As to how Beulah Sands’s code had affected my friend, I was ignorant.  For the first time in our association I was completely in the dark as to what he was doing stockwise.  Up to that Saturday I was the first to whom he would rush for congratulations when he struck it rich over others on the exchange, and he invariably sought me for consolation when the boys “upper-cut him hard,” as he would put it.  Now he never said a word about his trading.  I saw that his account with the house was inactive, that his balance was about the same as before Miss Sands’s advent, and I came to the conclusion that he was resting on his oars and giving his undivided attention to her account and the execution of his commissions.  His handling of the business of the house showed no change.  He still was the best broker on the floor.  However, knowing Bob as I did, I could not get it out of my mind that his brain was running like a mill-race in search of some successful solution to the tremendous problem that must be solved in the next three months.

Shortly after the October 1st statements had been sent out, Bob dropped in on Kate and me one night.  After she had retired and we had lit our cigars in the library he said: 

“Jim, I want some of that old-fashioned advice of yours.  Sugar is selling at 110, and it is worth it; in fact it is cheap.  The stock is well distributed among investors, not much of it floating round ‘the Street.’  A good, big buying movement, well handled, would jump it to 175 and keep it there.  Am I sound?”

I agreed with him.

“All right.  Now what reason is there for a good, big, stiff uplift?  That tariff bill is up at Washington.  If it goes through, Sugar will be cheaper at 175 than at 110.”

Again I agreed.

“‘Standard Oil’ and the Sugar people know whether it is going through, for they control the Senate and the House and can induce the President to be good.  What do you say to that?”

“O.K.,” I answered.

“No question about it, is there?”

“Not the slightest.”

“Right again.  When 26 Broadway[1] gives the secret order to the Washington boss and he passes it out to the grafters, there will be a quiet accumulation of the stock, won’t there?”

“You’ve got that right, Bob.”

“And the man who first knows when Washington begins to take on Sugar is the man who should load up quick and rush it up to a high level.  If he does it quickly, the stockholders, who now have it, will get a juicy slice of the ripening melon, a slice that otherwise would go to those greedy hypocrites at Washington, who are always publicly proclaiming that they are there to serve their fellow countrymen, but who never tire of expressing themselves to their brokers as not being in politics for their health.”

“So far, good reasoning,” I commented.