Washington D.C., The White House.
The night had gradually deepened.
In the corridor outside the Oval Office, two Army guards stood straight.
Inside the President's study.
Ulysses S. Grant sat tiredly in his leather chair, the green-shaded desk lamp casting a soft light.
In front of him lay two documents.
The one on the left was a report just urgently sent by Treasury Secretary George Boutwell.
In the report, Boutwell tearfully recounted the terrifying extortion he had suffered at the hands of the evil forces of Wall Street (alluding to Imperial Bank), requesting that the President immediately send Federal Marshals to protect him, and firmly demanding the maintenance of the discount authorization for United Trust Bank in order to defend the "independence of federal finance."
And the one on the right.
It was an encrypted telegram that had just been deciphered, delivered personally by the head of the confidential office.
The sender was Felix Argyle.
Grant had an unlit cigar in his mouth.
He had been staring at Felix's telegram for a full half-hour, his eyes vacant.
"You fear an invisible royal family that does not yet exist. So you open the city gates and welcome in a real foreign emperor."
This sentence was like a red-hot branding iron, repeatedly searing itself onto Grant's optic nerves.
The door to the study was gently pushed open.
General Horace Porter, the President's chief private secretary and an old subordinate of Grant's from the Civil War, walked in.
He was holding a glass of warm water.
"Mr. President, you have been sitting for a long time. Have some water." Porter placed the glass on the corner of the desk.
Grant did not take the glass; he pushed the telegram paper toward Porter.
"Horace, take a look at this. That young man in New York. He is actually teaching me how to govern the country."
Grant's voice betrayed no emotion.
Porter picked up the telegram and quickly scanned it. Then his expression changed.
"Mr. President, Mr. Argyle' words are overly arrogant. This already constitutes a serious offense against the executive branch. He actually dares to use such a tone to accuse you of welcoming in a foreign emperor. If this telegram were made public, it would be enough for the Department of Justice to investigate him for treason."
Porter said with some indignation.
Although Mr. Argyle was the largest donor to the Republican Party and the person who pushed the President into office.
But he could not speak to the President of the country in such a manner.
"Arrogant? Yes, he has always been arrogant."
Grant took the cigar out of his mouth and threw it on the desktop.
He looked out the window at the pitch-black Potomac River.
"But do you think what he said is wrong? Horace."
Grant turned around and looked at his old subordinate.
Porter hesitated; to be honest, he didn't know either.
"Mr. Argyle' analysis of European capital... in terms of macroeconomics, it does have its rationality. If United Trust Bank really packages America's resources and uses the endorsement of the federal treasury to issue bonds in London, that is indeed sucking our blood." After thinking about it, Porter answered truthfully.
"But I still believe the domestic monopoly of General Electric is a more direct threat."
"That is the problem."
Grant walked back to the desk, pressing his hands on the two documents.
"Thomas Clark was here earlier threatening me that if I touched Argyle, next year's election donations would be completely cut off. Today, Felix sent this telegram."
Grant picked up Boutwell's report, crumpled it into a ball with force, and threw it into the wastebasket.
"Boutwell, that idiot, does he think I don't know how much dirty money he has taken from Argyle? He comes running to show his loyalty to me now only because he has been caught by Felix. The memorandum he signed was not for any federal financial independence; it was just to save himself."
Grant sank into his chair.
"Perhaps... Felix is right, the meat rots in the pot. Argyle' factories are in America, and his money is also in America. I can hit him anytime through tax bills or congressional hearings. But if Old Morgan's syndicate takes root in North America, those British parliamentarians will come to talk to us about tariffs with gunboats."
"So, Mr. President. What is your decision?" Porter asked.
"Cancel all discount privileges of the Treasury Department for United Trust Bank." Grant issued the order decisively.
"Tomorrow morning, you go to the Treasury Department yourself and watch Boutwell issue the revocation order. If he dares to say one more word of nonsense, make him submit his resignation."
Porter stood at attention.
"Yes! Mr. President. And what about that antitrust assessment report against Argyle from the Department of Justice? Should it be completely destroyed?"
Grant raised his hand.
"No, no, no."
A complex light flashed in Grant's eyes.
"I cannot let Argyle think that he can just rely on a telegram, a few macroeconomic analyses, and the intimidation of his puppet to issue orders on the desk of The White House."
