"I lost my head—absolutely—completely. I did just what Forshay and DeLancy did—gambled with money that didn't belong to me. I lived in a nightmare. Mr. Drake, I lost my bearings. Now I'm going to get them back." He paused, drew breath, and continued earnestly: "Now you understand why I don't deserve a cent of that money even if you could swear to me you didn't use me purposely, which you can't! I pretty nearly went over the line, Mr. Drake, and it wasn't my fault I didn't, either. I guess I'm not built right for this sort of life—that's the short of it."
"You are young, very young, Tom," said Drake slowly. "Young people look at things through their emotions. That's what you're doing!"
"Thank God," said Bojo, and it seemed to him for the first time a feeling of peace returned.
"What do you want to do?" said Drake, frowning and rising.
"I can not return you the two hundred thousand dollars," said Bojo slowly. "I paid one friend thirty-eight thousand to cover his losses, to save him from disgrace and dishonor in the eyes of a woman; another friend refused to accept a cent. I paid to the estate of Forshay every cent of indebtedness he owed the firm—fifty-two odd thousand dollars. Forshay gambled because he thought I knew. That makes over ninety thousand dollars. The rest—one hundred and fifty-nine thousand—I will return to you."
"Good heavens, Tom, you did that?" said Drake, taking out his handkerchief. He sat down in his chair, overcome. For a long interval no one spoke, and then from the chair a voice came out that sounded not like Drake but something bodiless. "That's awful—awful. From my point of view I have played the game as others, as square as the squarest. I have lost thousands of thousands sticking to a friend, thousands in keeping to my word. This is not business, this is war. Those who go in, who intend to gamble with life, to fight with thousands and millions, must go in to take the consequences. If they ever get me it'll be because some one has turned traitor, not because I've sold out or done anything disreputable. If others were ruined in Pittsburgh & New Orleans, that's because they were willing to make money by smashing up some other person's property. It was their fault, not mine. If a man can't control himself—his fault. If a man goes bankrupt and won't face the world and work back instead of blowing his brains out—his fault.
"You think of the individual—men, friends, death. They move you, they're closer to you than the big perspective. They don't count, no one counts. If a man kills himself, he dies quicker than he would and is not worth living, that's all. Sounds cold-blooded to you. Yes. But we're dealing in movements, armies! Poverty, sorrow, disaster, death, they are life—you can't get away from them. A great bridge is more important than the lives of the men who build it, a great railroad is necessary, not the question whether a few thousand people lose their fortunes, in the operation which makes a great amalgamation possible. That's my point of view. It's not yours. You're set on what you've made up your mind to do. Your emotions have got you. Ten years from now you'll regret it."
"I hope not," said Bojo simply.
"What are you going to do? Well, come in here as my private secretary," said Drake, placing his hand on the young man's shoulder, and adding, with that burst of human understanding which gave him a magnetic power over men: "Tom, you're a —— fool to do what you're doing, but, by heaven, I love you for it!"
"Thank you," said Bojo, controlling his voice with difficulty.