XVII. A GENTEEL "HOLD-UP"
In my childhood at home, my father was often away for a week or longer, working or looking for work. My mother had a notion that a boy should be punished only by his father; so, whenever she caught me in what she regarded as a serious transgression, she used to say: "You will get a good whipping for this, when your father comes home." At first I used to wait pa.s.sively, suffering the torments of ten thrashings before the "good whipping" came to pa.s.s. But soon my mind began to employ the interval more profitably. I would scheme to escape execution of sentence; and, though my mother was a determined woman, many"s the time I contrived to change her mind. I am not recommending to parents the system of delay in execution of sentence; but I must say that in my case it was responsible for an invaluable discipline. For example, the Textile tangle.
I knew I was in all human probability doomed to go down before the Stock Exchange had been open an hour the next morning. All Textile stocks must start many points higher than they had been at the close, must go steadily and swiftly up. Entangled as my reserve resources were in the Coal deal, I should have no chance to cover my shorts on any terms less than the loss of all I had. At most, I could hope only to save myself from criminal bankruptcy.
And now my early training in coolly and calmly studying how to avert execution of sentence came into play. There is a kind of cornered-rat, hit-or-miss, last-ditch fight that any creature will make in such circ.u.mstances as mine then were, and the inspirations of despair sometimes happen to be lucky. But I prefer the reasoned-out plan.
There was no signal of distress in my voice as I telephoned Corey, president of the Interstate Trust Company, to stay at his office until I came; there was no signal of distress in my manner as I sallied forth and went down to the Power Trust Building; nor did I show or suggest that I had heard the "shot-at-sunrise" sentence, as I strode into Roebuck"s presence and greeted him. I was a.s.suming, by way of precaution, that some rumor about me either had reached him or would soon reach him. I knew he had an eye in every secret of finance and industry, and, while I believed my secret was wholly my own, I had too much at stake with him to bank on that, when I could, as I thought, so easily rea.s.sure him.
"I"ve come to suggest, Mr. Roebuck," said I, "that you let my house--Blacklock and Company--announce the Coal reorganization plan. It would give me a great lift, and Melville and his bank don"t need prestige.
My daily letters to the public on investments have, as you know, got me a big following that would help me make the flotation an even bigger success than it"s bound to be, no matter who announces it and invites subscriptions."
As I thus proposed that I be in a jiffy caught up from the extremely humble level of reputed bucket-shop dealer into the highest heaven of high finance, that I be made the official spokesman of the financial G.o.ds, his expression was so ludicrous that I almost lost my gravity. I suspect, for a moment he thought I had gone mad. His manner, when he recovered himself sufficiently to speak, was certainly not unlike what it would have been had he found himself alone before a dangerous lunatic who was armed with a bomb.
"You know how anxious I am to help you, to further your interests, Matthew," said he wheedlingly. "I know no man who has a brighter future.
But--not so fast, not so fast, young man. Of course, you will appear as one of the reorganizing committee--but we could not afford to have the announcement come through any less strong and old established house than the National Industrial Bank."
"At least, you can make me joint announcer with them," I urged.
"Perhaps--yes--possibly--we"ll see," said he soothingly. "There is plenty of time."
"Plenty of time," I a.s.sented, as if quite content. "I only wanted to put the matter before you." And I rose to go.
"Have you heard the news of Textile Common?" he asked.
"Yes," said I carelessly. Then, all in an instant, a plan took shape in my mind. "I own a good deal of the stock, and I must say, I don"t like this raise."
"Why?" he inquired.
"Because I"m sure it"s a stock-jobbing scheme," replied I boldly. "I know the dividend wasn"t earned. I don"t like that sort of thing, Mr. Roebuck.
Not because it"s unlawful--the laws are so clumsy that a practical man often must disregard them. But because it is tampering with the reputation and the stability of a great enterprise for the sake of a few millions of dishonest profit. I"m surprised at Langdon."
"I hope you"re wrong, Matthew," was Roebuck"s only comment. He questioned me no further, and I went away, confident that, when the crash came in the morning, if come it must, there would be no more astonished man in Wall Street than Henry J. Roebuck. How he must have laughed; or, rather, would have laughed, if his sort of human hyena expressed its emotions in the human way.
From him, straight to my lawyers, Whitehouse and Fisher, in the Mills Building.
"I want you to send for the newspaper reporters at once," said I to Fisher, "and tell them that in my behalf you are going to apply for an injunction against the Textile Trust, forbidding them to take any further steps toward that increase of dividend. Tell them I, as a large stock-holder, and representing a group of large stock-holders, purpose to stop the paying of unearned dividends."
Fisher knew how closely connected my house and the Textile Trust had been; but he showed, and probably felt no astonishment. He was too experienced in the ways of finance and financiers. It was a matter of indifference to him whether I was trying to a.s.sa.s.sinate my friend and ally, or was feinting at Langdon, to lure the public within reach so that we might, together, fall upon it and make a battue. Your lawyer is your true mercenary. Under his code honor consists in making the best possible fight in exchange for the biggest possible fee. He is frankly for sale to the highest bidder. At least so it is with those that lead the profession nowadays, give it what is called "character" and "tone."
