All this was flashing through my mind while I was thanking him.
“I am glad to have such a long forewarning,” I was saying. “Can I be of use to you? You know my machinery is perfect—I can buy anything and in any quantity without starting rumors and drawing the crowd.”
“No thank you, Matthew,” was his answer. “I have all of those stocks I wish—at present.”
Whether it is peculiar to me, I don't know—probably not—but my memory is so constituted that it takes an indelible and complete impression of whatever is sent to it by my eyes and ears; and just as by looking closely you can find in a photographic plate a hundred details that escape your glance, so on those memory plates of mine I often find long afterward many and many a detail that escaped me when my eyes and ears were taking the impression. On my memory plate of that moment in my interview with Roebuck, I find details so significant that my failing to note them at the time shows how unfit I then was to guard my interests. For instance, I find that just before he spoke those words declining my assistance and implying that he had already increased his holdings, he opened and closed his hands several times, finally closed and clinched them—a sure sign of energetic nervous action, and in that particular instance a sign of deception, because there was no energy in his remark and no reason for energy. I am not superstitious, but I believe in palmistry to a certain extent. Even more than the face are the hands a sensitive recorder of what is passing in the mind.
But I was then too intent upon my dilemma carefully to study a man who had already lulled me into absolute confidence in him. I left him as soon as he would let me go. His last words were, “No gambling, Matthew! No abuse of the opportunity God is giving us. Be content with the just profits from investment. I have seen gamblers come and go, many of them able men—very able men. But they have melted away, and where are they? And I have remained and have increased, blessed be God who has saved me from the temptations to try to reap where I had not sown! I feel that I can trust you. You began as a speculator, but success has steadied you, and you have put yourself on the firm ground where we see the solid men into whose hands God has given the development of the abounding resources of this beloved country of ours.”
Do you wonder that I went away with a heart full of shame for the gambling projects my head was planning upon the information that good man had given me?
I shut myself in my private office for several hours of hard thinking—as I can now see, the first real attention I had given my business in two months. It soon became clear enough that my Textile plunge was a folly; but it was too late to retrace. The only question was, could and should I assume additional burdens? I looked at the National Coal problem from every standpoint—so I thought. And I could see no possible risk. Did not Roebuck's statement make it certain as sunrise that, as soon as the reorganization was announced, all coal stocks would rise? Yes, I should be risking nothing; I could with absolute safety stake my credit; to make contracts to buy coal stocks at present prices for future delivery was no more of a gamble than depositing cash in the United States Treasury.
“You've gone back to gambling lately, Matt,” said I to myself. “You've been on a bender, with your head afire. You must get out of this Textile business as soon as possible. But it's good sound sense to plunge on the coal stocks. In fact, your profits there would save you if by some mischance Textile should rise instead of fall. Acting on Roebuck's tip isn't gambling, it's insurance.”
I emerged to issue orders that soon threw into the National Coal venture all I had not staked on a falling market for Textiles. I was not content—as the pious gambling-hater, Roebuck, had begged me to be—with buying only what stock I could pay for; I went plunging on, contracting for many times the amount I could have bought outright.
The next time I saw Langdon I was full of enthusiasm for Roebuck. I can see his smile as he listened.