"
He paused, and then went on, in a reminiscent mood, "You've read of
the great strike, I suppose? It was Roberts put that job through. He
made himself the worst-hated man in the country--Gad! how the
newspapers and the politicians used to rage at him! But he stood his
ground--he would win that strike or die in the attempt. And he very
nearly did both, you know. An Anarchist came to his office and shot
him twice; but he got the fellow down and nearly choked the life out
of him, and he ran the strike on his sick-bed, and two weeks later
he was back in his office again."
And now the Major's store-rooms of gossip were unlocked. He told
Montague about the kings of Steel, and about the men they had hated
and the women they had loved, and about the inmost affairs and
secrets of their lives. William H. Roberts had begun his career in
the service of the great iron-master, whose deadly rival he had
afterwards become; and now he lived but to dispute that rival's
claims to glory. Let the rival build a library, Roberts would build
two. Let the rival put up a great office building, Roberts would buy
all the land about it, and put up half a dozen, and completely shut
out its light.
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