated openly, control was creed to him.

He broke the long silence with a conciliatory remark. "Let's think matters over for a day or two. My scheme might be modified on the financial side. I'm prepared to make concessions to what you think is fair to the shareholders. We shall find some common ground of agreement."

The smooth words did not deceive Matheson. So his answer came with deliberate finality: "I've said my last word."

"Well, I'll consider it carefully. Meanwhile, doing anything to-night? I hear that Polaire is on at the Folies BergÈres with her opium-den scene. A thriller, I'm told."

Theatres and music-halls were nothing to the shipowner; his idea was to keep Matheson under observation if possible, and try to solve the riddle.

"Thanks, but I've got to get away from Paris," answered Matheson with his tired droop of the shoulders. "I have to join my wife and father-in-law at Monte Carlo."

"Very well, then, I'll say good-bye for the present."

When Larssen had left the office, he hurried into a taxi and was whirled to the Grand Hotel near at hand. Here he found his secretary turning over the illustrated papers in the hall lounge, and gave a few curt directions. "Drive round to the Rue Laffitte—a hurry case. On the second floor of No. 8 is the office of Clifford Matheson. He may be still there—you'll know by the light in the window. Wait till he comes out, and follow him. Find out where he goes. If it's to a woman's house—good. In any case shadow him to-night wherever he goes."