Shortly after this talk Bob left for Europe with Beulah. A great German expert on brain disorders had held out hope that a six month's treatment at his sanitarium in Berlin might aid in restoring her mind. They returned the following August. The trip had been fruitless. It was plain to me that Bob was the same hopelessly desperate man as when he left, more hopeless, more desperate if anything than when he warned me of his determination.

When he left for Europe "the Street" breathed more freely, and as time went by and there was no sign of his confidence-disturbing influence in the market, the "System" began to bring out its deferred deals. Times were ripe for setting up the most wildly inflated stock lamb-shearing traps. It had been advertised throughout the world that Tom Reinhart, now a two-hundred-time millionaire, was to consolidate his and many other enterprises into one gigantic trust with twelve billions of capital. His Union and Southern Pacific Railroads, his coal and Southern lines, together with his steamship company and lead, iron, and copper mines, were to be merged with the steel, traction, gas, and other enterprises he owned jointly with "Standard Oil." Some of the railroads owned by Rockefeller and his pals, in which Reinhart had no part, were to go in too, and with these was to unite that mother hog of them all, "Standard Oil" itself. The trust was to be an enormous holding company, the like of which had until then not even been dreamed of by the most daring stock manipulators. The "System's" banks, as well as trust and insurance companies throughout the country, had for a long time been getting into shape by concentrating the money of the country for this monster trust. It was newspaper and news bureau gossip that Reinhart and his crowd had bought millions of shares of the different stocks involved in the deal, and it was common knowledge that upon its successful completion Reinhart's fortune would be in the neighbourhood of a billion. On October 1st the certificate of the Anti-People's Trust, $12,000,000,000 capital, 120,000,000 shares, were listed upon the New York, London, and Boston Stock Exchanges, and the German and French Bourses, and trading in them started off fast and furious at 106. The claim that one billion of the twelve billions capital had been set aside to be used in protecting and manipulating the stock in the market, had been so widely advertised that even the most daring plunger did not think of selling it short.

It was evident to all in the stock-gambling world that this was to be the "System's" grand coup, that at its completion the masses would be rudely awakened to a realisation that their savings were invested in the combined American industries at vastly inflated values, that the few had all the real money, and that any attempt upon the people's part to regulate and control the new system of robbery, would be fraught with unparalleled disaster—not to the "System," but to the people.

Since Bob's return from Europe I had seen him but a few times. Up to October 1st he had not been near the Stock Exchange or "the Street." Shortly after the listing of the "People Be Damned," as "the Street" had dubbed the new trust, he began to show up at his office regularly. This was the condition of affairs when Fred Brownley called me up on the telephone, as I related at the beginning of my story, which I did not realise I had been so long in telling.

My thoughts had been chasing each other with lightning-like rapidity back over the last five years and the fifteen before them, and each thought deepened the black mist over my present mental vision. In the midst of my reflections my telephone rang again.

"Mr. Randolph, for Heaven's sake have you done nothing yet?" It was Fred Brownley's voice. "Things are frightful here. Bob's brokers are selling stocks at five and ten thousand-lot clips. Barry Conant is leading Reinhart's forces. It is said he has the pool's protection order in Anti-People's and that it is unlimited, but Bob has the Reinhart crowd pretty badly scared. Swan has just finished giving Conant a hundred thousand off the reel in 10,000 lots, and he told me a moment ago he was going over to get Bob himself to face Barry Conant. They're down twenty points on the average, although they haven't let Anti-People's break an eighth yet. They have it pegged at 106, but there is an ugly rumour just in that Bob, under cover of a general attack, is unloading Anti-People's on to the Reinhart wing for Rogers and Rockefeller, and the rumour is getting in its work. Even Barry Conant is growing a bit anxious. The latest talk is that Reinhart is borrowing hundreds of millions on Anti-People's, and that his loans are being called in all directions. Do you know Reinhart is at his place in Virginia and cannot get here before to-morrow night? If Bob breaks through Anti-People's peg, it will be the worst crash yet."

"All right, Fred," I answered. "I will go over to Bob's right now. I hate to do it, but there is no other hope."

I dropped the receiver and started for Bob's office. As I went through his counting-room one of the clerks said, "They have just broken Anti-People's to 90 on a bulletin that Tom Reinhart's wife and only daughter have been killed in an automobile accident at their place in Virginia. They first had it that Reinhart himself was killed. That has been corrected, although the latest word is that he is prostrated."

I rapped on Bob's private-office door. I felt the coming struggle as I heard his hoarse bellow, "Come in." He stood at the ticker, with the tape in one hand, while with the other he held the telephone receiver to his ear. My God, what a picture for a stage! His magnificent form was erect, his feet were as firmly planted as if he were made of bronze, his shoulders thrown back as if he were withstanding the rush of the Stock Exchange hordes, his eyes afire with a sullen, smouldering blaze, his jaw was set in a way that brought into terrible relief the new, hard lines of desperation that had recently come into his face. His great chest was rising and falling as though he were engaged in a physical struggle; his perfect-fitting, heavy black Melton cutaway coat, thrown back from the chest, and a low, turned-down, white collar formed the setting for a throat and head that reminded one of a forest monarch at bay on the mountain crag awaiting the coming of the hounds and hunters.

I hesitated at the threshold to catch my breath, as I took in the terrific figure. Had Bob Brownley been an enemy of mine I should have backed out in fear, and I do not confess to more than my fair share of cowardice. Inwardly I thanked God that Bob was in his office instead of on the floor of the Exchange. His whole appearance was frightful. He showed in every line and lineament that he was a man who would hesitate at nothing, even at killing, if he should find a human obstacle in his road and his mind should suggest murder. He was the personification of the most awful madness. Even when he caught sight of me, he hardly moved, although my coming must have been a surprise.

"So it is you, Jim Randolph, is it? What brings you here?" His voice was hoarse, but it had a metallic ring that went to my marrow. Bob Brownley in all the years of our friendship had never spoken to me except in kind and loving regard. I looked at him, stunned. I must have shown how hurt I was. But if he saw it, he gave no sign. His eyes, looking straight into mine, changed no more than if he had been addressing his deadliest enemy.

Again his voice rang out, "What brings you here? Do you come to plead again for that dastard Reinhart after the warning I gave you?"

I clenched both hands until I felt the nails cut the flesh of my palms. I loved Bob Brownley. I would have done anything to make him happy, would willingly have sacrificed my own life to protect his from himself or others, but this madman, this wild brute, was no more Bob Brownley as I had known him than the howling northeast gale of December is the gentle, welcome zephyr of August; and I felt a resentment at his brutal speech that I could hardly suppress. With a mighty effort I crushed it back, trying to think of nothing but his awful misery and the Bob of our college days.

