“I am with you there, Ike,” answered Joe. “If Barry Conant’s knife-edged teeth ever spelt a killin’, they do to-day. I just got orders from somewhere to drop call money from four to two and a half per cent., and they have given me ten millions to drop it with and the order is to favour Sugar as ‘collat.’ Some one is anxious to make it easy for the bleaters to get the coin to buy all the Sugar they want. Ike, you and I might make turkey money for Thanksgiving if we only knew whether Barry and his bunch were going to shoot her up thirty or forty points before they turned the bag upside down, or whether they will bury them from 200 to 150. What do you think?”
“I gant make out, aldo I haf vatched dem sharp all day. Dey certainly haf deh lambs lined up right now for any vey dey vont to twist id. I nefer see a petter market for a deluge. From Barry’s movements all day I should say dey vould keep hoistin’ her until apout noon to-morrow, unt dat deh might get her up to two-tirty or even to deh two-fifty. Put dere are von or two topes on deh sheet vhat run deh uder vay. First der is dey fact you gant run out, dat dere is alreaty on deh Sugar vagon deh piggest load of chuicy suckers dat efer game in from deh suppurbs. Sharley Pates says if any von hat tapped his Vashington vire er any utter Capitol vire dis veek he vould haf tought dere vas a Senate, House, unt Kabinet roll-gall on. Deh topes say ‘Cam’ vill nefer led dat fat punch off grafters slite out mit real money if he gan help id unt deh game iss endirely in his hands.”
“I agree with you, Ike. If I had the steering of this killing I don’t think I would take any chance of tempting them to dump and grab the profits by carrying it much over 200. But you can’t tell what ‘Cam’ and those four-eyed dentists at 26 Broadway will do.”
“Yes, put der iss anudder t’ing, Cho, dat makes me sit up unt plink about her goin’ ofer two hundred. To-morrow’s Friday der t’irteenth.”
“Of course, Ike, that is something to be reckoned with, and every man on the floor and in the Street as well has his eye on it. Friday, the 13th, would break the best bull market ever under way. You and I know that, Ike, and the dope shows it too, but you have got to stack this up against it on this trip: no man on the floor knows what Friday the 13th, means better than Barry Conant. He has worked it to the queen’s taste many a time. Why, Barry would not eat to-day for fear the food would get stuck in his windpipe. He’s never left the pole for a minute; but suppose, Ike, Barry has tipped off ‘Cam’ that all the boys will let go their fliers, and most of them will take one on the short side over to-night for a superstition drop at the opening; and suppose ‘Cam’ has told him to take them all into camp and give her a rafter-scraper at the opening, where would old Friday, 13th, land on to-morrow’s dope-sheets? Bring up the average, wouldn’t it, for five years to come? I tell you, Ike, she’s too deep for me this run, and I’m goin’ to let her alone and pay for the turkey out of loan commissions or stick to plain workday food.”
“Zame here, Cho. Say, Cho, haf you noticed Pop Prownlee to-tay? He has frozen to deh fringe off dat Sugar crowd ess t’ough some von hat nipped ‘is scarf-pin unt he vos layin’ for him ass he game out. He hasn’t made a trade to-tay unt yet he sticks like a stamp-tax. I ben keeping my eyes on him for I t’ought he hat someding up his sleeve dat might raise tust ven he tropt id. I dink Parry has hat deh same itear. He never loses sight of him, yet Pop hasn’t made a trade to-tay, unt here id iss twenty minutes of der glose unt dere iss Parry in deh centre again whooping her up ofer two hundred unt four.”
Chapter V.
Thursday, November 12th, was a memorable day in Wall Street. As the gong pealed its the-game’s-closed-till-another-day, the myriad of tortured souls that are supposed to haunt the treacherous bogs and quicksands of the great Exchange, where lie their earthly hopes, must have prayed with renewed earnestness for its destruction before the morrow. Never had the Stock Exchange folded its tents with surer confidence of continuing its victorious march. Sugar advanced with record-breaking total sales to 207½ and in the final half-hour carried the whole list of stocks up with it. In that time some of the railroads jumped ten points. Sugar closed at the very top amid great excitement, with Barry Conant taking all offered. During the last thirty minutes it had become evident to all that the boardroom traders and plungers, together with many of the semi-professional gamblers, who operated through commission houses, were selling out their long stock and going short over the opening of the Wall Street hoodoo-day, Friday, the thirteenth of the month. But it was also evident, with the heavy selling at the close and the stiffness of the price, which had never wavered as block after block was thrown on the market, that some powerful interest as well had taken cognisance of the fact that the morrow was hoodoo-day. At the close, most of the sellers, had they been granted another five minutes, would have repurchased, even at a loss, what they had sold, for it looked as though they had sold themselves into a trap. Their anxiety was intensified by the publication, a few minutes later, of this item:
“Barry Conant in coming from the Sugar crowd after the close remarked to a fellow broker, ‘By three o’clock to-morrow, Friday, the 13th, will have a new meaning to Wall Street.’ This was interpreted as pointing to a terrific jump in Sugar to-morrow.”
“The Street” knew that the news bureau that sent out this item was friendly to Barry Conant and the “System,” and that it would print nothing displeasing to them. Therefore, this must be, a foreword of the coming harvest of the bulls and the slaughter of the bears.