Edison had a mansion in the affluent neighborhood of Cleveland. At least, that's what Edison himself thought. Although this villa is still a far cry from Scrooge's Duck Castle in terms of luxury, it is already very luxurious by Edison's standards.

"Jericho, how's my house?" Edison said to his friend Jericho in a ostentatious tone.

"Ah, not bad. I really didn't expect that the naughty egg who did bad things everywhere with me when I was a child has now become an American legend. Jericho sat down on the couch in Edison's small living room, looked around the furnishings, and said to Edison.

"Would you like something to drink?" Edison pointed to his wine cabinet and said to Jericho. Being able to show off in front of your friends can be regarded as a kind of homecoming.

"Whatever." Jericho said.

Edison pulled a bottle of red wine from the wine cabinet, uncorked it, and poured himself and Jericho a small half glass.

Jericho took the glass, gently shook it with a skilful motion, and took a small sip......

"Yes, authentic Lafite." Jericho said.

"Yes, Jericho. Looks like you've been having a good time lately. Edison said. Being able to taste the origin of this wine in one sip shows that Jericho is definitely very familiar with this wine, and he can often drink Lafite wine. In the United States at that time, Lafite wine was definitely a luxury that only a few people could taste regularly. Even Edison, if it weren't for the sake of finding a feeling of returning home in front of his children, he was generally reluctant to drink such wine.

Edison was happy for him when he found that his childhood playmate was now mixing well, but on the other hand, he was a little unhappy because of the disillusionment of that sense of superiority. Edison had thought that his childhood playmates had not read as much as he did, and that everyone else but him should have been working hard workers. But now it seems, at least not Jericho.

"We haven't seen each other in years, it's been almost a decade, right?" Edison also sat down, "Where are you high now?" ”

"It's not as good as you, I'm carrying a leather bag for my boss in a Wall Street bank." Jericho replied.

The so-called carrying a leather bag refers to doing secretarial work for the boss. This level of work may not seem like much, but it is extremely important. Because doing this kind of work means that you have a lot of opportunities to dangle in front of the boss's eyes, and what achievements you have done are easy for the boss to see. And you are close to the boss, and there are many things that have certain secrets, and the secretary must know about them. And this kind of knowing is determined by the characteristics of the job, not the kind of "you know too much", and I don't worry about being killed by the boss. Because the boss's next secretary still needs to know so much. In addition, the secretary often deals with the boss, so naturally there are many opportunities to influence the boss's decision-making. In this way, although the position of the secretary is not high, the influence is very large.

is not only close to the boss, but also more or less involved in a lot of secrets, such a person must and must be the boss's henchman. In the future, the chances of being promoted and taking charge of oneself will definitely be much higher than others. Actually, it's not just the boss's secretary, but other secretaries as well. For example, He Shen, a famous corrupt official in Chinese history, started by working as a secretary for the Qianlong Emperor, who loved cultural relics the most.

"That's good, which bank? If I had known you wanted this, I would have deposited my money in your bank. Edison half-truthfully said, "You're going to give me the best interest rate." ”

"I'm at Morgan Bank. If you're willing to put your money in JPMorgan Bank, that's a great help. I will definitely be able to get you the best deal. Jericho replied earnestly.

"Morgan Bank? Are you following Mr. Morgan? Then you have a great future! At this moment, Edison was really surprised. Being Morgan's handler is definitely a career with both promise and money.

"That's no match for you." Jericho said, "You're a big inventor in the United States, and the technology shares you have in your hands alone should be enough to make you a millionaire, right?" As far as I know, Mr. Martin, who invented open-hearth steelmaking, is already a millionaire by virtue of his stake in open-hearth steelmaking technology alone. You invented the electric light, you invented the telephone, you invented the gramophone, you invented the vacuum tube, none of these things are worse than open-hearth steelmaking, my brother, you don't already have to be a multimillionaire, right? ”

Hearing this, Edison's face changed unconsciously. Because his situation is completely different from Martin's. Open-hearth steelmaking was first studied independently by Martin for a long time, and it was only when he was close to success that the MacDonald consortium offered him an investment. Therefore, in the cooperation between Martin and the MacDonald consortium, Martin's identity has always been a joint venture, so as open-hearth steelmaking continues to bring huge profits to the McDonnell consortium, Martin himself has also relied on this to get a lot of money.

