Brent scowled again. For years he had been amassing a fortune by a process that was scarcely within the law.
For, when inventions threaten to render useless already existing patents, necessitating the scrapping of millions of dollars' worth of machinery, vested interests must be protected.
Thus, Brent and his partner, Herbert Balcom, had evolved a simple method of protecting corporations against troublesome inventors and inventions. They had formed their own corporation, International Patents, Incorporated.
Their method was effective—though desperate. It was to suppress the inventor and his labor. They bought the sole rights from the inventor, promising him glittering royalties. The joker was that the invention was suppressed. None were ever manufactured. Hence there were no royalties and the corporations went on undisturbed while Brent and Balcom collected huge retainers for the protection they afforded them.
Thus Brent Rock had come to be hated by scores of inventors defrauded in this unequal conflict with big business.
The inventor looked about at the library, richly paneled in oak and luxuriously furnished. Through a pair of folding-doors he could see the dining-room and a conservatory beyond. All this had been paid for by himself and such as he.
"Sit down, sir," nodded Brent, suavely.
The man continued to stand, growing more and more excited. Had he been a keener observer he would have seen that under Brent's suavity there was a scarcely hidden nervousness.
Finally Brent leaned over and spoke in a whisper, looking about as though the very walls might have ears.
"My dear fellow," he confided, "for some time I have been considering your water-motor. I will return the model to you—release the patent to the world."