“You go ahead in your own way, and I shall know how to help you as long as you hold your own. But you may rest assured that in a given case we shall know how to drop you in time.”
To this Charles Gould’s only answer had been: “You may begin sending out the machinery as soon as you like.”
And the great man had liked this imperturbable assurance. The secret of it was that to Charles Gould’s mind these uncompromising terms were agreeable. Like this the mine preserved its identity, with which he had endowed it as a boy; and it remained dependent on himself alone. It was a serious affair, and he, too, took it grimly.
“Of course,” he said to his wife, alluding to this last conversation with the departed guest, while they walked slowly up and down the corredor, followed by the irritated eye of