Grant pulled open a drawer and took out a sheet of blank letterhead with The White House header.
"I can help him block the British, and I can also temporarily suspend the antitrust guillotine in mid-air. But he must understand that in this country, the center of power is always in Washington, not in New York. I will not allow anyone to treat the President of the United States with such a condescending attitude."
Grant picked up his fountain pen and dipped it full of ink.
He wrote a line on the letterhead.
There were no long-winded speeches or pleasantries.
After finishing, he handed the letter to Porter.
"Send this. Through that dedicated line, back to the Empire State Building exactly as it is."
Porter took the letter and glanced at the content.
"Mr. President. This... this is like an ultimatum." Porter said in a low voice.
"This is an ultimatum, Horace. Go send it."
Late at night.
The telegraph room of the Empire State Building in New York.
The telegraph machine made a crisp sound, and a short slip of paper was delivered to the big boss.
Felix took the slip of paper; it had only a simple sentence on it.
"Felix, we haven't seen each other for a while. If you want to cancel the Treasury Department's authorization and withdraw the antitrust investigation, then come to Washington in person; perhaps we should have a good talk. — U.S.G."
Felix looked at the slip of paper without rage or surprise.
He folded the paper and put it into the inner pocket of his suit.
It seems... this is Grant's bottom line.
The President has compromised, acknowledged Old Morgan's threat, and is willing to withdraw those weapons aimed at the Argyle Family.
But in exchange, he demanded that he leave that impregnable commercial fortress and personally step into the political quagmire of Washington.
Felix walked to the window of the telegraph room and muttered to himself.
"Go to Washington..."
He knew very well that this trip to the capital was by no means as simple as attending a few dinner parties.
Grant must have prepared chips and conditions.
But if he didn't go, the situation that had just eased would completely collapse.
"Prepare the car, have my private train ready at Grand Central Station." Felix turned his head and ordered the telegraph operator.
"I am going to The White House tomorrow morning to meet this stubborn President."
German Empire, Berlin.
73 Wilhelm Street, Imperial Chancellery.
The air here was filled with the acrid smell of coal smoke and bitter black coffee.
The sky outside was gloomy.
Although the Franco-Prussian War had ended in a total victory for the German Empire, Berlin's factories were puffing black smoke into the sky day and night to digest the dividends brought by the war.
Otto von Bismarck sat behind a large oak desk. He was still wearing his dark grey uniform, though today it was devoid of those cumbersome medals.
At this moment, he held a coded telegram that had just been transmitted via the Atlantic Ocean undersea cable.
As the office door was pushed open.
A man with graying hair and wearing a tailcoat walked in.
He carried a heavy briefcase, and his eyes behind his spectacles revealed the rigor of a scholar. This was the chief professor of physics at Berlin Industrial University, Carl Wagner.
"Please sit... Professor Wagner."
Bismarck gestured to the leather chair opposite him and pushed the telegram to the center of the desk.
Wagner pulled out the chair, sat down, and placed his briefcase on his lap.
"Excuse me, Prime Minister. You called me over from the laboratory in such a hurry—is it for the industrial allocation plan regarding the reparations from France?"
Wagner asked, somewhat anxiously.
"It is not that, Professor. It is about that madman on the other side of the ocean."
Bismarck picked up the cigar box on the desk, took one out, and lit it.
"Our agents in Washington have sent back intelligence that the founder of the Argyle Family has run into trouble in America. That old soldier sitting in The White House, Ulysses S. Grant, is reportedly trying to use antitrust laws to chop off Argyle's hands. And British capital is also encircling him on Wall Street."
Wagner pushed up his glasses, his brow furrowing.
"Argyle? That American businessman who sold us Smokeless Powder and Gatling guns at high prices during the war? Sorry... he is a pure war profiteer. Isn't it a good thing for the German Empire that he is in trouble? We won't have to be extorted for gold by him anymore."
"No, no, no... you only see the gunpowder, Wagner."
Bismarck exhaled a puff of blue smoke, his voice slightly low.
"I didn't call you here to discuss guns and cannons. It's about those two things I asked you to evaluate. How is the progress?"
Wagner's expression immediately became serious.
He opened his briefcase and took out two reports filled with mechanical structure diagrams.
