Jacob's Ladder. E. Phillips Oppenheim

      Jacob laughed scornfully.

      “If I were ten times a millionaire,” he said, rising to his feet, “I would never risk a penny of my money to rid you of the millstone you have hung around your neck. It is going to be part of my activity in life, Mr. Bultiwell, to assist nature in dispensing justice. For many years you have ruled the trade in which we were both brought up, and during the whole of that time you have never accomplished a single gracious or kindly action. You have wound up by trying to drag me into a business which is rotten to the core. Your accountants may be technically justified in reckoning that hundred and forty thousand pounds owed you by those six men as good, because they never failed, but you yourself know that they are hopelessly insolvent, and that the moment you stop renewing their bills they will topple down like ninepins.... I would not help you if you were starving. I shall read of your bankruptcy with pleasure. There is, I think, nothing more to be said.”