Crossing the ferry one morning I was joined by a friend in the employ of a Stock Exchange firm, then well known, but since retired from business.
I had been thinking of an investment and spoke to him on the subject, telling him the amount of money I had to invest. I had in mind the buying of some good bonds.
My friend, who was a most plausible talker, had, I understood, made considerable money in Wall Street, and when he told me of a movement in certain stocks then being manipulated for a rise, through his office, I was at first interested and then carried away with the desire to enter what seemed such an easy road to wealth.
He told me of several instances where the investment of a few thousands had resulted in enormous profits. These stories usually get to public knowledge one way or another, but the other side, the vastly greater number of cases where ruin and often worse follows, one does not hear so much of.
Before I went home that day I had bought five hundred shares of stock and had deposited as a margin five thousand dollars. I was told that the margin would surely be ample to carry the stock through any possible fluctuations, that I was not to feel alarmed if I saw the price go off a point or two, and that I was certain to see a twenty-point rise within a few weeks.
On my way home that afternoon I, for the first time in my life, read in the paper closing prices at the Stock Exchange, before reading anything else.
My stock was up half a point above the price I paid and I experienced a feeling of jubilation that was very pleasant. I saw in my mind my five thousand dollars transformed into fifteen thousand.
It was great!
At first I thought I would tell my wife about it, then decided not to do so, but to wait and surprise her with the good news when the money was made.
Fatal mistake.