Gilmartin, with the ten dollars he had borrowed, promptly bought ten shares in a bucket shop at 63%; the stock promptly went to 62%; he was promptly “wiped”; and the stock promptly went back to 64%.
On the next day a fellow-customer of Gilmartin of old days invited him to have a drink. Gil-martin resented the man’s evident prosperity. He felt indignant at the ability of the other to buy hundreds of shares. But the liquor soothed him, and in a burst of mild remorse he told Smithers, after an apprehensive look about him as if he feared some one might overhear: “I’ll tell you something, on the dead q. t., for your own benefit.”
“Fire away!”
“Pa. Cent, is going ‘way up.”
“Yes?” said Smithers, calmly.
“Yes; it will cross par sure.”
“Umph!” between munches of a pretzel.
“Yes. Sam Sharpe told”—Gilmartin was on the point of saying a “friend of mine,” but caught himself and went on, impressively—“told me, yesterday, to buy Pa. Cent., as he had accumulated his full line, and was ready to whoop it up. And you know what Sharpe is,” he finished, as if he thought Smithers was familiar with Sharpe’s powers.
“Is that so,” nibbled Smithers.
“Why, when Sharpe makes up his mind to put up a stock, as he intends to do with Pa. Cent., nothing on earth can stop him. He told me he would make it cross par within sixty days. This is no hearsay, no tip. It’s cold facts, I don’t hear it’s going up; I don’t think it’s going up; I know it’s going up. Understand?” And he shook his right forefinger with a hammering motion.