"A few minutes' sensible talk," Weiss answered. "It will do you no harm to listen to us. Send your servant away and give us a quarter of an hour."
Phineas Duge hesitated, but only for a moment. These men had come openly, and they were known to be his enemies. It was not possible that they intended to use any violence. He turned to the butler, who stood behind his chair.
"Place chairs for these gentlemen," he ordered, "and leave the room."
They sat on his left-hand side, Phineas Duge pushed the decanter of Burgundy toward them, and the cigars. Then he leaned back in his chair and waited.
"Duge, we ought to have come to you before," Weiss began. "We are playing a child's game, all of us."
"Whatever the game may be," Duge answered, "it is not I who invented it."
"We grant that to start with," Weiss answered. "We were in the wrong. You have done a little better than hold your own against us. We are several millions of dollars the poorer and you the richer for our split. Let it go at that. We have other things to think about just now besides this juggling with markets. I take it that we are none of us particularly anxious to learn what the interior of a police court looks like."
Phineas Duge made no motion of assent or dissent.
"You refer," he said, "to the action against the Trusts which the
President is supposed to be supporting so vigorously?"
Weiss nodded.