It is true there is the Syndicate, that great scheme of yours yesterday from which you were so careful to exclude me--you are to get great monies from them in cash.

Bah! don't you see that Monty's existence breaks up that Syndicate--smashes it into tiny atoms, for you have sold what was not yours to sell, and they do not pay for that, eh?
They call it fraud!" He paused, out of breath, and Trent remained silent; he knew very well that he was face to face with a great crisis.

Of all things this was the most fatal which could have happened to him.

Monty alive! He remembered the old man's passionate cry for life, for pleasure, to taste once more, for however short a time, the joys of wealth.

Monty alive, penniless, half-witted, the servant of a few ill-paid missionaries, toiling all day for a living, perhaps fishing with the natives or digging, a slave still, without hope or understanding, with the end of his days well in view! Surely it were better to risk all things, to have him back at any cost?
Then a thought more terrible yet than any rose up before him like a spectre, there was a sudden catch at his heart-strings, he was cold with fear.