I said in a firm voice, "Bob, is this the way to talk to me in your own office?" At any time before, my words and tone would have touched his all-generous Southern chivalry, but now he said harshly—"To hell with sentiment. What——" He did not take his eyes from mine, but they told me that he was listening to a voice in the receiver. Only for a second; then he let loose a wild laugh, which must have penetrated to the outer office.

"Eighty and coming like a spring freshet," he said into the mouthpiece, "and the boys want to know if I won't let up now that Reinhart is down? Go back and smother them with all they will take down to 60. That's my answer. Tell them if Reinhart had ten more wives and daughters and they were all killed, I'd rend his bastard trust to help him dull his sorrow. Give the word at every pole that I will have Reinhart where he will curse his luck that he was not in the automobile with the rest of his tribe——

"To hell with sentiment!" He was speaking to me again. "What do you want? If you are here to beg for Reinhart and his pack of yellow curs, you've got your answer. I wouldn't let up on that fiendish hyena, not if his wife and daughter and all the dead wives and daughters of every 'System' man came back in their grave clothes and begged. I wouldn't let up a share." I gasped in horror.

"When did those robbers of men and despoilers of women and children ever let up because of death? When were they ever known to wait even till the corpse stiffened to pluck out the hearts of the victims? It is my turn now, and if I let up a hair may I, yes, and Beulah, too, be damned, eternally damned."

I could not stand it. If I stayed, I, too, should become mad. I reached for the doorknob, but before I could swing the door open Bob was upon me like a wolf. He grasped me by the shoulders and with the strength of a madman hurled me half across the room. I sank into a chair.

"No, you don't, Jim Randolph, no, you don't. You came here for something and, by heaven, you will tell me what it is! You know me; you are the only human being who does. You know what I was, you see what I am. You know what they did to me to make me what I am. You know, Jim Randolph, you know whether I deserved it. You know whether in all my life up to the day those dollar-frenzied hounds tore my soul, I had done any man, woman, or child a wrong. You know whether I had, and now you are going to sneak off and leave me as though I were a cur dog of the Reinhart-'Standard Oil' breed gone mad!"

He was standing over me, a terrible yet a magnificent figure. As he hurled these words at me, I was sure he had really lost his mind; that I was in the presence of a man truly mad. But only for an instant; then my horror, my anger turned to a great, crushing, all-consuming agony of pity for Bob, and I dropped my head on my hands and wept. It is hard to admit it, but it is true—I wept uncontrollably. In an instant the room was quiet except for the sound of my own awful grief. I heard it, was ashamed of it, but I could not stop. The telephone rang again and again, wildly, shrilly, but there was no answer. The stillness became so oppressive that even my own sobs quieted. I gasped as the lump in my throat choked me, then I slowly raised my eyes.

Bob's towering figure was in front of me. His head had fallen forward, and his arms were folded across his breast. But that he stood erect I should have thought him dead, so still was he. I jumped to my feet and looked into his face, down which great tears were dropping silently. I touched him on the shoulder.

"Bob, my dear old chum, Bob, forgive me. For God's sake, forgive me for intruding on your misery."

I looked at him. I will never forget his face. No heartbroken woman's could have been sadder. He slowly raised his head, then staggered and grasped the ticker-stand for support.

"Don't, Jim, don't—don't ask me to forgive you. Oh, Jim, Jim, my old friend, forgive me for my madness; forget what I said to you, forget the brute you just saw and think of me as of old, when I would have plucked out my tongue if I had caught it saying a harsh word to the best and truest friend man ever had. Jim, forget it all. I was mad, I am mad, I have been mad for a long time, but it cannot last much longer. I know it can't, and, Jim, by all our past love, by the memories of the dear old days at St. Paul's and at Harvard, the dear old days of hope and happiness, when we planned for the future, try to think of me only as you knew me then, as you know that I should now be, but for the 'System's' curse."

The clerks were pounding on the door; through the glass showed many forms. They had been gathering for minutes while Bob talked in his low, sad tone, a tone that no one could believe came from the same mouth that a few moments before had poured forth a flood of brutal heartlessness.

Bob went to the door. The office was in an uproar. Twenty or thirty of Bob's brokers were there, aghast at not getting a reply to their calls. Many more were pouring in through the outer office. Bob looked at them coldly. "Well, what is the trouble? Is it possible we are down to a point where the Stock Exchange rushes over to a man's office when his wire happens to break down?"

They saw his bluff. You cannot deceive Stock Exchange men, at least not the kind that Bob Brownley employed on panic days, but his coolness reassured them, and when they saw me it was odds-on that they guessed to a man why Bob had ignored his wires—guessed that I had been pleading for the life of "the Street."

"Well, where do you stand?"

Frank Swan answered for the crowd: "The panic is in full swing. She's a cellar-to-ridge-pole ripper. They're down 40 or over on an average. Anti-People's is down to 35, and still coming like sawdust over a broken dam. Barry Conant's house and a dozen other of Reinhart's have gone under. His banks and trust companies are going every minute. The whole Street will be overboard before the close. The governing committee has just called a meeting to see whether it will not be best to adjourn the Exchange over to-day and to-morrow."

Bob listened as if he had been a master at the wheel in a gale, receiving reports from his mates.

There was no trace now of the scene he had just been through. He was cool, masterful, like the seasoned sea-dog who knows that in spite of the ocean's rage and the wind's howl, the wheel will answer his hand and the craft its rudder. "Jim, come over to the Exchange." The crowd followed along. "We have but a minute and I want to have you say you forgive me," he said to me. "I know, Jim, you understand it all, but I must tell you how sorrowful I am that in my madness I should have so forgotten my admiration, respect, and love for you, yes, and my gratitude to you, as to say what I did. I'll do the only thing I can to atone. I will stop this panic and undo as much as possible of my work; and now that I have wrecked Reinhart I am through with this game forever, yes, through forever."

He pressed my hand in his strong, honest one and strode into the Exchange ahead of the crowd. All was chaos, although the trading had toned down to a sullen desperation. So many houses, banks, and trust companies had failed that no man knew whether the member he had traded with early in the day would on the morrow be solvent enough to carry out his trades. The man who had been "long" in the morning, and had sold out before the crash, and who thought he now had no interest in the panic, found himself with his stock again on hand, because of the failure of the one to whom he had sold, and the price cut in two. The man who was "short" and who a few minutes before had been eagerly counting his profits now knew that they had been turned to loss, because the man from whom he had borrowed his short stocks for delivery would be in no condition to repay for them, the next day, when they should be returned to him. The "short" man was himself, therefore, "long" stocks he had bought to cover his "short" sale. In depressing the price he had been working against his own pocket instead of against the bulls he had thought he was opposing. All was confusion and black despair. There is, indeed, no blacker place than the floor of the Stock Exchange after a panic cyclone has swept it, and is yet lingering in its corners, while the survivors of its fury do not know whether or not it will again gather force.



