"Unless she were over head and heels in love with him," he chuckled.
"Unless he were a great man," I corrected.
"You mean a rich man, Ben? So your oil business is merely a little love attention, after all."
"No, money has very little to do with it, and the woman I want to marry wouldn't marry me for money. But it's the mettle that counts, and in this age, given the position I've started from, how can a man prove his mettle except by success?—and success does mean money. The president of the Great South Midland and Atlantic Railroad is obliged to be a rich man, isn't he?"
"So you're still after my job, eh? Is that why you've let me bully and badger you for the last six years?"
"It was at the bottom of it," I answered honestly, for the gay old bird liked downright speaking, and I knew it. "I'd rather have been your confidential secretary for six years than general manager of traffic. I was learning what I wanted to know."
"And what was that?"
"The way you did things. The way you handled men and bought and sold stocks."
"You like the road, too, eh?"
"I like the road as long as it can be of use to me."