fifty. Try the chair."
Gordon laughed at the imperturbable smile on his father's face, but he flung his great body into the chair.
James Carbhoy deliberately knocked the ash from his cigar. It was many years since he had received such a straight talk from any man. Some of it had stung—stung sharply, but the justice or injustice of it he set aside. His whole mind and heart were upon other matters. He took no umbrage. He swept all personal feeling aside and regarded the boy whom he idolized.
"We've both made some talk," he observed, "but I think the last word's with me. I don't seem to be sure which of us has put up the bluff. Maybe we both have. Anyway, right here and now I'm going to call your hand. I offered you a stake. You say it's easy to make a pile. Can you make a pile?"
Gordon shrugged.
"Why, yes. If I follow your wish and embark on—big finance. And—forget my Sunday school."
The millionaire gathered up the sheaf of loose accounts on the desk and held them up. His smile was grim and challenging.
"One hundred thousand dollars these bills represent. The cashier will hand you a check for that amount. Say, you've shown your ability to spend that amount; can you show your ability to make it?"
For a moment the boy's blue eyes avoided the half-ironical smile of his father's. Then suddenly they returned the steady gaze, and a flush spread swiftly over his handsome face. Something of his father's purpose was dawning upon him. He began to realize that the man who had made those many millions was far too clever for him when it came to debate. He squared his shoulders obstinately and took up the challenge. There was no other course for him. But even as he accepted it his heart sank at the prospect.
"Certainly," he cried. "Certainly—with a stake to start me."
His father nodded.
"Sure. That goes," he said.
Then he laid the papers on the desk, and his whole manner underwent a further change. His eyes seemed to harden with the light of battle. There was an ironical skepticism in them. Even there was a shadow of contempt. For the moment it seemed as if he had forgotten that the man before him was his son, and regarded him merely as some rival financier seeking to beat him in a deal.
"I'll hand you one hundred thousand dollars. That's your stake. This is the way you'll pay those bills. You'll leave this city in twenty-four hours. You can go where you choose, do what you choose. But you must return here in twelve months' time with exactly double that sum. I make no conditions as to how you make the money. That's right up to you. I shall ask no questions, and blame you for no process you adopt, however much I disapprove. Then, to show you how certain I am you can't do it—why, if you make good, there's a half-share partnership in my organization waiting right here for you."
"A half-share partnership?" Gordon repeated incredulously. "You said—a half-share?"
"That's precisely what I said."
All of a sudden the younger man flung back his head and laughed aloud.
"Why, Dad, I stand to win right along the line—anyway," he exclaimed.
The older man's eyes softened.
"Maybe it's just how you look at it."
The change in his father's manner was quite lost upon Gordon. He only saw his enormous advantage in this one-sided bargain.
"Say, Dad, was there ever such a father as I've got?" he cried exuberantly. "Never, never! But you're not going to monopolize all the sportsmanship. I can play the game, too. I don't need one hundred thousand dollars on this game. I don't need twelve months to do it in. I'm not going to cut twelve months out of our lives together. Six is all I need. Six months, and five thousand dollars' stake. That's what I need. Give me that, and I'll be back with one hundred and five thousand dollars in six months' time. I haven't a notion where I'm going or what I'm going to do. All I know is you've put it up to me to make good, and I'm going to. I'll get that money if—if I have to rob a bank."
The boy's recklessness was too much for the gravity of the financier. He sat back and laughed. He flung his half-smoked cigar away, and in a moment father and son had joined in a duel of loud-voiced mirth.
Presently, however, their laughter died out. The millionaire sprang to his feet. His eyes were shining with delight.
"I don't care a darn how you do it, boy," he cried. "As you say, it's up to you. You see, I've got over my Sunday-school days, as you so delicately reminded me. That's by the way. But there's more in this than maybe you get right. You're going to learn that no graft can turn five thousand dollars into one hundred thousand in six months without a mighty fine commercial brain behind it. It's that brain I'm looking for in my son. Now get along and see your mother and sister. You've only got twenty-four hours' grace. Leave these bills to me. You're making a bid for the greatest fortune ever staked in a wager, and things like that don't stand for any delay. Get out, Gordon, boy; get out and—make good."
He held one powerful hand out across the desk, and Gordon promptly seized and wrung it.
"Good-by, Dad, and—God bless you."
CHAPTER II
IN CHASTENED MOOD
Of course, the whole thing was ridiculous. Gordon knew that. No one could know it better. The more he thought about it the more surely he was certain of it. He told himself that he, personally, had behaved like a first-class madman over the whole affair. How on earth was he to make one hundred thousand dollars in six months? It couldn't be done. That was all. It simply couldn't be done. What power of mischief had driven him to charge his highly respectable father with graft? It was a rotten thing to do anyway. And it served him right that it had come back on him by pointing the way to the present impossible situation.
He was perfectly disgusted with himself.
But after a while he began to chuckle. The thing was not without an atmosphere of humor—of a sort. No doubt his friends would have seen a tremendous humor in the idea of his making one hundred thousand dollars under any conditions.
One hundred thousand dollars! What a tremendous sum it sounded viewed from the standpoint of his having to make it. He had never considered it a vast sum before. But now it seemed to grow and grow every time he thought of it. Then he laughed. What stupid things "noughts" were. They meant so much just now, and, in reality, they mean nothing at all.
Oh, dear. The whole thing was a terrible trouble. It was worse. It was a tragedy. But—he mustn't give his friends the laugh on him. That would be the last straw. No. The whole thing should remain a secret between his father and himself. He almost broke into a sweat as he suddenly remembered the Press. What wouldn't the Press do with the story. The son and heir of James Carbhoy, the well-known multi-millionaire, leaving home to show the world how to make one hundred thousand dollars in record time! A stupendous farce. Then the swarm of reporters buzzing about him like a cloud of flies in summer time. The prospect was too depressing. Think of the columns in the Press, especially the cheaper Press. They would haunt him from New York to—Timbuctoo!
It