Chapter IX.



The Governing Committee was holding a meeting in its room. Bob rushed in unceremoniously.

"One word, gentlemen," he called. "I have more trades outstanding, both buys and sells, than any other member or house. Before deciding whether to adjourn in an attempt to save 'the Street', I ask your consideration of this proposition: If the Exchange will suspend operations for thirty minutes, and allow me to address the members on the floor, I will agree to buy stocks all around the room, until they have regained at least half their drop—all of it, if possible. I will buy until I have exhausted to the last hundred my fortune of a billion dollars. This should make an adjournment unnecessary. I know that this is a most extraordinary request, but you are confronted with a most extraordinary situation, the most remarkable in the history of the Stock Exchange. Already, if what they say on the floor is correct, over two hundred banks and trust companies throughout the country have gone under, and new failures are being announced every minute. Half the members of this and the Boston and Philadelphia Exchanges are insolvent and have closed their doors, or will close them before three o'clock, and the shrinkage in values so far reported runs over fifteen billions. Unless something is done before the close, there will be a similar panic in every Exchange and Bourse in Europe to-morrow."

The committee instantly voted to lay the proposition before the full board. In another minute the president's gavel sounded, and the floor was still as a tomb. All eyes were fixed on the president. Every man in that great throng knew that upon the announcement they were about to hear, might depend, at least temporarily, the welfare, not only of Wall Street, but of the nation, perhaps even of the civilised world. The president spoke:

"Members of the New York Stock Exchange:

"The Governing Committee instructs me to say that Mr. Robert Brownley has asked that operations be suspended for thirty minutes, in order that he be allowed to address you. Mr. Brownley has agreed, if this request be granted, he will upon resumption of operations purchase a sufficient amount of stock to raise the average price of all active shares at least one-half their total drop—all of it, if possible. He agrees to buy to the limit of his fortune of a billion dollars. I now put Mr. Brownley's request to a vote. All those in favour of granting it will signify the same by saying 'Yes.'"

A mighty roof-lifting "Yes" sounded through the room.

"All those opposed, 'No.'"

There was a deathly hush.

"Mr. Brownley will please speak from this platform, and remember, in thirty minutes to the second, I will sound the gavel for the resumption of business."

Bob Brownley strode to the place just vacated by the president. The crowd was growing larger every minute. The ticker was already hissing a tape biograph of this extraordinary situation in brokerage shops, hotels, and banks throughout the country, and in a few minutes the news of it would be in the capitals of Europe. Never before in history did man have such an audience—the whole civilised world. Already arose from Wall, Broad, and New Streets, which surround the Exchange, the hoarse bellow of the gathering hordes. Before the ticker should announce the resumption of business these would number hundreds of thousands, for the financial district for more than an hour had been a surging mob.

For once at least the much-abused phrase, "He looked the part," could be used in all truthfulness. As Robert Brownley threw back his head and shoulders and faced that crowd of men, some of whom he had hurt, many of whom he had beggared, and all of whom he had tortured, he presented a picture such as a royal lion recently from the jungles and just freed from his cage might have made. Defiance, deference, contempt, and pity all blended in his mien, but over all was an I-am-the-one-you-are-the-many atmosphere of confidence that turned my spinal column into a mercury tube. He began to speak:

"Men of Wall Street:

"You have just witnessed a record-breaking slaughter. I have asked permission to talk to you for the purpose of showing you how any member of a great Stock Exchange may at any time do what I have done to-day. Weigh well what I am about to say to you. During the last quarter of a century there has grown up in this free and fair land of ours a system by which the few take from the many the results of their labours. The men who take have no more license, from God or man, to take, than have those from whom they filch. They are not endowed by God with superior wisdom, nor have they performed for their fellow-men any labour or given to them anything of value that entitles them to what they take. Their only license to plunder is their knowledge of the system of trickery and fraud that they themselves have created. No man can gainsay this, for on every side is the evidence. Men come into Wall Street at sunrise without dollars; before that same sun sets they depart with millions. So all-powerful has grown the system of oppression that single men take in a single lifetime all the savings of a million of their fellows. To-day the people, eighty millions strong, are slaving for the few, and their pay is their board and keep. I saw this robbery. I felt the robbers' scourge. I sought the secret. I found it here, here in this gambling-hell. I found that the stocks we bought and sold were mere gambling chips; that the man who had the biggest stack could beat his opponent off the board; that his opponent was the world, because all men directly or indirectly played the stock-gambling game. To win, it was but necessary to have unlimited chips. If chips were bought and sold, on equal terms, by all, no one could buy more than he could pay for, and the game, although still a gambling one, would be fair. A few master tricksters, dollar magicians, long ago seeing this condition, invented the system by which the people are ruthlessly plundered. The system they invented was simple, so simple that for a quarter of a century it has remained undiscovered by the world at large—and even by you, who profess to be experts. No man thought that a free people who had intended to allow all the equal use of every avenue for the attainment of wealth, and who intended to provide for the safeguarding of wealth after it was secured, could be such dolts as to allow themselves to be robbed of all their accumulated wealth by a device as simple as that by which children play at blindman's buff. The process was no more complex than that employed by the robber of old, who took the pebbles from the beach, marked them money, and with the money bought the labour of his fellows, and by the manipulation of that labour and by turning pebbles into money he took away from the labourer the money which he had paid them for the labour until all in the land were slaves of the moneymaker. These few tricksters said: We will arbitrarily manufacture these chips—stocks. After we have manufactured them, we will sell the world what the world can pay for, and then by the use of the unlimited supply we still have we will win away from the world what it has bought, and repeat the operation, until we have all the wealth, and the people are enslaved. To do this there was one thing besides the manufacturing of the chips—stocks—that was absolutely necessary—a gambling-hell, the working of whose machinery would place a selling value upon such chips; a hell where, after selling the chips, they could be won back. I saw that if these tricksters were to be routed and their 'System' was to be destroyed, it must be through the machinery of this Stock Exchange. I studied the machinery, and presently I marvelled that men could for so long have been asses.

