His unconquerable optimism rose determinedly to the
surface, even as he summed up and related the forces working against him.
"They have all come at once," he said; "all the activities opposing me,
just as though they had all been started long ago at different points,
with a fixed course to run, and to meet and give me a fall in the hour
when I could least resist. You call it Fate. I call it what it proves
itself to be. But here it is a hub of danger and trouble, and the spokes
of disaster are flying to it from all over the compass, to make the wheel
that will grind me; and all the old troop of Palace intriguers and
despoilers are waiting to heat the tire and fasten it on the machine of
torture. Kaid has involved himself in loans which press, in foolish
experiments in industry without due care; and now from ill-health and bad
temper comes a reaction towards the old sinister rule, when the Prince
shuts his eyes and his agents ruin and destroy. Three nations who have
intrigued against my work see their chance, and are at Kaid's elbow.
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