The broker shook his head.
“You might have done that two days ago, but now? with gilt-edged stock like Rockervelt’s on the toboggan how can you expect to raise a loan on Northern Pacifics? I don’t believe any one would venture a thousand dollars on that security to-day. Those who have money are sitting on it, waiting for the clouds to roll by. This may be merely a little financial flutter and a quick recovery, or it may prove the beginning of a commercial crisis that will last for two or three years.”
“Yet these devils in New York heedlessly run the whole country into such a risk to make a few more dirty dollars for themselves, who are already millionaires.”
The veins in Steele’s forehead were swelling, and his hair bristled with indignation, but the broker merely threw back his head and laughed.
“Satan reproving sin!” he cried. “What were you doing, a man with a quarter of a million or so, but trying to add a few dollars, dirty or clean, to that amount.”
“True, true,” said John, calming down suddenly, “you are in the right. Well, good morning; I see there’s a host waiting for you, and as you have no advice to give, and no money to lend, I’ll see what I can do outside.” He walked to the nearest telegraph station, and sent a message to Philip Manson in New York:
“Can you telegraph me twenty-one thousand dollars? Will forward as security sixty thousand par-value Northern Pacific.”
This handed over, he returned to his office, opened the safe, took out the Northern Pacific securities, and placed them on his desk. For an hour and a half he was busy giving directions to this man or that, then a telegram was brought in to him from Philip Manson.
“Very sorry, but have lost everything I possessed in yesterday’s panic.”
“Poor old Manson,” mused Steele sadly. “So he was caught in the trap too. Well, after all, when an old and experienced man is nipped, there is some excuse for myself.” He thrust the securities in his pocket, put on his hat, and paid a visit to Colonel Beck. That benign gentleman received him with beaming effusion.