Not without some regret did I thus arrange to attack my friend in his absence. "Still," I reasoned, "his blunder in trusting some leaky person with his secret is the cause of my peril--and I"ll not have to justify myself to him for trying to save myself." What effect my injunction would have I could not foresee. Certainly it could not save me from the loss of my fortune; but, possibly, it might check the upward course of the stock long enough to enable me to s.n.a.t.c.h myself from ruin, and to cling to firm ground until the Coal deal drew me up to safety.
My next call was at the Interstate Trust Company. I found Corey waiting for me in a most uneasy state of mind.
"Is there any truth in this story about you?" was the question he plumped at me.
"What story?" said I, and a hard fight I had to keep my confusion and alarm from the surface. For, apparently, my secret was out.
"That you"re on the wrong side of the Textile."
So it was out! "Some truth," I admitted, since denial would have been useless here. "And I"ve come to you for the money to tide me over."
He grew white, a sickly white, and into his eyes came a horrible, drowning look.
"I owe a lot to you, Matt," he pleaded. "But I"ve done you a great many favors, haven"t I?"
"That you have Bob," I cordially agreed. "But this isn"t a favor. It"s business."
"You mustn"t ask it, Blacklock," he cried. "I"ve loaned you more money now than the law allows. And I can"t let you have any more."
"Some one has been lying to you, and you"ve been believing him," said I.
"When I say my request isn"t a favor, but business, I mean it."
"I can"t let you have any more," he repeated. "I can"t!" And down came his fist in a weak-violent gesture.
I leaned forward and laid my hand strongly on his arm.
"In addition to the stock of this concern that I hold in my own name," said I, "I hold five shares in the name of a man whom n.o.body knows that I even know. If you don"t let me have the money, that man goes to the district attorney with information that lands you in the penitentiary, that puts your company out of business and into bankruptcy before to-morrow noon.
I saved you three years ago, and got you this job against just such an emergency as this, Bob Corey. And, by G.o.d, you"ll toe the mark!"
"But we haven"t done anything that every bank in town doesn"t do every day--doesn"t have to do. If we didn"t lend money to dummy borrowers and over-certify accounts, our customers would go where they could get accommodations."
"That"s true enough," said I. "But I"m in a position for the moment where I need my friends--and they"ve got to come to time. If I don"t get the money from you, I"ll get it elsewhere--but over the cliff with you and your bank! The laws you"ve been violating may be bad for the practical banking business, but they"re mighty good for punishing ingrat.i.tude and treachery."
He sat there, yellow and pinched, and shivering every now and then. He made no reply. He was one of those sh.e.l.ls of men that are conspicuous as figureheads in every department of active life--fellows with well-shaped, white-haired or prematurely bald heads, and grave, respectable faces; they look dignified and substantial, and the soul of uprightness; they coin their looks into good salaries by selling themselves as covers for operations of the financiers. And how those operations, in the nude, as it were, would terrify the plodders that save up and deposit or invest the money the financiers gamble with on the big green tables!
Presently I shook his arm impatiently. His eyes met mine, and I fixed them.
"I"m going to pull through," said I. "But if I weren"t, I"d see to it that you were protected. Come, what"s your answer? Friend or traitor?"
"Can"t you give me any security--any collateral?"
"No more than I took from you when I saved you as you were going down with the rest in the Dumont smash. My word--that"s all. I borrow on the same terms you"ve given me before, the same you"re giving four of your heaviest borrowers right now."
He winced as I thus reminded him how minute my knowledge was of the workings of his bank.
"I didn"t think this of you, Matt," he whined. "I believed you above such hold-up methods."
"I suit my methods to the men I"m dealing with," was my answer. "These fellows are trying to push me off the life raft. I fight with every weapon I can lay hands on. And I know as well as you do that, if you get into serious trouble through this loan, at least five men we could both name would have to step in and save the bank and cover up the scandal. You"ll blackmail them, just as you"ve blackmailed them before, and they you.
Blackmail"s a legitimate part of the game. n.o.body appreciates that better than you." It was no time for the smug hypocrisies under which we people down town usually conduct our business--just as the desperadoes used to patrol the highways disguised as peaceful merchants.
"Send round in the morning and get the money," said he, putting on a resigned, hopeless look.
I laughed. "I"ll feel easier if I take it now," I replied. "We"ll fix up the notes and checks at once."
He reddened, but after a brief hesitation busied himself. When the papers were all made up and signed, and I had the certified checks in my pocket, I said: "Wait here, Bob, until the National Industrial people call you up. I"ll ask them to do it, so they can get your personal a.s.surance that everything"s all right. And I"ll stop there until they tell me they"ve talked with you."
"But it"s too late," he said. "You can"t deposit to-day."