"From the very nature of stock-gambling it is necessary, absolutely necessary, that it be conducted under certain rules, unchangeable, unbreakable rules, to attempt to change or break which would destroy stock-gambling. The foundation rule, the rule absolutely necessary for the existence of stock-gambling is: Any member of the Stock Exchange can buy, or sell, between the opening and the closing of the Exchange as many shares of stock as he cares to. With this rule in force his buying and selling cannot be restricted to the amount he can take and pay for, or deliver and receive pay for, because there is not money enough in the world to pay for what under this same rule can be bought and sold in a single session. This is because there have been arbitrarily created by these few tricksters many times more stocks than there is money in existence. The amount of stock that any man can sell in one session of the Exchange is limited only by the amount that he can offer for sale, and he can offer any amount his tongue can utter; and he is not compelled and cannot be compelled to show his ability to deliver what he has offered for sale until after he has finished selling, which is the following day. You will ask as I did: Can this be possible? You will find the answer I found. It is so, and must continue to be so, or there will be no stock-gambling. Mark me, for this statement is weighted with the greatest import to you all. A member of this Exchange can sell as many shares of stock at one session as he cares to offer. If any attempt is made at the session he sells at to compel him either before or after he offers to sell to show his ability to deliver, away goes the stock-gambling structure, because from the very nature of the whole structure of stock-gambling the same shares are sold and resold many times in each session and the seller cannot know, much less show, that he can deliver until he first adjusts with the buyer and the buyer cannot adjust until after he has become such by buying. If a rule were made compelling a seller to show his responsibility before selling, every member would have every other member at his mercy and there could be no stock-gambling. When I had worked this out, I saw that while the few tricksters of the 'System' had a perfect device for taking from the people their wealth, I had discovered as perfect a means of taking away from the few the wealth they had secured from the many. With this knowledge came a conviction that my way was as honest as the 'System's,' in fact more honest than theirs. They took from the innocent, I took from the guilty what had already been dishonestly secured. I determined to put my discovery into practice.

"I might never have done so but for that Sugar panic in which I was robbed of millions by the 'System' through Barry Conant. In that panic the 'System,' with its unlimited resources, filched from the people by the arbitrary manufacture of stocks, and by their manipulation did to me what I afterward discovered I could do to them, without any resources other than my right to do business on the floor of this Exchange. You saw the outcome, in the second Sugar panic, of my first experiment. In a few minutes I cleared a profit of ten million dollars. I could have made it fifty millions, or one hundred and fifty, but I was not then on familiar terms with my new robber-robbing device, and I had yet a heart. To make this ten millions of money, all that was necessary for me to do was to sell more Sugar than Barry Conant could buy. This was easy, because Barry Conant, not knowing of my newly invented trick, could buy only what he could pay for on the morrow, or, at least, what he believed his clients could pay for; while I, not intending to deliver what I sold—unless by smashing the price to a point where I could compel those who had bought to resell to me at millions less than I sold at—could sell unlimited amounts—literally unlimited amounts. When Barry Conant had bought all that he thought he could pay for, he was obliged to beat a retreat in front of my offerings, and I was able to smash, and smash, until the price was so low that he could not by the use of what he had bought, as collateral, borrow sufficient to pay me for what I had sold him. Then he was compelled to turn about and sell what he had bought from me, and when I had rebought it, for ten millions less than I had sold it for, the trick had been turned. I had sold him 100,000 shares say at 220. He had sold them back to me say at 120, and he stood where he had stood at the beginning. He had none of the 100,000 shares. Both of us stood, so far as stock was concerned, where we had stood at the beginning, but as to profits and losses there was this difference: I had ten millions of dollars profits, while Barry Conant's clients, the 'System,' were ten millions losers—and all by a trick. The trick did not differ in principle from the one in constant practice by the 'System.' When the 'System,' after manufacturing Sugar stock, sell 100,000 shares to the people for $10,000,000, they so manipulate the market by the use of the $10,000,000 that they have taken from the people as to scare them into selling the 100,000 shares back to them for $5,000,000. After they have bought they again manipulate the market until the people buy back for $10,000,000 what they sold for $5,000,000. The 'System' commits no legal crime. I committed no legal crime. I had not even infringed any rule of the Exchange, any more than had the 'System' when they performed their trick. Since my experimental panic I have repeatedly put the trick in operation, and each time I have taken millions, until to-day I have in my control, as absolutely as though I had honestly earned them, as the labourer earns his week's wages, or the farmer the price of his crops, over $1,000,000,000, or sufficient to keep enslaved the rest of their lives a million people.

"What do you intelligent men think of this situation? You know, because you know the stock-gambling game, that the American people, with their boasted brains and courage, come year after year with their bags of gold, the result of their prosperous labours, and dump them, hundreds of millions, into this gambling-inferno of yours. You know that they are fools, these silly millions of people whom you term lambs and suckers. You chuckle as, year after year, having been sent away shorn, they return for new shearing. You marvel that the merchants, manufacturers, miners, lawyers, farmers, who have sufficient intelligence to gather such surplus legitimately, would bring it to our gambling-hell, where upon all sides is plain proof that we who conduct the gambling, and who produce nothing, are obliged to take from those who do produce, hundreds of millions each year for expenses, and hundreds of millions each year for profits—for you know that we have nothing to give them in return for what they bring to us. You know that every dollar of the billions lost in Wall Street means higher prices for steel rails, for lumber and cars, and that this means higher passenger and freight rates to the people. You know that when the manufacturer brings his wealth to Wall Street and is robbed of it, he will add something to the price of boots and shoes, cotton and woollen clothes, and other necessities that he makes and that he sells to the people. You know that when the copper, lead, tin, and iron miners part with their surplus to the 'System,' it means higher prices to the people for their copper pots and gutters, for the water that comes through lead pipes, for their tin dippers and wash boilers, and for their rents, and all those necessities into which machinery, lumber, and other raw and finished material enters. You know that every hundred millions dropped by real producers to the brigands of our world means lower wages or less of the necessities and luxuries for all the people, and especially for the farmer. You know that it is habit with us of Wall Street to gloat over the doctrine of the 'System,' which the people parrot among themselves, the doctrine that the people at large are not affected by our gambling, because they, the people, having no surplus to gamble with, never come into Wall Street. And yet, knowing all this, you never thought, with all your wisdom and cynicism, that right here in this institution, which you own and control, was the open sesame, for each or all of you, to those great chests of gold that your clients, the 'System,' have filled to bursting from the stores of the people. What, I ask, do you wise men think of the situation as you now see it?"

There was an oppressive stillness on the floor. The great crowd, which now contained nearly all the members of the Exchange, listened with bulging eyes and open mouths to the revelations of their fellow member. From time to time, as Bob Brownley poured forth his shot and shell of deadly logic, from the vast mob that now surrounded the Exchange rose a hoarse bellow of impatience, for few in that dense throng outside could understand the silence of the gigantic human crusher, which between the hours of ten and three was never before known to miss a revolution except while its victims' hearts and souls were being removed from its gears and meshes.

