“Mr. Williams, Mr. Grinnell may call on us for drafts on Europe. You will place yourself at his disposal, and give him your very best efforts at all times.”
“Certainly, sir,” said the assistant cashier, with a hasty deference. “Very glad to do what I can, Mr. Grinnell,” he said, in a grateful voice, to the young man.
“That is all,” said the president. The assistant cashier apologized facially, and left the room.
Grinnell rose to go. “Good-morning, Mr. Dawson. I’ll be around when my month is up.
“You are not doing time, Mr. Grinnell,” smiled the president.
“I feel like it. I don’t like idleness. Good-morning.”
He didn’t like idleness! He would resume the manufacture of gold! Given rope, the young man would hang himself and the bond-holding public. But Dawson now had no bonds. When the discovery came, the community would be convulsed. The bank was fortifying itself with legal tender notes. Gold would have but little value when the crash came. There were various points to study. In the entire affair there was but one danger. The president voiced it.
“William,” he said, “after the cat’s out of the bag, what’s to hinder Grinnell, out of pure philanthropy, from stopping his production of gold in order to avert a disastrous world panic?”
“I’ve thought of that,” answered the richest man in the world, with a calmness that came from previous meditation and settled conviction. “He’s quite likely to cease his operations in new gold, as he calls them. But not before there has been a crash, Richard. And we will then be his principal advisers. I feel he will keep on until the mischief is done. We are prepared now. And yet, somehow—” His face clouded with doubt.
George Mellen entered hurriedly. “Here, Richard, here are my bonds.” The president looked at the long list. “Those I’ve marked with a cross I’ve already ordered sold. Meighan & Cross, and W. A. Shaw & Co. are practically giving them away at this moment,” finished George Mellen, with a touch of bitterness.