It required very little mathematical knowledge to arrive at the conclusion that with such another turn of speculative prosperity, he would, within the next six months, be a millionaire and have the original investment left intact. Then if he should make this on three turns, which seemed not unlikely, when he should be present to look after his own business, he might pile up millions by the dozen.
The mind of this fortunate speculator being filled with such thoughts as these, he lost no time after breakfast in taking the train on the elevated road and arrived at Ward’s office before business had begun. When Ward arrived he met his customer with a gracious smile, took the check in the most handsome manner and made a note of it in his book.
The investor had not very long to wait this time before he knew the result of his venture. It was only a few days prior to the 12th of May, 1884, at which date the failures of Grant & Ward and the Marine Bank were announced in Wall Street, as the avant courier of a sudden panic. So, the only thing that interfered with the second check producing similar results to those of the first, was the unfortunate panic, but of course Mr. Ward could tell his customer that he was not responsible for that.
In this connection an important financial question arises. Would there have been any panic had it not been for Ward, Fish, Eno & Co.? However this may be, there is one thing very evident, namely, that Mr. Ward must be accorded the power of ability to control men with whom he came in contact in a remarkable manner, and of being able to get the best of them in all financial matters. Old and astute financiers, who were considered experts in every method of speculation, and who knew all the artifices of making a sharp bargain, became helpless in the mystical presence of Ward, and were completely non-plussed by his superior acumen in taking advantage of every situation that offered the least opportunity of practicing his peculiar methods of chicanery and fraud.
Ward seems to have been very much of a mind reader. He knew when he passed that check over to the gentleman referred to, for $250,000, that it would come back again, that it would keep burning that man’s pocket while he kept it there, and that sooner or later he was bound to return it to the mysterious place of its issue. Doubtless this was not the first case that Ward had experimented upon in this way. He had evidently made a regular practice of it, and could calculate the proportion of his victims with as much accuracy as tables of mortality are made out for insurance companies. There was no blind chance about Ferdinand’s methods. He worked according to a rule, having calculated to a nicety the exceptions that proved it, and his success showed that he had not wasted much time over stubborn cases.
Ward displayed marvellous tact in discovering, at a glance, those who were sufficiently credulous to be entrapped into acquiescence with his schemes, and manifested great executive ability in pouncing upon his prey at the proper moment. His methods of operation were admirably suited to his purposes. He saw, for instance, that this man would not put the money in any other kind of investment, and would not be likely to operate, except through Ward himself, as no other man could be found anywhere who could make himself the instrument of realizing such stupendous returns for the money invested.
It is marvellous how the idea of large profits, when presented to the mind in a plausible light, has the effect of stifling suspicion.
The specious pretexts of Ward appeared equal to the task of overcoming the most obdurate cases of incredulity. So, it is not so singular, after all, that men utterly unacquainted with business methods and sharp practice in speculation, were so easily victimized by the sinister methods, conciliatory manners and seductive schemes of this consummate imposter.
Ward was so successful in his arts of persuasion that he could not only succeed in getting possession of all the available capital, for his own practical use, of many eminent financiers, but he had the power of transforming them into walking advertisements for the promotion of his nefarious designs, and turned them to the best account in drumming up business and customers for him while they were blissfully ignorant that they were all the time the subservient mediums of swindling projects. In fact, they made themselves the willing instruments of “roping” in others for Ward’s purposes, inspired by the purest motives of gratitude toward him as their confidential broker and benefactor.
In this way General Grant and his sons became the helpless victims of Ward’s deeply designing duplicity.