“Of course the stock began to show strength as soon as I stopped selling,” Dodge went on: “Everybody was watching me. I sent three messages to Cooper Gillett from the floor, and got no answer. Finally I left the floor, and went to his office. Keep and Shriver were with him. He was biting his nails in a blue funk. When I asked for additional orders to sell, he flew into a passion. ‘I’m already short forty thousand shares of the damned stock!’ he cried. ‘Suppose she jumps five points more? I should be seriously embarrassed!’
“We all laughed a little at this,” Dodge went on. “ ‘Seriously embarrassed’ sounded comic, coming from him. ‘How about the rest of us?’ said I. ‘We have all put every cent we possessed into this.’
“ ‘The more fools, you!’ he said.
“ ‘We followed you in,’ I reminded him.
“ ‘Yah! and now you look to me to get you out again!’ he snarled. ‘I must throw away a million maybe, to save your paltry thousands!’
“I gave it to him straight, then. ‘Look here,’ said I, ‘that’s not the point. Never mind what we stand to lose. I’m your broker, and I’m supposed to give you honest advice. Well, here it is! Everybody knows you can’t go into a deal like this, and stop half way. You might just as well stand on the corner, and pitch your money down a sewer opening. As soon as I stopped selling for you, the stock began to rise. When it becomes generally known that you have released the pressure on it, it will rebound like a rubber ball. It won’t be a question of five points rise then, but ten, and very likely twenty. You’ll lose half a million dollars, and become a laughing-stock. I’ll be ruined. . . .’
“ ‘On the other hand,’ I said, ‘if you see the thing through, you can’t lose! This is simply a duel between you and the Mattisons of Chicago. Well, you’ve got more money and more credit than that crowd. As yet, you haven’t begun to touch your resources. You’re bound to beat them out in the end. . . . Now what are my instructions for the opening on Monday?’
“But he only sat there glowering and biting his fingers. I couldn’t get him up to the sticking-point. Your name was never mentioned, but we could all see that he wanted you to buck him up, and wouldn’t admit it. You must see him to-day, Kaplan, or we’ll all be in the soup. He’s going out of town over Sunday.”
“But I can’t see him unless he sends for me,” Joe objected. “If I go after him, he is bound to take the defensive, just as he did with you.”
“He’ll never send for you,” said Dodge gloomily, “because he’s ashamed to admit that a man as young as you has so much influence over him. . . . Couldn’t you run into him as if by accident?”