The President Part 32

"You shall receive it," returned Mr. Bayard. "By the way, we are prepared to the last detail for that raid. I've bought more than five hundred thousand shares of Northern Consolidated in Europe at an average of forty-two. In order that our raiders may have what rope they require to thoroughly hang themselves, I've brought more than two hundred thousand of those shares to this country. It is placed where they may reach it for the purpose of borrowing stock for delivery. In fact, our arrangements are perfect; they make as complete a deadfall as ever waited for its prey."

Richard and Inspector Val returned to Washington, Richard to write Dorothy a letter freighted of promise and hope and love. In it he told her that soon he would have canceled the last element of Storri's power, removed the last fear of Mr. Harley, and, in loving brief, destroyed the last bar which separated them and kept them apart.

Dorothy read the letter again and again, and then kissed it pending the advent of something more kissable. Richard's promise was like the smell of flowers to refresh her jaded, fear-wearied heart. The one regret was, since Richard had forbidden it, that she could not share the blessed promise with her father.

Richard wrote nothing of the note of warning; nor did he speak of Inspector Val and his deductions as to Storri's visits to the Harley house. His only thought had been to cheer the drooping soul of Dorothy with the glad nearness of happier days. The word of comfort came in good time, for the shameful weight of the situation was crushing Dorothy.

Mr. Harley these days walked in troubles as deep as those of Dorothy, but not the same. Mr. Harley was not borne upon by the shame of the thing; that did not depress him any more than the knowledge that he was guiltless of wrong upheld him. A man of finer nature would have been strengthened by his innocence. To such a man his self-respect would have been important; while he retained that support he could have summoned up a fort.i.tude to bear the worst that lay in Storri's hands. But Mr. Harley was no such one of fineness, upon whom he would have looked down as a visionary and a sentimentalist. There arose the less cause why he should be, perhaps, since Mr. Harley was sure of being popular with himself in spite of any conduct that could be his. His ideals were not lofty, his moral senses not keen, and what original decent point the latter might have once possessed had long been dulled away. True, Mr. Harley was shaken of an ague of fear; but his tremblings were born of the practical. He was agitated by thoughts of what havoc, in his own and in Senator Hanway's affairs of politics and business, naming him formally as a forger would work. Such a disaster would be tangible; he could appreciate, and, appreciating, shrink from it.

One thing to feather the wing of his apprehensions and set them soaring was his uncertainty concerning Storri. He could not gauge Storri; he would have felt safer had that n.o.bleman been an American or an Englishman. Storri was so loaded of alarming contradictions; he could so snarl and purr, threaten and promise, beam and glower, smile and frown, and all in the one moment of time! Mr. Harley could not read a spirit so perverse and in such perpetual head-on collision with itself! Nor could he, being fear-blind, see that in most, if not all of these, Storri was acting. If Mr. Harley had realized what a joy it was to Storri to frighten him, the knowledge might have made for his peace of mind. As it was, he looked upon Storri as at the best half mad, and capable, in some beckoning moment of caprice, of any lunatic move that should level the worst against him.

Mr. Harley had one hope, and that rested with Northern Consolidated. If he could stand off disaster until the raid on Northern Consolidated had been made, and the profits, namely the road, were in their hands, he might then arrange a permanent truce. In this he reckoned on Storri's rapacity, to which a million of dollars was as a mouthful. Given a foretaste of what riches should dwell therein, Storri would desire with triple intensity to push forward in his earth-girdling dream of Credit Magellan. The conquest of Northern Consolidated would teach him to look upon the rest as sure. Being in this frame, Mr. Harley argued that Storri, feeling his inability to go forward without him, might be softened to the touch of reason. Under these pleasant new conditions, with Credit Magellan hopefully launched, Storri could be treated with.

Mr. Harley would then feel his way to some safe compromise; he would invent an offer for those French shares which should present both peril and profit. He would threaten to go no further with Credit Magellan unless Storri put those French shares in his hands; and he would give him twenty-fold their value if he did. Mr. Harley harbored the thought that Storri would yield; and yield all the more readily since his pa.s.sion for Dorothy and his appet.i.te for revenge against Mr. Harley would have had time to cool. Thus reasoning, and thus hoping, and, one had almost said, thus fearing, Mr. Harley gave himself to the task in two parts of keeping Storri in paths of peace, and praying for a break in the market so that the attack on Northern Consolidated might begin.

You are not to suppose those changes in Mr. Harley and Dorothy went uncounted by Mrs. Hanway-Harley; that would be claiming too much against the lady's vigilance. In her double role of wife and mother, it was her duty to observe the haggard face of Mr. Harley and the woe that settled about Dorothy's young eyes; and Mrs. Hanway-Harley, as wife and mother, observed them. And this is how that perspicacious matron read those signs. She translated Mr. Harley's haggard looks at a glance; he was losing money. Legislation, or stocks, or both, were going the wrong way; but in legislation, or stocks, or both, or the way they went, Mrs.

