"Now,
then, shut that door, for you and I, Jack Somers, have a word to say to
each other."
What that word was, and how it was said and received, is not a part of
this record. But it is told that it was the beginning of that mighty
Iliad, still remembered of men, which shook the financial camps of San
Francisco, and divided them into bitter contending parties. For when it
became known the next day that Somers had suddenly abandoned Rushbrook,
and carried over to a powerful foreign capitalist the secret methods,
and even, it was believed, the LUCK of his late employer, it was certain
that there would be war to the knife, and that it was no longer a
struggle of rival enterprise, but of vindictive men.
CHAPTER VII
For a year the battle between the Somers faction and the giant but
solitary Rushbrook raged fiercely, with varying success. I grieve to say
that the proteges and parasites of Maecenas deserted him in a body; nay,
they openly alleged that it was the true artistic nature and refinement
of Somers that had always attracted them, and that a man like Rushbrook,
who bought pictures by the yard,--equally of the unknown struggling
artist and the famous masters,--was no true patron of Art.
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