But Edison's situation was completely different, Edison was only a failed junior clerk before he was discovered by Scrooge, and after that, he was only a senior staff member in the MacDonald consortium. Moreover, what is even worse is that those epoch-making inventions, although in terms of publicity, the company gave itself the main honor in order to cater to the psychology of the masses who need heroes, but the patent rights of those inventions are completely the company, and have nothing to do with Edison. Even, even those most critical ideas or something were actually taken out by the company's big boss Scrooge, Edison is just a senior technician responsible for turning the boss's genius design into industrial design, and if you really want to talk about patent rights or anything, it will not be Edison's turn. Of course, no matter how high Edison's IQ was, he could not have imagined that most of the whimsy that his boss Scrooge admired was actually plagiarized from his designs in another time and space.

As a senior technician, Edison, one of the leaders of the research project, can be said to have a very high salary, but compared to Martin, who actually owns the technology shares brought by his own patent rights, Edison is still a poor man.

"If you want to say, you already have a net worth of millions, or even tens of millions, and it's really rare for you to live so simply." Jericho continued to say what sounded harsh to Edison, as if he didn't notice the change in Edison's face.

Unlike Maxwell, who was preoccupied with science, Edison was the kind of scientist who devoted his entire life and all his energies to the most immortal cause of mankind—the struggle to reveal the truth of nature. Of course, he also loves science, but he also loves the money that science and technology can bring with almost the same or even more enthusiasm. In the original time and space, the biggest reason why Edison and Tesla, the leader of science, fell out, was money. Even in order to combat Tesla, Edison exhausted all kinds of means, including some very despicable means, to oppose the obviously more technically reasonable and promising alternating current. With Edison's IQ, doesn't he know who is right on this issue, he or Tesla? But Edison hated alternating current to the point where people thought he was a little paranoid. Why is that? Quite simply, it's for the money!

Unlike Maxwell, who spent all his time on scientific research, Edison still knew a lot about human affairs. He thought about it for a moment, and then he understood Jericho's purpose in coming to the door. Maxwell didn't think about the economic impact of Scrooge's coma. But Edison was different, he had been thinking about this for a long time. He felt that if the Dashi yàn room was not under the leadership of Scrooge, at least in the field of engineering, he would be the absolute boss. If Scrooge is okay, then his role can be replaced. But if Scrooge can't wake up, then he will immediately become irreplaceable. The price of a replaceable staff member and an irreplaceable leader is absolutely not the same. Maybe you should talk to the people above, and they should understand the change. In the future, I may be able to earn a lot of technology equity returns.

Jericho now follows Morgan. Edison was aware of the problems McDonald Ventures had been going on recently. Behind this there must be the black hand of the gang of Wall Street bankers represented by Morgan. Now, Jericho suddenly came to the door and deliberately mentioned Martin, no doubt that this was deliberately provoking contradictions between himself and the MacDonald consortium. Most of them wanted to take the opportunity to dig up the most precious treasure of the MacDonald Consortium, the corner of the Dashi yàn room. However, although this behavior is not good for the Macdonald consortium, it is very beneficial for Edison. With Morgan's invitation, Edison felt that it was simply too advantageous for him to bargain with the guys above.

"Jericho, you don't have to pretend. Mr. Morgan asked you to dig the foot of the wall, right? Now that he had figured this question out, Edison decided not to have any more relationships with this former friend, now Morgan's generation. The rational person went around in circles with a clear pretense of confusion.

"Yes, I don't have any technical equity in my hands, because the patents for electric lights and all that are in Mr. MacDonald's. I'm just a senior mechanic. Edison continued, "I am not irreplaceable in the Great Reality room. ”

"Even with Mr. Scrooge 61 MacDonald fully healthy, it's not easy to find a technical project leader as good as you." Jericho said, "Mr. Morgan was very envious of the MacDonald family's technology-leading, patent-monopoly management methods. It's just that when Mr. Scrooge 61 Mr. MacDonald was healthy, anyone who walked such a path like him was dead. But now, we judge, the odds of Mr. Scrooge 61 Mr. MacDonald waking up are slim. So, we also intend to build a similar Dashi yàn room at Yale or Haval. We'd like to know if you're interested in where you can become a technical director. Mr. Morgan, let me tell you that, if you wish, you will receive about twenty percent of the results of any research project in these rooms that you are chairing. Thomas, are you interested in this? ”