The impulse to come and have it out in this manner was big-man-like, I thought, even though the root was self-justification. No one else had done so much. All the others had gone slinking away. If Galt had responded differently a real friendship might have blazed there, for instinctively they liked and admired each other. Their antagonism was not essential. And, besides, the real reason, as we afterward knew, was the one he gave first. Potter, with all his wealth, was himself in a tight place. Bullguard was pressing the oil crowd, too.
“That’s understood,” said Galt, in his worst manner. “I didn’t buy your pride. I only rented it. Now you’ve got it back, look it over, see how much it’s damaged, and send me a bill.”
Potter went out roaring oaths.
A change was taking place in Galt. I saw it in sudden, unexpected glimpses. The movements of his body were slower. Anger and irritation no longer found outlet in tantrums, but in sneering, terrible sarcasms, uttered in a cold voice. He looked without seeing and spoke as from a great distance, high up. His mind, when he revealed it, was the same as ever. Nothing had happened to his mind. His soul lived in torment. His greatest sin had been to hold public opinion in contempt. Now it was paying him back. To have deserved the opprobrium and suspicion with which he was overwhelmed would perhaps have killed him then; but to suffer disgrace undeservedly was in one way worse. He reacted by suspecting those who suspected him, and some who didn’t. I believe at one time he almost suspected Mordecai, whose loyalty never for one moment wavered.
However, Mordecai knew, as no one else did, that Galt was still in a very strong position. He had not begun to strike. Thanks to the intuition which moved him at the onset to convert two thirds of his fortune into cash he could, when the moment came, strike hard.
Now came the day of days,—the time when Bullguard did his utmost. Fastenings gave way. Walls rocked. Strong men lost their rational faculties and retained only the power of primitive vocal utterance. The sounds that issued from the Stock Exchange were appalling. The ear would think a demented menagerie was devouring itself. Thousands of small craft disappeared that day and left no trace.
Great Midwestern, spilling out on the tape in five and ten-thousand share blocks, fell twenty points in two hours. Galt was in his office at the ticker. Mordecai was with him, holding his hands reverently together, gazing at the tape in a state of fascination. On one headlong impulse Great Midwestern touched one hundred dollars a share,—par! It had fallen from two-hundred-and-twenty in three months.
“It’s over,” said Galt, turning away. I once saw a great prizefighter, on giving the knock-out blow at the end of a hard battle, turn his back with the same gesture and walk to his own corner.
“Vhat iss id you zay?” asked Mordecai, following.
“It’s over,” Galt repeated. “They haven’t got me and they can’t go any further without breaking themselves. Get your house on the wire. That’s the direct telephone ... that one. I want to give an order.”