"Stick to that rule," Steele advises Hubbs. "Ask "em ten points more than outside quotations."
What really got things goin", though, was when some of the stock clerks and bookkeepers, who"d heard and talked nothin" but Gopher these last two days, begun buyin" lots outright and turnin" "em in for deeds.
Whether or not they believed all Hubbs had fed "em about Gopher don"t matter. They was takin" a chance. So they slips out at noon and gives real orders. Course, they wa"n"t plungin"; but the combined effect was the same.
And it don"t take the curb long to get wise. "The suckers are buying Gopher," was the word pa.s.sed round. Then maybe the quotations didn"t jump! There wa"n"t any quarter matchin" down in Broad street after that. They was too busy yellin" Gopher at each other. Up she went,--75, then 85, then 110, and when closin" hour come the third day it was the liveliest scene inside the ropes that the margin district had known in years.
I expect the newspapers helped a lot too. They had a heap of fun with Hubbs and his Gopher proposition,--Hubbs of Gopher, U.S.A. They printed pictures of him playin" the accordion, and interviews reproducin" his descriptive gems about "the banks of the pellucid Pinto," and such.
But you never can tell how a comedy stab is goin" to turn out. This game of buyin" real estate shares for a dollar or so, with the prospects that before night it might be worth twice as much, was one that hit "em hard.
By Friday Gopher stock was being advertised like Steel preferred, and the brokers was flooded with buyin" orders. Some of the big firms got into the game too. A fat German butcher came all the way down from the Bronx, counted out a thousand dollars in bills to Nelson Hubbs, and was satisfied to walk away with a deed for a hundred front feet of Gopher realty. He wasn"t such a b.o.o.b, either. Two hours later he could have closed out five hundred to the good.
It wa"n"t like a stock flurry, where there"s an inside gang manipulatin"
the wires. All the guidin" hand there was in this deal was that of J.
Bayard Steele, and he contents himself with eggin" Hubbs on to stand firm on that ten-cent raise.
"Not a penny more, not a penny less," says he, beamin". "It"ll get "em."
And I don"t know when I"ve seen him look more contented. As for Nelson Hubbs, he seems a little dazed at it all; but he keeps his head and smiles good-natured on everybody. Not until Gopher Development hits twenty-five dollars a share does he show any signs of gettin" restless.
"Boys," says he, bangin" his fist down on the desk, "it"s great! I"ve turned that thousand-dollar fund into fifty, and as near as I can figure it property values along our Main street have been jumped about eight hundred per cent. They"ve heard of it out home, and they"re just wild. I expect I ought to stay right here and push things; but--well, McCabe, maybe you can guess."
"No word from a certain party, eh?" says I.
Hubbs shakes his head and starts pacin" up and down in front of the window. He hadn"t done more"n three laps, though, before in blows a messenger boy and hands him a telegram.
"We-e-e-yow!" yells Hubbs. "Hey, Shorty, it"s come--doggoned if it ain"t come! Look at that!"
It was a brief bulletin, but full of meat. It runs like this:
Good work, Nelson. You"ve done it. Gopher"s on the map.
And the last we saw of him, after he"d turned the stock business over to Mendell & Co., he was pikin" for a west-bound train with his grip in one fist and that old accordion in the other.
J. Bayard smiles after him friendly and indulgent. "A woman in the case, I suppose?" says he.
"Uh-huh," says I. "The plumpest, cheeriest, winnin"est little body ever left unclaimed,--his description. She"s the lady Mayor out there. And if I"m any judge, with them two holdin" it down, Gopher"s on the map to stay."
CHAPTER IX
WHAT LINDY HAD UP HER SLEEVE
"But think of it, Shorty!" says Sadie. "What an existence!"
"There"s plenty worse off than her," says I; "so what"s the use?"
"I can"t help it," says she. "Twenty years! No holidays, no home, no relatives: nothing but sew and mend, sew and mend--and for strangers, at that! Talk about dull gray lives--ugh!"
"Well, she"s satisfied, ain"t she?" says I.
"That"s the worst of it," says Sadie. "She seems to live for her work.
Goodness knows how early she"s up and at it in the morning, and at night I have to drive her out of the sewing room!"
"And you kick at that?" says I. "Huh! Why, on lower Fifth-ave. they capitalize such habits and make "em pay for fifteen-story buildin"s.
Strikes me this Lindy of yours is perfectly good sweatshop material. You don"t know a good thing when you see it, Sadie."
"There, there, Shorty!" says she. "Don"t try to be comic about it.
There"s nothing in the least funny about Lindy."
She was dead right too; and all I meant by my feeble little cracks was that a chronic case of acute industry was too rare a disease for me to diagnose offhand. Honest, it almost gave me the fidgets, havin" Lindy around the house. Say, she had the busy bee lookin" like a corner loafer with his hands in his pockets!
