A few days later public announcement was made that the Brookline Gas Company, Rogers' corporation, had been awarded the contract for lighting Boston, and that henceforth the legal price of gas to the consumer was to be $1 per thousand feet. This was due notice to all concerned that "Standard Oil" had captured City Hall, and Addicks realized his error. He sought the mayor's office, but the mayor had no time to see him. His companies met the new rate. There was nothing else for them to do.
CHAPTER XV
THE GREAT BAY STATE GAS FIGHT
It was to this condition that I had to adapt my campaigning plans. I determined first to raise the market price of Addicks' securities; to turn the tide against the "Standard Oil" by that most potent of stock-market weapons, publicity; and then to attack Rogers from the rear through the City Hall. For Addicks to attempt to match pocket-books with Rogers and "Standard Oil" in corrupting city or State officials I knew would be useless; and besides a fundamental stipulation in the agreement with the Delaware financier on the Now-Then had been that under no circumstances should bribery or corruption be allowed to enter into any of our plans while I was connected with the enterprise. I had always held, do now, and always shall hold, that the meanest crime in the calendar of vice is bribery of the servants of the people. I felt pretty sure, moreover, that I could play a card that would more than offset the dollars of "Standard Oil." Nathan Matthews was on the high-road to the governor's chair, but I happened to know that, however ambitious he might be for political preferment, his temperament rendered him more avid for distinction in business. Addicks had within his gift the richest plum in all the Boston commercial world. As controller of the affairs of the Bay State Company of Delaware, which controlled the nomination and consequent election of the officers of the old Boston gas companies, he could award to any one he pleased the presidency of these corporations, together with the large salary that went with the office.[6]
My plans in shape, I rushed to the firing-line. I began with a statement to the investors of New England and the gas consumers of Boston brimming over with facts and figures. Then I fired a volley of candid details as to the manner in which city and State officials had recently betrayed the public's interests. Lastly, I discharged at "Standard Oil" a broadside which my attorneys and friends assured me meant jail on a libel charge. I put my banking-house and my personal guarantee behind the old and new loans, and proceeded to roll up my sleeves in the stock-market. I got results at once. A change became apparent in public sentiment—the rottenness of Addicksism was overcome by the stench of "Standard Oil." The prices of Bay State stocks and bonds shot up; loan funds were offered freely and at lower rates of interest.
There were, however, reprisals. Rogers met my onslaught by a manœuvre new in "Standard Oil" tactics. He came into the open, issuing a proclamation over his own signature which gave me the lie, at the same time tearing off a yard or two of my skin and throwing on a bucket of brine to remind me I had lost it. This attack was just off the press when I was out with a rejoinder which he, in after-years, referred to as quite the hottest thing of its kind he had ever read. In it I calmly, but in that "chunk English" which those who really wish to convey the truth naked can always find handy, told him plainly who he was, explicitly what "Standard Oil" was, and exactly who and what I was. I opine that about either assault there was nothing dignified, generous, or refined, but in stock-exchange battles one has not time to scent shrapnel. The immediate result of this interchange of deckle-edged[7] insults was to daze the public. "Standard Oil" attacked and actually replying; Rogers assaulting Lawson and Lawson sending back worse than he got—almost anything might happen next. It was right here I got to Rogers' solar plexus. I came out with another plain public talk, and gave him the choice of haling me into court—in which event I pledged him my word I would send him and his associates to jail for bribery and other crimes—or of acknowledging to the world he was licked and on the run. He was silent and I loudly claimed victory. The price of Addicks stocks quickly emphasized our success by a further advance.
Thus far the campaign appeared to be working smoothly, and I turned my attention next to my rear attack. I began negotiations with Mayor Matthews for the withdrawal of his support from Rogers. It was a difficult task, but after much manœuvring I landed my big fish. I promised him the presidency of the Boston, South Boston, Roxbury, and Bay State gas companies for the term of three years, at a salary of $25,000 per annum, with the explicit understanding that he was to allow me, as his vice-president, to see that the bargain between us was lived up to. When the trade was made it was understood that the fact of Matthews' change of base should be kept secret, and that he should not assume the office until the end of his term as mayor of Boston. With that agreement the deal was clinched, signed, sealed, and delivered.
In order that my readers may comprehend the events that follow, it is necessary that they understand something of the complications in which Addicks' manipulations had involved that corporation.