He kept up this reassurance until cotton began to sell, and then he postponed:
"Wait; we are all easier now. Got enough so I can cash in any day and have plenty to pay all bills. But just wait until it goes a little higher."
And when it had gone to eight cents, eight and a half, and at last nine, his creditors had ceased to worry him. Now that Reedy could sell out any day and liquidate, and still be worth a hundred thousand or more, there was no hurry to collect. Nobody wants to push a man who can pay his debts any hour. Some of them even began to lend him more money. He had borrowed $25,000 as a first payment on the $200,000 for the Dillenbeck water system.
To-night Reedy had a list of figures before him again. Cotton had touched 9.76 to-day. Things were coming to a head. It was time to act.
Reedy had one set of figures in which 8,000 bales were multiplied by fifty and a fraction. It added $474,000. There was a column of smaller sums, the largest of which was, Revenue $28,000. These smaller sums were totalled and subtracted from $474,000, leaving $365,000—a sum over which Reedy moistened his lips. Then he multiplied 15,000 acres by something and set that sum also under the $365,000 and added again. The total made him roll his pencil between his two plump hands.
Madrigal, the Mexican Jew, entered with a jaunty gesture, and took a chair and lighted a cigarette.
"When did you get back from Guaymas?" Reedy leaned back, lighted a match on the bottom of his chair and touched it to a plump cigar.
"Yesterday, Señor Reedy." There was always a mixture of aggressiveness and mocking freshness in Madrigal's tone and air.
"See Bondeberg?"
The Mexican nodded.