Bob Brownley paused and looked down into the faces of the breathless gamblers with a contempt that was superb. He went on:

"Men of Wall Street, it is writ in the books of the ancients that every evil contains within itself a cure or a destroyer. I do not pretend that what I am revealing to you is to you a cure for this hideous evil, but I do say that what I am giving you is a destroyer for it, and that while it will be to the world a cure, it may leave you in a more fiery hell than the one of which you now feel the flames. I do not care if it does. When I am through, any member of the New York Stock Exchange who feels the iron in his soul can get instant revenge and unlimited wealth. You who are turning over in your minds the consideration that your great body can make new rules to render my discovery inoperative, are dealing with a shadow. There is no rule or device that can prevent its working. There are one thousand seats in the New York Stock Exchange. They are worth to-day $95,000 apiece, or $95,000,000 in all. Their value is due to the fact that this Exchange deals in between one and three million shares a day. Were any attempt made to prevent the operation of my invention, transactions would because of such attempt drop to five or ten thousand shares per day, or to such transactions as represent stock that will be actually delivered and actually paid for. To make my invention useless it must be made impossible to buy or sell the same share of stock more than once at one session, and short selling, which is now, as you know, the foundation of the modern stock-gambling structure, must likewise be made impossible. If this could be done the $95,000,000 worth of seats in the Exchange would be worth less than five millions, and, what is of far greater import to all the people, the financial world would be revolutionised. Men of Wall Street, do not fool yourselves. My invention is a sure destroyer of the greatest curse in the world, stock-gambling."

A sullen growl rose from the gamblers. Robert Brownley glared down his defiance.

"Let me show you the impossibility of preventing in the future anyone's doing what I have done to you so many times during the past five years. All the capital required to work my invention is nerve and desperation, or nerve without desperation. It is well known to you that there are at all times Exchange members who will commit any crime, barring perhaps murder, to gain millions. Your members have from time to time shown nerve or desperation enough to embezzle, raise certificates, give bogus checks, counterfeit stocks and bonds, and this for gain of less than millions, and when detection was probable. All these are criminal offences and their detection is sure to bring disgrace and State prison. Yet members of this Exchange desperate enough to take the chance, when confronted with loss of fortune and open bankruptcy, have always been found with nerve enough to attempt the crimes. I repeat that there are at all times Exchange members who will commit any crime, barring perhaps murder, to gain millions. That you may see that my successors will surely come from your midst from time to time during the future existence of the Exchange, I will enumerate the different classes of members who will follow in my footsteps:

"First, the 'In Gold We Trust' schemer who is of the 'System' type, but who is outside the magic circle. A man of this class will reason: I know scores of men, who stand high on 'the Street' and in the social world, who have tens of millions that they have filched by 'System' tricks, if not by legal crimes. If I perform this trick of Brownley's, the trick of selling short until a panic is produced, I shall make millions and none will be the wiser. For all I know, many of the multi-millionaires whom I have seen produce panics and who were applauded by 'the Street' and the press for their ability and daring, and whose standing, business and social, is now the highest, were only doing this same thing, and having been successful, they have never been detected or suspected. But even suppose I fail, which can only be through some extraordinary accident happening while I am engaged in selling, I shall have committed no crime, and, in fact, shall have done no one any great moral wrong, for if I fail to carry out my contract to deliver the stock I have sold in trying to produce a panic, the men to whom I have sold will be no worse off for not receiving what they bought; in fact they will stand just where they stood before I attempted to bring on a panic.

"Second, if an Exchange member for any reason should find himself overboard and should realise that he must publicly become bankrupt and lose all, he surely would be a fool not to attempt to produce a panic, when its production would enable him to recoup his losses and prevent his failure, and when if by accident he should fail in his attempt to produce a panic, the penalty would simply be his bankruptcy, which would have taken place in any event.

"The third class is that large one that always will exist while there is stock-gambling, a class of honest, square-dealing-play-the-game-fair-Exchange men who would take no unfair advantage of their fellow-members until they become awakened to the knowledge that they are about to be ruined by their fellow-members' trickery.

"Next, let us consider further whether it is possible for our Exchange to prevent my device from being worked, now that it is known to all. Suppose the Governing Committee was informed in advance that the attempt to work the trick was to be made. If, at any session, after gong-strike, the Governing Committee, or any Exchange authority, could for any reason compel a member to cease operating, even for the purpose of showing that his transactions were legitimate, the entire structure of stock-gambling would fall. Think it through: Suppose a man like Barry Conant or myself, or any active commission broker, begins the execution of a large order for a client, one, say, who has advance information of a receivership, a fire at a mine, the death of a President, a declaration of war, or any of the hundred and one items of information that must be acted upon instantly, where a delay of a minute would ruin the broker, or his house, or its clients. If the Governing Committee could thus call the broker to account, the professional bear or the schemer, who desired to prevent him from selling, would have but to pass the word to the president of the Exchange that the broker in question was about to work Brownley's discovery and he could be taken from the crowd and before he returned his place could be taken by others and he could be ruined.

"Men of Wall Street, it is impossible to prevent the repetition of those acts by which in five years I have accumulated a billion dollars, impossible so long as a short sale or a repurchase and resale, is allowed. When short sales, and repurchases and resales, are made impossible, stock speculation will be dead. When stock speculation is dead, the people can no longer be robbed by the 'System.' In leaving you, the Exchange, and stock-gambling forever, as I shall when I leave this platform, I will say from the depth of a heart that has been broken, from the profoundity of a soul that has been withered by the 'System's' poison, with a full sense of my responsibility to my fellow-man and to my God, that I advise every one of you to do what I have done and to do it quickly, before the doing of it by others shall have made it impossible, before the doing of it by others shall have blown up the whole stock-gambling structure. In accepting my advice you can quiet your conscience, those of you who have any, with this argument: 'If I start, I am sure of success. If I succeed, no one will be the wiser. The millions I secure I will take from men who took them from others, and who would take mine. The more I and others take, the sooner will come the day when the stock-gambling structure will fall.'

"The day on which the stock-gambling structure falls is the day for which all honest men and women should pray."

Bob Brownley paused and let his eyes sweep his dumfounded audience. There was not a murmur. The crowd was speechless.

Again his eyes swept the room. Then he slowly raised his right hand with fist clenched, as though about to deal a blow.

"Men of Wall Street"—his voice was now deep and solemn—"to show that Robert Brownley knew what was fitting for the last day of his career, he has revealed to you the trick—and more.

