"To get forty thousand dollars--if I have to turn highwayman," Sherman flung over his shoulder.
CHAPTER XXXVII
"GIVE US OUR SAVINGS!"
As he left the bank Sherman cast over in his mind with desperate swiftness the list of men to whom he could go for financial support. Turner, Lucas & Co. had loaned Captain Folsom $25,000 on his two late ventures, the Metropolitan Theatre and the Tehama House. Both, under normal conditions, would have made their promoter rich. But nothing was at par these days.
Sherman wondered uneasily whether Folsom could help. He was not a man to save money, and the banker, who made it his business to know what borrowers of the bank's money did, knew that Folsom liked gambling, frequented places where the stakes ran high. Of late he had met heavy losses. However, he was a big man, Sherman reasoned; he should have large resources. Both of them were former army officers. That should prove a bond between them. At Captain Folsom's house an old negro servant opened the door, his wrinkled black face anxious.
"Mars Joe, he ain't right well dis evenin'," he said, evasively, but when Sherman persisted he was ushered into a back room where sat the redoubtable captain, all the fierceness of his burnside whiskers, the austerity of his West Point manner, melted in the indignity of sneezes and wheezes.
Sherman looked at him in frank dismay.
"Heavens, man," he said, "I'm sorry to intrude on you in this condition ... but my errand won't wait...."
"What do you want, Bill Sherman?" the sick man glowered.