Filled with wrath and thoughts of what a horse-
whip could do to a Boston board meeting he made
his preparation for a flying trip, but before he could
reach the Capital, necessarily its first stage, his blood
had cooled and his brain cleared; he realized that he
had been about to abandon the sole strength of his
position, the mingled elements of distance and pos-
session. By virtue of the local laws and his extraor-
dinary isolation he was a king in his own right; he
went through the formality of mortgaging a hun-
dred million dollars' worth of property and arranged
to have his checks honoured locally.
Everybody knew about this friendly duel and
many were the speculations as to EUerton's motives^;
one of them came near the truth. Twenty years be-
fore Mary Digby had called him a nice, lovable
gambler. She should have omitted the adjectives.
EUerton had not the itch which makes a man sit up
all night risking sums he can ill afford with trem-

226



NOT ALL THE KING'S HORSES

bling fingers but he haicl the iron nerve which will
play a long shot while the heavens fall. He was
capable of defying a tremendously powerful com-
pany and fate combined in the knowledge that should
he succeed he would be a made man, his rebellion
forgotten, wiped out by praise, congratulations and
advancement.