"Many of you are desperate. Many of you by to-morrow will be ruined. The time of all times for such to put my trick in practice is now. The victim of victims is ready for the experiment. I am he. I have a billion dollars. With this billion dollars I am able to buy ten million shares of the leading stocks and to pay for them, even though after I have bought they fall a hundred dollars a share. Here is your chance to prevent your ruin, your chance to retrieve your fortune, your chance to secure revenge upon me, the one who has robbed you."

He paused only long enough for his astounding advice to connect with his listener's now keenly sensitive nerve centres; then deep and clear rang out, "Barry Conant." The wiry form of Bob's old antagonist leaped to the rostrum.

"I authorise you to buy any part of ten million shares of the leading stocks at any price up to fifty points above the present market. There is my check-book signed in blank, and I authorise you to use it up to a billion dollars, and I agree to have in bank to-morrow sufficient funds to meet any checks you draw. You have failed to-day for seven millions, and, therefore, cannot trade, but I herewith announce that I will pay all the indebtedness of Barry Conant and his house. Therefore he is now in good standing." Bob had kept his eye on the great clock; as the last word passed his lips, the President's gavel descended.

With a mighty rush the gamblers leaped for the different poles. Barry Conant with lightning rapidity gave his orders to twenty of his assistants, who, when Bob Brownley called for Conant, had gathered around their chief. In less than a minute the dollar-battle of the age was on, a battle such as no man had ever seen before. It required no supernatural wisdom for any man on the floor to see that Bob Brownley's seed had fallen in superheated soil, that his until now secret hellite was about to be tested. It needed no expert in the mystic art of deciphering the wall hieroglyphics of Old Hag Fate to see that the hands on the clock of the "System" were approaching twelve. It needed no ear trained to hear human heart and soul beats to detect the approaching sound of onrushing doom to the stock-gambling structure. The deafening roar of the brokers that had broken the stillness following Robert Brownley's fateful speech had awakened echoes that threatened to shake down the Exchange walls. The surging mob on the outside was roaring like a million hungry lions in an Arbestan run at slaughter time.



Chapter X.



The instant after the gong sounded Bob Brownley was alone on the floor at the foot of the president's desk. His form was swaying like a reed on the edge of the cyclone's path. I jumped to his side. His brother, who had during Bob's harangue been vainly endeavouring to beat his way through the crowd, was there first. "For God's sake, Bob, hear me. Word came from your house half an hour ago of the miracle: Beulah has awakened to her past. Her mind is clear; the nurses are frantic for you to come to her."

He got no further. With a mad bellow and a bound, like a tortured bull that sees the arena walls go down, Bob rushed out through the nearest door, which, I thanked God, was a side one leading to the street where the crowd was thinnest. He cast a wild look around. His eyes lighted on an empty automobile whose chauffeur had deserted to the crowd. It was the work of a second to crank it; of another to jump into the front seat. Quick as had been his movement, I was behind him in the rear seat. With a bound the great machine leaped through the crowd.

"In the name of Christ, Bob, be careful," I yelled, as he hurled the iron monster through the throng, scattering it to the right and left as the mower scatters the sheaves in the wheat fields. Some were crushed beneath its wheels. Bob Brownley heard not their screams, heard not the curses of those who escaped. He was on his feet, his body crouched low over the steering-wheel, which he grasped in his vise-like hands. His hatless head was thrust far out, as though it strove to get to Beulah Sands ahead of his body. His teeth were set, and as I had jumped into the machine I had noted that his eyes were those of a maniac, who saw sanity just ahead if he could but get to it in time. His ears were deaf not only to the howl of the terrified throng and the curses of the teamsters who frantically pulled their horses to the curb, but to my warnings as well. He swung the machine around the corner at New Street and into Wall as though it had been the broadest boulevard in the park. He took Wall Street at a bound I was sure would land us through the fence into Trinity's churchyard. But no. Again he turned the corner, throwing the Juggernaut on its outside wheels from Wall Street into Broadway as the crowds on the sidewalk held their breath in horror. I, too, was on my feet, but crouching as I hung to the sides. Thank God, that usually crowded thoroughfare was free from vehicles as far up as I could see, on beyond the Astor House. What could it mean? Was that divinity which 'tis said protects the drunkard and the idiot about to aid the mad rush of this love-frenzied creature to his long-lost but newly returned dear one? I heard the frantic clang of gongs, and as we shot by the World Building, I saw ahead of us two plunging automobiles filled with men. 'Twas from them the gong clamour sounded. As we drew nearer. I saw that these were the cars of the fire chiefs answering a call. I thanked God again and again as I yelled into Bob's ear, "For Beulah's sake, Bob, don't pass; if you do, we'll run into a blockade. If we keep in the rear they'll clear our way, and we may get to her alive." I do not know whether he heard, but he held the machine in the rear of the other cars and did not try to pass. Away we went on our mad rush through crowded Broadway. At Union Square we lost our way-clearers. As our automobile jumped across Fourteenth Street into Fourth Avenue, Bob must have opened her up to the last notch, for she seemed to leap through the air. We sent two wagons crashing across the sidewalks into the buildings. Cries of rage arose above the din of the machine, and seemed to follow in our wake. Bob was dead to all we passed. His entire being seemed set on what was ahead. I knew he was an expert in the handling of the automobile, for since his misfortune, automobiling with Beulah Sands had been his favourite pastime, but who could expect to carry that plunging, swaying car to Forty-second Street! Bob seemed to be performing the wondrous task. We shot from curb to curb and around and in front of vehicles and foot passengers as though the driver's eyes and hands were inspired.

Across the square at last and on up Fourth Avenue to Twenty-sixth Street. Then a dizzying whirl into Madison. Was he going to keep to it until he got to Forty-second Street and try to make Fifth Avenue along that congested block with its crush of Grand Central passengers and lines upon lines of hacks and teams? No. His head must be clear. Again he threw the great machine around the corner and into Fortieth Street. For a part of the block our wheels rode the sidewalk, and I awaited the crash. It did not come. Surely the new world Bob was speeding to must be a kind one, else why should Hag Fate, who had been at the steer-wheel of his life-car during the last five years, carry him safely through what looked a dozen sure deaths? Without slacking speed a jot we swung around the corner of Fortieth into Fifth Avenue. The road was clear to Forty-second; there a dense jam of cars, teams, and carriages blocked the crossing. Bob must have seen the solid wall for I heard his low muttered curse. Nothing else to indicate that we were blocked with his goal in sight. He never touched the speed controller, but took the two blocks as though shot from a catapult. The two? No, one, and three-quarters of the next, for when within a score of yards of the black wall he jammed down the brakes, and the iron mass ground and shook as though it would rend itself to atoms, but it stopped with its dasher and front wheels wedged in between a car and a dray. It had not stopped when Bob was off and up the avenue like a hound on the end-in-sight trail. I was after him while the astonished bystanders stared in wonder. As we neared Bob's house I could see people on the stoop. I heard Bob's secretary shout, "Thank God, Mr. Brownley, you have come. She is in the office. I found her there, quiet and recovered. She did not ask a question. She said, 'Tell Mr. Brownley when he comes that I should like to see him.' Then she ordered me to get the afternoon paper. I handed it to her an hour ago. I think she believes herself in her old office. I shut off the floor as you instructed. I did not dare go to her for fear she would ask questions. I have"—but Bob was up the stairs two and three steps at a time.

