As the first coupon-holder entered H. R. rose and took from his pocket a huge roll of bills, all yellow-backs. He carelessly peeled off one of them and with a bow handed it to the Mayor.
Everybody sat up straight. His Honor looked at it. It was for ten thousand dollars. He nodded and then silently passed it to a bank president, who in turn examined it, nodded, and passed it on to a colleague. The reporters pressed forward.
"Experts in all kinds of small change," smiled H. R., pointing to the bankers.
The reporters' eyes followed the return of the ten-thousand-dollar bill to the Mayor. They also decided that H. R.'s roll was the most impressive demonstration of brute strength ever seen in New York.
Then H. R. asked his question, slowly, distinctly, enunciating carefully and smiling the while:
"What is it we have all heard about from earliest childhood and that we acknowledge exists; that is neither a person nor a beast, neither a thing nor an object, but something that no man can kill, though it is dead to-day; that all men need and most New-Yorkers neglect; that should be present everywhere and is found in no trade? The answer is a word of five letters and begins with A—the first letter of the alphabet, the first of the five vowels. There is another word, a synonym, which is now obsolescent, though it is at times used in poetry. But while either word will win the ten thousand dollars in cash now in the custody of the Mayor of New York, the word I particularly have in mind has five letters, of which the first is appropriately A, the Alpha of the Greeks, the Aleph of the Hebrews, and now the first of all the alphabets of European languages. It is logically the first letter because it is the first sound that man naturally makes—'A' or 'Ah!' The first letter! What is the word of five letters beginning with A that will give you ten thousand dollars? With 'A'! Now!"
Stop-watch in hand, H. R. began to move his left arm up and down like a referee at a prize-fight. He had astutely emphasized the fact that the word had five letters, of which the first was A. The mind of the coupon-holder was thus made to study the dictionary instead of thinking about the question itself.
It was inevitable as fate itself. The first man could not guess. Neither could the second nor any of the thousands. But before the applicant's indignation at the unfairness of the question and the shortness of the time could grow into fury H. R. exclaimed, "Time's up." Approaching the non-guesser, he whispered: "The name of the unsuccessful will not be given to the newspapers. Not by us! I thank you in the name of the poor starving people whose lives you have prolonged. That way to the seats. You can have your pick of the very best!"
In that simple way was bloodshed and the cry of fraud averted at one and the same time.