Hanway-Harley refused to have an interest. If Mr. Harley had lost money, Mr. Harley must make some more; that was all.

In divining Dorothy's griefs, Mrs. Hanway-Harley showed even greater ingenuity. Dorothy and Richard had quarreled; Mrs. Hanway-Harley was sharp to note that now she neither saw nor heard of Richard. Also, Dorothy came to the dinner table when Storri was there, and neither fled to her room nor called Bess to her shoulder on hearing that n.o.bleman's name announced. Mrs. Hanway-Harley saw how the land lay; Dorothy took a more lenient view of Storri when now her fancy for Richard was wearing dim. After all, it had been only a fancy; it asked just a trifle of care, and the happy denouement would be as Mrs. Hanway-Harley wished.

Mrs. Hanway-Harley began now to play her game exceeding deep. She would say nothing of Richard; to name him would serve to keep him in Dorothy's memory. She would say nothing of Storri; to speak of him would heat Dorothy's obstinacy, and Mrs. Hanway-Harley had learned not to desire that. No, she would be wisely, forbearingly diplomatic; the present arrangement was perfect for the ends in view. Storri came to the house; Richard stayed away; the conclusion was natural and solitary, and Dorothy would marry Storri. Mrs. Hanway-Harley, fully understanding the currents of events and the flowing thereof, became serenely joyful, and the charm of her manner gained accent from those clouds so visibly resting upon Mr. Harley and Dorothy. Yes, indeed; it must not be written that the sun did not shine for Mrs. Hanway-Harley, whose conversation the satirical Storri told the San Reve was as the conversation of a magpie.

Tuesday came, and the President of this republic shook a pugnacious fist beneath the German nose. Some impression of the weird suddenness of the maneuver might have been gathered from the comment of Senator Gruff.

Speaking for the Senate, that sagacious man remarked:

"It came down upon us like a pan of milk from a top shelf!"

In Wall Street the effect was all that Mr. Bayard foretold. Prices began to melt and dwindle like ice in August. Panic prevailed; three brokerage firms fell, a dozen more were rocking on their foundations.

In the midst of the hubbub, Senator Hanway sent for Richard. Our statesman's smile was bland, his brow untroubled.

"You see I do not forget," said Senator Hanway sweetly. "I promised that I'd give you an exclusive story when the committee on Northern Consolidated was ready to report. Here is the report, it was finished last evening; I have added a brief interview to explain it."

Richard's impulse was to ask a dozen questions; he restrained himself and asked none. Richard was not so fond of fiction as to invite it. He sent the report and interview to the _Daily Tory_, and dispatched a private message to Mr. Bayard, giving him the news and congratulating him on his unerring gifts as a seer.

CHAPTER XVII

HOW NORTHERN CONSOLIDATED WAS SOLD

When the President of these United States so dauntlessly flourished the Monroe Doctrine in the German face, and shook the Presidential fist beneath the German nose, the flourishing and fist-shaking were accomplished through the medium of a special message to Congress which--a clap of thunder from a cloudless sky--made its appearance in House and Senate upon a certain Tuesday afternoon at four of the congressional clock. The hour of four had been settled upon to diminish as much as might be, so the President said, the chances of an earthquake in the New York stock market, which closed at three. In San Francisco, which is three hours younger than New York, the winds of disastrous speculation blew a hurricane that afternoon; but no one east of the Mississippi cares what happens in San Francisco. Besides, the New York hurricane was only deferred.

Tuesday afternoon, after word of that Presidential fist-shaking had soaked into the souls of men, speculative New York went nervous to the frontiers of hysteria. Tuesday night, speculative New York couldn't sleep; it sat up till morning, for, like cattle, it could smell in the breeze the coming storm. Wednesday heard the crash; and the crashing continued unabated throughout Thursday and Friday. The papers of that hour in attempting to describe stock conditions drew exhaustively on such terms as "tornado," "blizzard," "simoon," "maelstrom," "cyclone,"

"landslide," "avalanche," and whatever else in the English language means death and devastation. No one found fault of those similes, which were justified of the hopeless truth. Values were beaten as flat as a field of turnips. The best feature was that no banks failed; two or three of the weaker sisters wavered, but the big, burly concerns gave them the arm of their aid and led them through.

Days before the smash, that osprey pool had perfected the last fragment of its arrangements. The old gray buccaneer, who had charge of the pool's interests, was as ready for action as was Mr. Bayard. The latter stock-King was perhaps the only one in the Street who possessed a foreknowledge of what daring deeds our White House meditated. To Mr.