My breath was almost gone and it took me minutes to get to the second floor. My feet touched the top stair, when, O God! that sound! For five long years I had been trying to get it out of my ears, but now more guttural, more agonised than before, it broke upon my tortured senses. I did not need to seek its direction. With a bound I was at the threshold of Beulah Sands-Brownley's office. In that brief time the groans had stilled. For one instant I closed my eyes, for the very atmosphere of that hall moaned and groaned death. I opened them. Yes, I knew it. There at the desk was the beautiful gray-clad figure of five years ago. There the two arms resting on the desk. There the two beautiful hands holding the open paper, but the eyes, those marvellous gray-blue doors to an immortal soul—they were closed forever. The exquisitely beautiful face was cold and white and peaceful. Beulah Sands was dead. The hell-hounds of the "System" had overtaken its maimed and hunted victim; it had added her beautiful heart to the bags and barrels and hogsheads stored away in its big "business-is-business" safe-deposit vaults. My eyes in sick pity sought the form of my old schoolmate, my college chum, my partner, my friend, the man I loved. He was on his knees. His agonised face was turned to his wife. His clasped hands had been raised in an awful, heart-crushing prayer as his Maker touched the bell. Bob Brownley's great brown eyes were closed, his clasped hands had dropped against his wife's head, and in dropping had unloosed the glorious golden-brown waves until in fond abandon they had coiled around his arms and brow as though she for whom he had sacrificed all was shielding his beloved head from the chills and dark mists of the black river that laps the brink of the eternal rest. The "System" had skewered Robert Brownley's heart too. I staggered to his side. As I touched his now fast-icing brow my eyes fell upon the great black headlines spread across the top of the paper that Beulah Sands had been reading when the all-kind God had cut her bonds:

FRIDAY THE THIRTEENTH

And beneath in one column:

TERRIBLE TRAGEDY IN VIRGINIA

THE RICHEST MAN IN THE STATE, THOMAS REINHART, MULTI-MILLIONAIRE, WHILE TEMPORARILY INSANE FROM THE LOSS OF HIS WIFE AND DAUGHTER, AND OF HIS ENORMOUS FORTUNE, WHICH WAS SHATTERED IN TO-DAY'S AWFUL PANIC, CUT HIS THROAT. HIS DEATH WAS INSTANTANEOUS.

In another column:

ROBERT BROWNLEY CREATES THE MOST AWFUL PANIC IN HISTORY, AND SPREADS WRECK AND RUIN THROUGHOUT THE CIVILISED WORLD.

* * * * *

Publisher's Note



The following are fac-similes of a few of the letters received by the author during the serial publication of "Friday, the Thirteenth."



RESIDENCE OF THE PAULIST FATHERS 2158 PINE STREET

San Francisco, CA 21 October 1906

My Dear Mr. Dawson

Kindly allow one of your countless admirers to express his extreme gratification with the announcement that you will add fiction to your distinguished literary achievements. Your gifts as a writer are so wonderful and fascinating that I look forward eagerly to your work in this new field—and I pray God to prosper you in all good.

Sincerely, John Marus Haudly



70 Kirkland St., Cambridge Dec. 26, 1906.

Mr. T. W. Lawson, Boston, Mass.

My Dear Sir: Allow me to congratulate you on your last move and on your story, "Friday, the Thirteenth".

It is the best yet, not merely as a story but as an eye opener. I can begin to see daylight in spots, where it looks like a remedy and a real one. I can't see how you will work it; but I think I do get a hint, and it holds me tightly.

That story ought to be issued in a cheap (25c) edition in paper, and every man in American ought to read it. The third part is yet to come; but, if I mistake not, it will make us all say "Hurrah!" In this form the facts go home. They were too abstract before. Now they live and palpitate. Sincerely yours,

[Illegible: H. W. Majorson]



Dowagiac, Mich., Dec 26, 1906.

Mr. T. Lawson, Boston, Mass.

Dear Sir—

I have just finished reading your second installment of "Friday the 13th." It is one of the greatest stories I ever read. Your previous articles are good, but this is a wonder. I believe you are sincere and cannot help admiring your wonderful courage + grit in going up against big odds. I have no axe to grind with you, simply think that no matter how big you may be you like to know that what you write is appreciated by the majority of good american citizens. So Here's to you Mr Lawson + I back you to eventually win. Smash 'em good.

Yours Truly A. J. Hill.



Grinnell, Iowa, Nov. 3 1906

Thomas Lawson Boston, Mass.

Dear Sir,

What did "Bob" hear when he picked up the receiver. Impossible to wait one month to find out.

Yours truly, A. W. Talbott



103 Stedman Street Brookline Mass.

Dear Mr. Lawson:—

I have hit just read the first instalment of your serial "Friday the 13th."

I was so interested, aroused and stirred, I felt I must express to you some of the appreciation I feel for the work you have done and are doing.

The army of those who suffer is so great the human spoilers so strong; that one's heart goes out in gratitude to a champion who comes around and able willing to do better for the oppressed.

Would it be an intrusion to extend sympathy to one bereft of the beautiful gift of loving companionship? I hope that it is sincerely felt.

Many admire and rejoice in your work—may it go forward bringing the knowledge which is power to ever increasing numbers of American people.

Most Sincerely Marion E. Major

December 14th, 1906



L. GUY DENNETT ATTORNEY AT LAW 48 TREMONT ST., BOSTON TELEPHONE CONNECTION

Nov. 21/06

Thomas W. Lawson Esq. Boston, Mass.

Dear Sir,

I take it for granted that you want to know how the "Public" is going to take to your latest writing "fiction" and how are you to know unless your unknown friends write you?

I have read every thing you have ever written because I believe in you and admire the work you have done and are doing and allow me to say that I finaly believe that you will one day be recognized as one of the greatest story writers of the age. The first section of "Friday the Thirteenth" has convinced me that you will be a sure winner.

