“Jim, the man who first knows when the Senators and Congressmen and members of the Cabinet begin to buy Sugar, is the man who can kill four birds with one stone:  Win back a part of Judge Sands’s stolen fortune; increase his own pile against the first of January, when, if the little Virginian lady is short a few hundred thousand of the necessary amount, he could, if he found a way to induce her to accept it, supply the deficiency; fatten up a good friend’s bank account a million or so, and do a right good turn for the stockholders who are about to be, for the hundredth time, bled out of profit rightfully theirs.”

Bob was afire with enthusiasm, the first I had seen him show for three months.  Seeing that I had followed him without objection so far, he continued: 

“Well, Jim, I know the Washington buying has begun.  All I know I have dug out for myself and am free to use it any way I choose.  I have gone over the deal with Beulah Sands, and we have decided to plunge.  She has a balance of about four hundred thousand dollars, and I’m going to spread it thin.  I am going to buy her 20,000 shares and to take on 10,000 for myself.  If you went in for 20,000 more, it would give me a wide sea to sail in.  I know you never speculate, Jim, for the house, but I thought you might in this case go in personally.”

“Don’t say anything more, Bob,” I replied.  “This time the rule goes by the board.  But I will do better:  I’ll put up a million and you can go as high as 70,000 for me.  That will give you a buying power of 100,000, and I want you to use my last 50,000 shares as a lifter.”

I had never speculated in a share of stock since I entered the firm of Randolph & Randolph, and on general, special, and every other principle was opposed to stock gambling, but I saw how Bob had worked it out, and that to make the deal sure it was necessary for him to have a good reserve buying power to fall back on if, after he got started, the “System” masters, whose game he was butting in to and whose plans he might upset should try to shake down the price to drive him out of their preserves.  Bob knew how I looked at his proposed deal and ordinarily would not have allowed me to have the short end of it, but so changed had he become in his anxiety to make that money for the Virginians that he grabbed at my acceptance.

“Thank you, Jim,” he said fervently, and he continued:  “Of course, I see what’s going through your head, but I’ll accept the favour, for the deal is bound to be successful.  I know your reason for coming in is just to help out, and that you won’t feel badly because your last 50,000 shares will be used more as a guarantee for the deal’s success than for profit.  And Miss Sands could not object to the part you play, as she did at the underwriting, for you will get a big profit anyway.”