And so it was that in the small hours of the morning, Montague, pale and nervous, but quite unshaken, was sitting and listening while his brother unfolded before him a picture of the Metropolis as he had come to see it.  It was a city ruled by mighty forces—­money-forces; great families and fortunes, which had held their sway for generations, and regarded the place, with all its swarming millions, as their birthright.  They possessed it utterly—­they held it in the hollow of their hands.  Railroads and telegraphs and telephones—­ banks and insurance and trust companies—­all these they owned; and the political machines and the legislatures, the courts and the newspapers, the churches and the colleges.  And their rule was for plunder; all the streams of profit ran into their coffers.  The stranger who came to their city succeeded as he helped them in their purposes, and failed if they could not use him.  A great editor or bishop was a man who taught their doctrines; a great statesman was a man who made the laws for them; a great lawyer was one who helped them to outwit the public.  Any man who dared to oppose them, they would cast out and trample on, they would slander and ridicule and ruin.

And Oliver came down to particulars—­he named these powerful men, one after one, and showed what they could do.  If his brother would only be a man of the world, and see the thing!  Look at all the successful lawyers!  Oliver named them, one after one—­shrewd devisers of corporation trickery, with incomes of hundreds of thousands a year.  He could not name the men who had refused to play the game—­for no one had ever heard of them.  But it was so evident what would happen in this case!  His friends would cast him off; his own client would get his price—­whatever it was—­and then leave him in the lurch, and laugh at him!  “If you can’t make up your mind to play the game,” cried Oliver, frantically, “at least you can give it up!  There are plenty of other ways of getting a living—­if you’ll let me, I’ll take care of you myself, rather than have you disgrace me.  Tell me—­will you do that?  Will you quit altogether?”

And Montague suddenly leaped to his feet, and brought his fist down upon the desk with a bang.  “No!” he cried; “by God, no!”

“Let me make you understand me once for all,” he rushed on.  “You’ve shown me New York as you see it.  I don’t believe it’s the truth—­I don’t believe it for one single moment!  But let me tell you this, I shall stay here and find out—­and if it is true, it won’t stop me!  I shall stay here and defy those people!  I shall stay and fight them till the day I die!  They may ruin me,—­I’ll go and live in a garret if I have to,—­but as sure as there’s a God that made me, I’ll never stop till I’ve opened the eyes of the people to what they’re doing!”

Montague towered over his brother, white-hot and terrible.  Oliver shrank from him—­he never had seen such a burst of wrath from him before.  “Do you understand me now?” Montague cried; and he answered, in a despairing voice, “Yes, yes.”