Bayard the secrets of Courts and Cabinets were told, for he had an agent at the elbow of every possibility. The old gray buccaneer was not so well provided; none the less, with decks cleared, guns shotted, cutla.s.ses ground to razor-edge, he was prompt on the instant to put forth against Northern Consolidated now when the tempest which lashed the market favored his pirate purposes.

Those four millions which had been decided upon as the fund of the osprey pool were banked ready to the hand of the old gray buccaneer.

Storri, who had been losing money, exhausted himself in providing the five hundred thousand which made up his one-eighth of the four millions.

By squeezing out his last drop of credit, he succeeded in gathering those thousands; once gathered, he tossed them into the pool's fund as carelessly as though they had been nothing more than the common furniture of his pocket, without which he would not think of beginning the day. Storri at least was a magnificent actor.

In collecting those five hundred thousand dollars, Storri, among other securities, put up the French shares. He thought nothing of that, since following victory over Northern Consolidated they would be back in his hands again. Incidentally, a gratifying thing happened, something in the nature of a compliment or a concession, which he attributed to the sn.o.bbish eagerness of Americans to pay homage to his n.o.bility. Fatuous Storri; he should never have looked for compliment or concession or sn.o.bbish adulation in a plain lend-and-borrow traffic of dollars and cents! Men will buy a coat of arms; but they will not take a coat of arms in p.a.w.n. No; Storri, instead of feeling flattered, should have grown suspicious when the gentleman from whom he borrowed those five hundred thousand proposed to let him have the full value of his securities if in return he were given the right to confiscate should the loans not be repaid on the nail. Why not? The new arrangement meant no real risk; the security might always be sold in case of default. And under the arrangement offered, Storri's credit would be enlarged by twenty per cent. He agreed, and had immediate advantage of the fact.

Drawing to the last dollar, he made his share of the pool's four millions good.

When the storm descended Wednesday morning, the old gray buccaneer was instantly in the middle of it doing all he might to encourage the storm.

As the stock world went to its sleepless bed on Tuesday night, it knew about the Presidential defiance of Germany. That news was enough to keep the stock world shivering till morning. When it arose and read the _Daily Tory_, its chills were multiplied by two. As if trouble with Germany were not sufficient invitation to general ruin, here came the Hanway report driving a knife to the heart of Northern Consolidated! At sight of that, the stock world's last hope abandoned it, and the work of slaughter commenced. The old gray buccaneer grinned with happiness that awful morning as he looked across the field of coming war.

Andrew Jackson, being half Scotch and half Irish, was wont before a battle to think and plan with the prudent sagacity of a Bailey Jarvie.

Once the battle began, he ceased to be Scotch and became wholly Irish; he quit thinking and devoted himself desperately to execution. The old gray buccaneer of stocks was like Andrew Jackson. His plan, thoroughly cautious and Scotch, had been laid to sell and sell and sell Northern Consolidated until the stock was beaten down to twenty. He would sell savagely, relentlessly, sell with his eyes shut, until the twenty point was reached. And if necessary, he would sell four hundred thousand shares.

The old gray buccaneer, under the conditions existing, did not think it would require a sale of four hundred thousand shares before the market broke to the figure he had fixed his heart upon. The general conflagration raging must of necessity smoke out thousands and thousands of innocent Northern Consolidated shares. These, blind and frenzied, would rush plungingly into the flames like horses at a fire. The old gray buccaneer felt sure that while he was selling four hundred thousand shares, full two hundred thousand, mayhap three hundred thousand, shares in addition would be offered. What stock could support itself against such a flood as that? When the bottom was reached, and the time was ripe, the pool would gather in the harvest. It was a beautiful plan; the more beautiful because of its simplicity!

Instantly on the morning of that black Wednesday the sale of Northern Consolidated began. Thousands of shares in two thousand, five thousand, and even ten thousand lots were thrown upon the market by the old gray buccaneer. In the roar and tumult of that disastrous day, what would have been in calmer moments a spectacle of astonishment pa.s.sed much unnoticed. The stock world was busy saving itself out of the teeth of destruction, and the smashing and slugging in Northern Consolidated attracted the less attention.

Northern Consolidated merited admiring attention; against that desperate hammering, it stood like a wall of granite. Ten, twenty, forty, eighty, over one hundred thousand shares were sold that Wednesday; and yet, marvel of marvels, Northern Consolidated at the day's close had fallen off no more than six points. It retreated sullenly, slowly, step by step and eighth by eighth; ever and anon it would make a stand and hold a price an hour. Other stocks lost twice and threefold the ground; the stubbornness of Northern Consolidated began to engage the notice of men.

