CHAPTER II.
THE PARTNERS.
Then, as was his habit, translating ideas into immediate action, he strode to a door at the far end of the office, flung it open and said: "See here a minute, Wally!" "Busy!" came an answering voice, from behind a huge roll-top desk.
"Of course! But drop it, drop it.

I've got news for you." "Urgent ?" asked the voice, coldly.
"Very.

Come in here, a minute.

I've got to unload!" From behind the big desk rose the figure of a man about five and forty, sandy-haired, long-faced and sallow, with a pair of the coldest, fishiest eyes--eyes set too close together--that ever looked out of a flat and ugly face.

A man precisely dressed, something of a fop, with just a note of the "sport" in his get-up; a man to fear, a man cool, wary and dangerous--Maxim Waldron, in fact, the Billionaire's right-hand man and confidant.