About once a month we had Lindy with us, for three or four days at a stretch, and durin" that time she"d be gallopin" through all kinds of work, from darnin" my socks or rippin" up an old skirt, to embroiderin"
the fam"ly monogram on the comp"ny tablecloths; all for a dollar"n a half per, which I understand is under union rates. Course, Sadie always insists on throwin" in something for overtime; but winnin" the extra didn"t seem to be Lindy"s main object. She just wanted to keep goin", and if the work campaign wa"n"t all planned out for her to cut loose on the minute she arrived, she"d most have a fit. Even insisted on havin"
her meals served on the sewin" table, so she wouldn"t lose any time.
Sounds too good to be true, don"t it? But remember this ain"t a cla.s.s I"m describin": it"s just Lindy.
And of all the dried-up little old maids I ever see, Lindy was the queerest specimen. Seems she was well enough posted on the styles, and kept the run of whether sleeves was bein" worn full or tight, down over the knuckles or above the elbow, and all that; but her own costume was always the same,--a dingy brown dress that fits her like she"d cut it out in the dark and had put it together with her eyes shut,--a faded old brown coat with funny sleeves that had little humps over the shoulders, and a dusty black straw lid of no partic"lar shape, that sported a bunch of the saddest lookin" violets ever rescued from the ashheap.
Then she had such a weird way of glidin" around silent, and of shrinkin"
into corners, and flattenin" herself against the wall whenever she met anyone. Meek and lowly? Say, every motion she made seemed to be sort of a dumb apology for existin" at all! And if she had to go through a room where I was, or pa.s.s me in the hall, she"d sort of duck her head, hold one hand over her mouth, and scuttle along like a mouse beatin" it for his hole.
You needn"t think I"m pilin" on the agony, either. I couldn"t exaggerate Lindy if I tried. And if you imagine it"s cheerin" to have a human being as humble as all that around, you"re mistaken. Kind of made me feel as if I was a slave driver crackin" the whip.
And there wa"n"t any special reason that I could see for her actin" that way. Outside of her clothes, she wa"n"t such a freak. That is, she wa"n"t deformed, or anything like that. She wa"n"t even wrinkled or gray haired; though how she kept from growin" that way I couldn"t figure out.
I put it down that her lonesome, old maid existence must have struck in and paralyzed her soul.
There was another queer quirk to her too. Work up as much sympathy as you wanted to, you couldn"t do anything for her. Sadie ain"t slow at that, you know. She got int"rested in her right off, and when she discovers how Lindy lives in a couple of cheap rooms down in the Bronx all by herself, and never goes anywhere or has any fun, she proceeds to spring her usual uplift methods. Wouldn"t Lindy like a ticket to a nice concert? No, thanks, Lindy didn"t care much about music. Or the theater?
No, Lindy says she"s afraid to go trapesin" around town after dark.
Wouldn"t she quit work for an hour or so and come for a spin in the car, just to get the air? Lindy puts her hand over her mouth and shakes her head. Automobiles made her nervous. She tried one once, and was so scared she couldn"t work for two hours after. The subway trains were bad enough, goodness knows!
I couldn"t begin to tell you all the things Lindy was afraid of,--crowds, the dark, of getting lost, of meetin" strangers, of tryin"
anything new. I remember seein" her once, comin" out on the train. She"s squeezed into the end seat behind the door, and was huddled up there, grippin" a little black travelin" bag in one hand and a rusty umbrella in the other, and keepin" her eyes on the floor, for all the world like she"d run away from somewhere and was stealin" a ride. Get it, do you?
But wait! There was one point where Lindy had it on most of us. She knew where she was goin". Didn"t seem to have any past worth speakin"
about, except that she"d been born in England,--father used to keep a little store on some side street in Dover,--and she"d come over here alone when she was quite a girl. As for the present--well, I"ve been tryin" to give you a bird"s-eye view of that.
But when it comes to the future Lindy was right there with the goods.
Had it all mapped out for twenty years to come. Uh-huh! She told Sadie about it, ownin" up to bein" near forty, and said that when she was sixty she was goin" to get into an Old Ladies" Home. Some prospect--what? She"d even picked out the joint and had "em put her name down. It would cost her three hundred and fifty dollars, which she had salted away in the savings bank already, and now she was just driftin"
along until she could qualify in the age limit. Livin" just for that!
"Ah, can the gloom stuff, Sadie!" says I as she whispers this latest bulletin. "You give me the w.i.l.l.i.e.s, you and your Lindy! Why, that old horse chestnut out there in the yard leads a more excitin" existence than that! It"s preparin" to leaf out again next spring. But Lindy! Bah!
Say, just havin" her in the house makes the air seem moldy. I"m goin"
out and tramp around the grounds a bit before dinner."
That was a good hunch. It"s a clear, crisp evenin" outside, with the last red of the sun just showin" in the northwest and a thin new moon hangin" over Long Island Sound off in the east, and in a couple of turns I shook off the whole business. I"d taken one circle and was roundin"
the back of the garage, when I sees something dark slip into a tree shadow up near the house.