Chapter 8

IN WHICH WE COME TO OMAR

"Miss Appleton," said the editor of The Review, "would you like to take a vacation?"

"Is that your delicate way of telling me I'm discharged?" inquired Eliza.

"You know very well we wouldn't fire you. But you haven't had a vacation for three years, and you need a rest."

"I thought I was looking extremely well, for me."

"We're going to send you on an assignment--to Alaska--if you'll go."

"I'm thinking of quitting newspaper-work for good. The magazines pay better, and I'm writing a book."

"I know. Perhaps this will just fit in with your plans, for it has to do with your pet topic of conservation. Those forestry stories of yours and the article on the Water Power Combination made a hit, didn't they?"

"I judge so. Anyhow the magazine people want more."

"Good! Here's your chance to do something big for yourself and for us. Those Alaskan coal claimants have been making a great effort in Washington to rush their patents through, and there seems to be some possibility of their succeeding unless the public wakes up. We want to show up the whole fraudulent affair, show how the entries were illegal, and how the agents of the Trust are trying to put over the greatest steal of the century. It's the Heidlemanns that are back of it--and a few fellows like Murray O'Neil."

"O'Neil!"

"You know him, don't you?"

"Yes. I interviewed him a year ago last spring, when he started his railroad."

"He's fighting for one of the biggest and richest groups of claims. He's backed by some Eastern people. It's the psychological moment to expose both the railroad and the coal situation, for the thieves are fighting among themselves--Gordon, O'Neil, and the Heidlemanns."

"Mr. O'Neil is no thief," said the girl, shortly.

"Of course not. He's merely trying to snatch control of an empire, and to grab ten million dollars' worth of coal, for nothing. That's not theft, it's financial genius! Fortunately, however, the public is rousing itself--coming to regard its natural resources as its own and not the property of the first financier who lays hold of them. Call it what you will, but give us the true story of the Kyak coal and, above all, the story of the railroad battle. Things are growing bitter up there already, and they're bound to get rapidly worse. Give us the news and we'll play it up big through our Eastern syndicate. You can handle the magazine articles in a more dignified way, if you choose. A few good vigorous, fearless, newspaper stories, written by some one on the ground, will give Congress such a jolt that no coal patents will be issued this season and no Government aid will be given to the railroads. You get the idea?"