The Secret Power

A cynical smile twisted his features as he spoke, and Roger Seaton, standing opposite to him with his fine head well thrown back on his shoulders and his whole face alive with the power of thought, looked rather like a Viking expostulating with some refractory vassal.

"So you think the United States wouldn't take my 'discovery?'" he said--"Or--if they took it--couldn't be trusted to keep a pledged word?"

Gwent shrugged his shoulders.

"Of course our government could be trusted as much as any other government in the world,"--he said--"Perhaps more. But it would exonerate itself for breaking even a pledged word which necessitated an inhuman act involving loss of money! See? War is an inhuman act, but it brings considerable gain to those who engineer it,--this makes all the difference between humanity and INhumanity!"

"Well!--you are a senator, and you ought to know!" replied Seaton--"And if your opinion is against my offer, I will not urge you to make it. But--as I live and stand here talking to you, you may bet every dollar you possess that if neither the United States nor any other government will accept the chance I give it of holding the nations like dogs in leash, I'll hold them myself! I! One single unit of the overteeming millions! Yes, Mr. Senator Gwent, I swear it! I'll be master of the world!"