"How would a piece of broadcloth answer your purpose?"
"What is it worth?"
"I have a piece of twenty yards, worth eight dollars a yard. It would bring six and a half under the hammer. You can hold that, if you please."
"How much interest will you pay?"
"I will give you two dollars for the use of one hundred for thirty days."
"If you will say three, you may have it."
"Three per cent. a month!--thirty-six per cent. a year! Oh no! That would ruin any man."
"I don"t think the operation worth making for less than three dollars."
"It is too much, Wolford. But I"ll tell you what I"ll do. Let it be for sixty days, and make the interest five dollars."
"I to hold the cloth as security until it is paid?"
"Certainly."
"Very well. You shall have the money."
A note for one hundred and five dollars, at sixty days, was drawn and handed to the young shaver, who paid down one hundred dollars, and went off with his collateral under his arm.
This transaction opened a new world to Wolford"s imagination. Two and a half per cent. a month, and six per cent. per annum, could hardly be compared together. He sat down and began to figure up the result of the one operation in comparison with the other, and found that while his investment in ground-rents yielded only three hundred dollars a year, five thousand dollars, at two and a half per cent. a month, the rate at which he had made the operation just referred to, would yield fifteen hundred dollars per annum!
From that moment he became dissatisfied with ground-rents as an investment. As quickly as it could be done, he sold, for one thousand dollars, a piece of real estate, and, depositing the money in bank, looked around him for good paper to shave. He did not have to look very long. Borrowers quickly presented themselves, but no one got money except on the most tangible kind of security, and at a ruinous interest. Careful as he tried to be, Wolford was not always successful in his operations. One or two failures on the part of his borrowers, made him acquainted at a magistrate"s office, where he acquired another new idea upon which he improved.
"If you wish to invest money safely and profitably, I will put you in the way of doing it," said a petty dispenser of justice to poor debtors, rogues and vagabonds, aside to the miser one day, after he had given judgment against a delinquent borrower.
"How?" eagerly asked Wolford.
"A great many cases of debt are decided by me every week, on amounts varying from one to fifty dollars," replied the magistrate. "As soon as a judgment is given, the debtor has to pay the money, find security, or go to jail, In most cases, the matter is settled by security for six months, when the debt, with costs and interest, has to be paid."
"Legal interest?" asked Wolford.
"Certainly," replied the magistrate, with a smile. "It is a legal matter, and only legal interest can be charged."
"Oh, of course! I didn"t think of that."
"Very well: after a judgment is obtained, in five cases out of six the prosecutor is sick, of the business, and perfectly willing to sell out the judgment and have no more to do with it. The best business in the world is to buy these judgments. You can make at least forty per cent. per annum."
"What!"
"Forty per cent."
"Forty per cent!" and Wolford"s eyes sparkled. "Are you sure?"
"Oh, yes. If I were allowed to buy them, as I am not, I would wish no better business."
"You think it safe?"
"Nothing can be safer. If the judgment is not paid at the end of six months, you can go to work immediately, with an execution, on the property of the original debtor, or his security, as you may think best, and at once obtain your money."
"Suppose neither of them have any property?"
"I take very good care not to accept bad security. Besides, you will find but few persons out of whom fifty dollars, or less, may not be obtained, under the pressure of an execution."
"I like the idea amazingly," said Wolford, thoughtfully. "Forty per cent. per annum! Capital! I will buy judgments."
"I have two hundred dollars" worth in my desk now, which I have directions to sell. Do you want them? They have six months to run.
Twenty per cent. off will be just forty dollars--here they are."
Wolford carefully examined the doc.u.ments which the magistrate placed in his hands, and, after considering the subject for some time, said that he would buy them. His check for one hundred and sixty dollars was received by the magistrate, and the judgments became his property.
"It"s even better than forty per cent. per annum," remarked the magistrate, as he folded up the check he had received.
"How so?"
"You make over fifty-five per cent."
"Indeed!"
"Yes--look at it. You have just paid one hundred and sixty dollars for what will yield you two hundred and six dollars in six months,--for you must remember that you will get legal interest on the claim you have bought. Now this is a fraction over fifty-five per cent. per annum. What do you think of that for an investment?"
"Capital! But have you much of this kind of business?"
"Enough to, keep several thousand dollars constantly employed for you."
"Good!"
With this brief e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.n, that came from Wolford"s heart, he turned away and left the office.
On this operation, the magistrate made six per cent. The regular selling price of judgments was twenty-five per cent., with a commission of one per cent. for effecting the sale.
In a few months, Wolford had all his money invested in judgments.
This business he continued for several years, meeting with but few losses. He could then write himself worth twenty-five thousand dollars, and began to find it necessary to seek for some heavier investments than buying judgments, even if they did not pay quite so well.
Loaning money on mortgages of real estate, at about ten per centum, he found a very safe business; with this he united the shaving of undoubted paper, at from one to two per cent. a month. Mr. Tompkins he had frequently shaved so closely as almost to make the blood come. This was previous to the loan before alluded to. Since that had been made, Mr. Tompkins rarely found it necessary to put good paper into Wolford"s hands for discount. This the miser considered a dead loss, and he therefore determined that the loan should be taken up, and made in some quarter not likely to affect the shaving operations.
The declaration of Mr. Tompkins, that he could easily get some one else to take the mortgage, was not too well relished by Wolford, If he were sure this could be done, he would be content to accept an increase of interest and continue the loan, for the security was of the very safest kind, and ample.
"I must think about this," said he to himself, as he walked homeward, after parting with Tompkins. "I rarely make false moves, and should not like to do so in this case."
CHAPTER II.