More than one poor "bull" when sore beset that day took fresh heart from the obstinacy of Northern Consolidated; his own foothold was steadied and made the stronger for it.

But the old gray buccaneer refused to be denied; he had quit thinking and begun to act; he would break the back of Northern Consolidated if it took the last share of those four hundred thousand! His courage never wavered; he would charge and keep charging; in the end his cavalry work must tell and the lines of Northern Consolidated crumple up like paper.

All it required was dash and confidence, with an underlying grim determination to win or die, and Northern Consolidated must yield.

The war was renewed upon Thursday, and staggered fiercely on throughout the day. Then Friday followed, a roaring, tottering, crashing, smashing fellow of the two days gone before. Millionaires became beggars and beggars millionaires between breakfast and lunch.

As on Wednesday, so also on Thursday and Friday the stock which best sustained itself was Northern Consolidated. And yet no other stock was so bitterly sold! As against this it should be added that no other was so bitterly bought! Every offer to sell was closed with at the very moment of its birth.

At last the end came; the old gray buccaneer could go no further. He had already oversold his self-fixed limit, having parted with four hundred and eleven thousand shares. The sales were made in the names of the various members of the pool, each selling one-eighth of the whole.

Senator Hanway's interest, as well as that of Mr. Harley, being fifty-one thousand three hundred and fifty shares for each, for reasons that do not require exhibition, was handled in the name of an agent.

Full one hundred and fifty thousand innocent shares, smoked into the open market as the old gray buccaneer had antic.i.p.ated, were also sold, making the round total of five hundred and sixty-one thousand shares of Northern Consolidated offered and snapped up during those three days of fire. It was the greatest "bear" raid in the annals of the Stock Exchange, so graybeards said; and what peculiarly marked it for the admiration of mankind was that it had had the least success. In three days, with five hundred and sixty-one thousand shares sold, the stock had fallen only eleven points. The raid was over and the "bears" had growlingly retreated thirty minutes before the close on Friday. Within ten minutes after the last offer to sell, and when it was plain the "bears" had quit the field, under a cross-fire of bids that fell as briskly thick as hail, Northern Consolidated was bid up thirteen points.

It had stood forty-one at Tuesday's close; it was forty-three when, "bears" routed, the market was over Friday afternoon. And thus disastrously fared the osprey pool.

"We're ruined, gentlemen," coolly remarked the old gray buccaneer when, with the exception of Senator Hanway, the members of the pool gathered themselves together Friday evening. "We're in a corner; we're gone--hook, line, and sinker!"

"What can we do?" asked Mr. Harley, his face the hue of putty.

"Nothing!" said the old gray buccaneer, lighting a Spartan cigar. "We're penned up; whoever has us cornered may now come round and knock us on the head whenever he finds it convenient."

"The market is still weak," observed one, "for all it lived through the panic. Suppose we creep in to-morrow and cover our shorts. The shares are forty-three; I for one think it might be wise to close the deal and take our losses, even if we go as high as fifty."

"For myself," remarked the old gray buccaneer, with a half-sneer at what he regarded as a most childish suggestion, "I'd be pleased to settle at sixty-five or even seventy." Then, turning to him who was for softly buying his way out: "Do you imagine that what has happened was accident?

I tell you there's a shark swimming in these waters--a shark so big that by comparison Port Royal Tom would seem like a dolphin. And, gentlemen, that shark is after us. He's been after us from the beginning; he's got between us and the sh.o.r.e, and he'll pull us under when the spirit moves him. If you think differently, go into the market to-morrow and try to buy Northern Consolidated. An attempt to buy five hundred shares will put it up ten points."

The next day, Sat.u.r.day, the pool sent quietly into the Exchange to buy one thousand shares; that, by way of feeler. The old gray buccaneer was right; Northern Consolidated climbed fifteen points with the vivacity of a squirrel, and rested mockingly at fifty-eight. Following this disheartening experiment, which resulted in nothing more hopeful than a demand for further margins from the pool's brokers, there were no more efforts to "buy." The pool was marked for death; but that, while discouraging, offered no argument in favor of self-destruction.

When the markets opened upon that storm-swept Wednesday, there were forty brokers on the floor of the Exchange to execute the orders of Mr.

Bayard. Not one of the forty knew of the other thirty-nine; not one was aware of Mr. Bayard in the business of the day. Thirty as a maximum had been commissioned to buy--each man twenty thousand shares--six hundred thousand shares of Northern Consolidated. The orders had come through banks in the city, and from banks and brokerages in London, Paris, Berlin, and a dozen points in Europe. They ran from five hundred to as high as twelve thousand shares the order. Each broker was given a certain limit below which he might buy, and the orders of no two were in conflict. Each for his orders would have the un.o.bstructed market to himself.