He paused, hoping this had convinced Stener, but the latter was still shaking.
"But what can I do, Frank?" he pleaded, weakly.
"I can't go against Mollenhauer.
They can prosecute me if I do that.
They can do it, anyhow.
I can't do that.
I'm not strong enough.
If they didn't know, if you hadn't told them, it might be different, but this way—" He shook his head sadly, his gray eyes filled with a pale distress.
"George," replied Cowperwood, who realized now that only the sternest arguments would have any effect here, "don't talk about what I did.
What I did I had to do.
You're in danger of losing your head and your nerve and making a serious mistake here, and I don't want to see you make it.
I have five hundred thousand of the city's money invested for you—partly for me, and partly for you, but more for you than for me"—which, by the way, was not true—"and here you are hesitating in an hour like this as to whether you will protect your interest or not.
I can't understand it.
This is a crisis, George.
Stocks are tumbling on every side—everybody's stocks. You're not alone in this—neither am I.
This is a panic, brought on by a fire, and you can't expect to come out of a panic alive unless you do something to protect yourself.
You say you owe your place to Mollenhauer and that you're afraid of what he'll do.
If you look at your own situation and mine, you'll see that it doesn't make much difference what he does, so long as I don't fail.
If I fail, where are you?
Who's going to save you from prosecution?
Will Mollenhauer or any one else come forward and put five hundred thousand dollars in the treasury for you?
He will not.
If Mollenhauer and the others have your interests at heart, why aren't they helping me on 'change today?
I'll tell you why.
They want your street-railway holdings and mine, and they don't care whether you go to jail afterward or not.
Now if you're wise you will listen to me.
I've been loyal to you, haven't I?
You've made money through me—lots of it.
If you're wise, George, you'll go to your office and write me your check for three hundred thousand dollars, anyhow, before you do a single other thing.
Don't see anybody and don't do anything till you've done that.
You can't be hung any more for a sheep than you can for a lamb.
No one can prevent you from giving me that check.
You're the city treasurer.
Once I have that I can see my way out of this, and I'll pay it all back to you next week or the week after—this panic is sure to end in that time.
With that put back in the treasury we can see them about the five hundred thousand a little later.
In three months, or less, I can fix it so that you can put that back.
As a matter of fact, I can do it in fifteen days once I am on my feet again.
Time is all I want.
You won't have lost your holdings and nobody will cause you any trouble if you put the money back.
They don't care to risk a scandal any more than you do.
Now what'll you do, George?
Mollenhauer can't stop you from doing this any more than I can make you.
Your life is in your own hands.
What will you do?"
Stener stood there ridiculously meditating when, as a matter of fact, his very financial blood was oozing away.
Yet he was afraid to act. He was afraid of Mollenhauer, afraid of Cowperwood, afraid of life and of himself.
The thought of panic, loss, was not so much a definite thing connected with his own property, his money, as it was with his social and political standing in the community.
Few people have the sense of financial individuality strongly developed.
They do not know what it means to be a controller of wealth, to have that which releases the sources of social action—its medium of exchange.
They want money, but not for money's sake.