While the Paris Stock Exchange was closed in honor of Aristide Briand, while 500,000 Parisians reverently stood in the Champs Elysée intent upon the Peach Man's funeral, a large pistol went off in a luxurious apartment nearby. No one heard it except Ivar Kreuger, the "Swedish Match King," the self-made colossus of Scandinavian finance. Matchman Kreuger was putting a bullet into his heart for business reasons (see p. 45) and for human reasons. His nerves were drawn so taut (he had suffered a nervous breakdown recently in New York) that to release...
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