"To be honest, it is not optimistic, Prime Minister."
Wagner handed over the first report.
"This is the reverse engineering report on that 'telephone'. Intelligence personnel obtained a commercial telephone from General Electric and some switchboard blueprints from New York. We tried to dismantle it."
"Mmhmm... and the conclusion?"
Bismarck didn't even look at the diagrams, staring directly into Wagner's eyes.
"Sigh... it is a piece of industrial art."
Wagner's tone carried an unconcealable sense of frustration.
"Their Carbon Transmitter technology is far ahead of the German Empire. We tried to replicate it in the laboratory using carbon powder and brass, but the stability of the current was extremely poor, and the sound turned into noise after traveling two hundred yards. Moreover, our domestic machine tools simply cannot achieve the processing precision required for that switchboard system with pure silver contacts. If we try to force production, line crosstalk will turn all of Berlin's communications into a mess."
Bismarck tapped his fingers on the desk twice.
"And what about the second item? Power transmission."
Wagner opened the second report.
"That is even worse, sir. The German Empire's focus has previously been entirely on Krupp's cannons and military factories. We have been left behind by the Americans by at least five years in the field of electromagnetic applications." Wagner sighed.
"The Direct Current grid that General Electric has laid out in New York is mature enough to provide lighting and fan power for twenty thousand households. Meanwhile, our streets in Berlin are still burning gas lamps."
"I heard Argyle's opponents are working on something called Alternating Current?" Bismarck asked with confusion.
"Yes, I heard that the Morgan family, along with a consortium of several other families, invested in Westinghouse Electric in Pittsburgh. But according to intelligence, their Transformer exploded in the plaza."
Wagner shook his head with regret.
"Alternating Current is a dead end. At least for now, without an AC motor, high-voltage electricity simply cannot enter factories. And the Argyle Family holds an absolute patent barrier on Direct Current."
Bismarck leaned back in his chair, remaining silent for a long time.
"So, Wagner. If the German Empire were to rely on its own strength to develop equipment that could rival General Electric and the American Telephone and Telegraph Company, how long would it take?"
Wagner calculated in his mind.
"If the national treasury provides unlimited funds, we would need three years to overcome the materials science bottlenecks, and another two years to establish production lines. It might take five years."
"Five years is too long."
Bismarck stood up abruptly and walked to the window.
"In five years, the British will have already sold their steam engines all over the world. We in the German Empire have just unified, and although we won against France and received five billion francs in reparations, if we cannot take the lead in the next industrial revolution, this five billion francs will sooner or later be completely sheared away by the British trade scissor gap."
Bismarck turned around and looked at Wagner.
"Since we cannot build it, then we will move the person who can, along with his factories, to Berlin."
Wagner was stunned and asked somewhat uncertainly: "You mean... Argyle? That is impossible, sir. After all, he controls the largest business empire in North America; how could he be willing to transfer technology to the German Empire?"
"Because he is currently being squeezed out by his own country."
Bismarck walked to the desk, picked up the telegram, and the corners of his mouth curled into a scheming smile.
"That President Grant fears Argyle's power and is trying to use political means to dismantle him. Old Morgan is stabbing him in the back with the financial cudgel of the British Empire."
"Capital has no borders, Professor Wagner. Argyle is just a hungry wolf that only recognizes profit. When he cannot eat meat in North America, and is even being encircled by hunters, what if I open the doors for him here, give him the entire European market, and Grant him an Imperial Charter?"
Bismarck slapped the telegram onto the desk.
"Do you think he would refuse to build the European headquarters of General Electric in the Ruhr region?"
Wagner swallowed hard.
"If we can obtain his technical patent licenses, the German Empire's industrial output will double within three years. If Krupp's steelworks use power grid energy, the output will completely crush Sheffield in the British Empire."
"So... this deal is worth making."
Bismarck grabbed the brass handbell on the desk and rang it vigorously.
The adjutant outside the door immediately pushed it open and entered.
"Prepare the carriage; I am going to Sanssouci Palace in Potsdam."
Bismarck picked up his overcoat from the coat rack.
"I am going to see His Majesty the Emperor; this matter requires the endorsement of the royal family. We are going to send a bit of 'friendship' from Prussia to that Mr. Argyle who is fighting alone on Wall Street."