Yours very truly, L. Guy Dennett



Angola Tulare Co. Cal. Dec. 29, 1906

W. T. Lawson,

Dear Sir,

I wanted to thank you for the first number of "Friday the 13th", but did not know your address. "Everybody's" contains some letters written you to Boston so hope this may reach its destination.

I live in the wildest of the wooley west + such a god send as in "Everybody's" (sent me by a sister in Oakland Cal.) + containing the first number of your story, words inadequately suffices. Friday the 13th made an impression on me which I could not easily shake off if I would. I was so sorry it ended where it did that I wanted to cry out + could hardly wait for the Jan. number. Yesterday I bought one in Hanford Cal. rode 30 miles north to get it. I live a mile from the recently filled in basin of old Tulare Lake. The snowfall on the mountains argue that our part of the Wild + Wooley may soon be a fishing station instead of an alfalfa ranch.

Perhaps you don't understand how much your story is appreciated.

You are Bob Brownley, I know. Can you really feel what you write as you make us do? Your characters appeal to me so that I live with them, every nerve alert to the straining point (but with pleasure). You are certianly the idol of the American people. I've heard you discussed by rich + poor, monopolist + antimonopolist during the publication of "Frenzied Finance" + the worst a monopolist could say was that you were as bad as the Standard Oil, but wanted to get even. "What is that but a virtue," exclaimed I. "Couldn't he have made millions by staying in, but he recognized his past failings and exposed [them] S.O. to uphold a nation. May honor attend him. Isn't that being a man and a gentleman?"

People read "Frenzied Finance" to a man + would loan the magazine one to another so those who felt the 15c impossible could get the good of your revelations.

I'm glad you believe in sentiment—the heart-lasting sentiment (instead of dollars and desire) which I feared was becoming a thing of the past; There are still splendid men in America. God bless them.

O happy New Year may the weight of your pen sway millions. Amen.

Respectfully, Louise D. Tennent

See 14 Kings

Angola P.O. Ca.



Spokane, Wash., December 28. 1906.

Mr. Thomas W. Lawson, Boston, Mass.

Dear Sir:

I have lived nine years in Anaconda, Montana, and therefore become somewhat familiar with amalgamated copper, etc. I want to say I have followed your writings with lively interest and have sworn by all the statements you have made. It is, therefore, with the greatest regret that I am compelled to state that my faith in you has been shattered.

When you state in your story of "Friday the 13th" that the heroine walked in to an office in New York in the middle of July with a feather turban on her head I simply cannot swallow it. That a lady of refinement and good taste with $30,000 in the bank, and anxious to make a good appearance, should walk into an office in New York with a winter hat taxes my credulity to the breaking point. However, be that as it may, I want to say that you have made a big fight against great odds and that I admire your pluck and genius, and I hope you will keep right on fighting for the right.

By the way, I might as well admit that it was my wife by the way is a superior woman who called my attention to the turban when I was reading your story aloud to her. I am,

Very truly yours, John Ortson



O'Fallon, Ill. Nov. 22nd, 1906

Thos W. Lawson Boston, Mass.

Dear Sir,

It has afforded me great pleasure to just have finished your first installment to "Friday the 13th," as have also your previous writings, from which I learned a great deal,—although from a financial standpoint, following what I thought to be your advice, I am several thousand dollars looser,—and I take this means of contributing my mite of encouragement, firmly believing that your work is doing a great good, and trusting that success on the lines you have mapped out, will be your reward.

Very respectfully, Wm. A. Staney.

(I'm awaiting your next installment)



Dear sir:

I have only had the pleasure of meeting you once—in your private car, with Thayer, when you were returning from your western trip—but I hope you will not consider me presuming if I take a moment of your valuable time to thank you for your masterpiece just begun in Everybody's.

Such magic has not flowed from a pen for many a year.

Yours Truly John O Powers

206 North 34th Street Philadelphia



Des Moines, Iowa, 11/20, 1906

Mr. Thos. Lawson Boston.

Dear Sir,

I like your story "Friday the Thirteenth." For the information and added knowledge your previous writing has given me I thank you.

—"for the crow that is in him and the spurs that are on him to back up the crow with." You certainly are a game and competant old fighter.

Sincerely, with best wishes [Illegible signature: A. S. Goodman]



St. Paul, Minn., November 26, 1906.

Mr. Thomas W. Lawson, Boston, Mass.

Dear Sir:

I wish to congratulate you on the good story you wrote in Everybody's Magazine this month. It is the beat story I ever read and the best I ever saw published in any magazine.

I am well posted on the "Brokers" business and enjoyed your story very much. I hope you will continue to write them. I know they are taken more from real life than immagination. I am sure they will be appreciated as much as "Frenzied Finance". I have taken the liberty to send a good word to Ridgway's.

With best wishes, I remain Tours respectfully,

Western Union Telegraph Co. R.A. Kelly



Los Angeles, Calif., December 11, 1906.

Mr. Thomas W. Lawson, Boston, Mass.

My dear Sir:

It was indeed a pleasure to read your novel in this month's Everybody's. Being an old trader myself, I have appreciated every word of it and look forward for the continuation with much interest.

I just want to say this too—that anyone who says that you cannot write anything else but "Street" gossip had better cover his "shorts".

Wishing you all kinds of success, and with congratulations on your splendid work, I am

Very sincerely,

Nancy Brown 214 Citizens Nat'l Bank Bldg.



Washington, D.C., December 1, 1906.

Thos. W. Lawson, Esq., Boston, Mass.

Dear Sir:

I have just read with very great pleasure and edification the first installment of your excellent story "Friday the 13th". It is so far a masterpiece.

Congratulating you. I remain Very truly, M. H. Ramaze



Cleburn, Texas, Dec 3 1906

Mr. Thos. W. Lawson Boston

Dear Sirs:

I have just your first installment of "Friday 13th." It is OK + if the balance of the story is as good (+ I have no doubts on that score) you are "It" when it comes to writting fiction as well as tricking the Insurance Thief + Standard Oil Grafters.

Wishing you success I am yours very truly S. F. Welch



Rumford Falls, Maine, November 20, 1906.

Mr. Tom Lewson, Boston, Mass.

Dear Sir:

I have read all your writings in Everybody's, including the first installment of your story in the December number, and I must say that I am more than pleased with it. As a writer of fiction you are sure to make another big hit.

Yours truly, W. I. White.



Footnotes



[1] "26 Broadway" is the Wall Street figure of speech for "Standard Oil," which has its home there.

[2] Those who seek to depress the price of a stock are known as bears, and those who oppose them by trying to raise the price are bulls.

THE END